The legal profession is embracing AI faster than many expected. According to Thomson Reuters, over 60% of law firms now use AI tools in some capacity. Here's how legal professionals are putting AI to work.
Legal Research
- Westlaw AI — Thomson Reuters' AI-powered legal research assistant searches case law, statutes, and secondary sources with natural language queries.
- Lexis+ AI — LexisNexis's conversational AI for legal research. Provides cited answers grounded in authoritative legal content.
- Perplexity AI (Free) — Not law-specific, but excellent for quick legal research questions with cited sources.
Contract Review & Drafting
- Spellbook — AI contract drafting assistant that works inside Microsoft Word. Suggests clauses, identifies risks, and reviews agreements.
- Claude (Free) — Upload contracts for analysis. Claude's 200K context window can process lengthy agreements and identify key terms, risks, and unusual clauses.
- Ironclad — AI-powered contract lifecycle management for teams. Automates workflows from drafting to signing.
Try our Contract Review prompt for a structured approach to AI-assisted contract analysis.
Document Analysis & Due Diligence
- Kira Systems — AI that extracts key information from contracts and documents during M&A due diligence.
- ChatGPT (Free) — Upload legal documents for summarization, comparison, and analysis. Useful for first-pass review.
Important Caveats
AI in legal practice comes with critical responsibilities:
- Always verify AI output — AI can hallucinate case citations. The famous Mata v. Avianca case showed lawyers being sanctioned for citing AI-generated fake cases.
- Client confidentiality — Never input confidential client information into public AI tools. Use enterprise versions with data protection guarantees.
- Ethical obligations — Check your jurisdiction's rules on AI use in legal practice. Many bar associations have issued AI guidance.
AI is a powerful assistant for legal professionals, but it requires careful oversight. Explore our Finance & Legal prompts for structured templates.