About Search the Law

Search the Law is a legal research platform that searches 15 official UK legal databases simultaneously and maintains a verified citation network of over 192,700+ court judgment relationships. It is built for legal professionals who need fast, reliable access to primary sources — and who need to trust what they find.

Why this exists

Practising lawyers spend significant time on preliminary research — checking whether an authority is still good law, tracing how courts have treated a particular decision, and locating the current leading cases in an area. Much of this work involves cross-referencing across multiple databases that don’t talk to each other.

Search the Law consolidates 15 official sources into a single search, overlays a verified citation treatment network, and produces structured research documents grounded in primary authorities. The aim is to reduce the time between question and answer, while maintaining the standard of accuracy that professional work demands.

The platform also serves advice organisations, in-house legal teams, and self-representing litigants — because access to authoritative legal research shouldn’t depend on the size of your budget.

What makes this different

Citation treatment network. Over 193,200+ citation relationships between court judgments, each classified by how the citing court treated the cited authority — applied, considered, distinguished, doubted, not followed, or overruled. High-stakes adverse treatments are individually verified against source judgments. When you open a case, you can immediately see whether it has been followed, distinguished, or overruled — and by whom.

Verified sources only. Every result comes from an official government database: the National Archives (Find Case Law), legislation.gov.uk, Hansard, GOV.UK, Employment Tribunals, Tax Tribunals, Administrative Appeals, HMRC Manuals, CPS Guidance, ICO Decisions, the Law Commission, the House of Commons Library, and more. No results are AI-generated. There are no hallucinated cases.

Structured research documents. Two AI-assisted research outputs — Research Report and Full Brief — locate relevant authorities, verify every citation against official records, and organise the results into a structured document. Every legal proposition is tied to a specific paragraph of a specific judgment, with a link to the original source.

AI-powered search, not AI-generated results. AI translates your query into formal legal search terms and runs parallel searches across all 15 databases. The underlying results are always real cases, real legislation, and real government documents.

Relevance filtering. A multi-stage filtering system ensures irrelevant results are removed before you see them. If you search for a property dispute, you won't see criminal cases or patent law.

Data sources and licences

Find Case Law (The National Archives) — court judgments from the Supreme Court, Court of Appeal, High Court, and other courts. Open Justice Licence.

legislation.gov.uk — Acts of Parliament and Statutory Instruments. Open Government Licence v3.0.

GOV.UK — official government guidance. Open Government Licence v3.0.

Hansard — parliamentary debates. Open Parliament Licence v3.0.

Employment Tribunals — Employment Tribunal and Employment Appeal Tribunal decisions.

Tax Tribunal — First-tier and Upper Tribunal (Tax Chamber) decisions.

Upper Tribunal (IAC) — Immigration and Asylum Chamber decisions.

UTAAC — Upper Tribunal (Administrative Appeals Chamber) decisions.

HMRC Manuals — HM Revenue & Customs technical guidance.

CPS Guidance — Crown Prosecution Service legal guidance.

ICO Decisions — Information Commissioner enforcement and decision notices.

Law Commission — law reform reports and consultations.

House of Commons Library — research briefings and papers.

Supreme Court Press Summaries — official case summaries from the UKSC.

Competition Tribunal — Competition Appeal Tribunal decisions.

External databases (linked, not searched directly):

Financial Ombudsman — decisions on complaints about financial services.

Scottish Courts — Court of Session, High Court of Justiciary, and Sheriff Court judgments.

SRA Decisions — Solicitors Regulation Authority disciplinary tribunal decisions.

IPO Decisions — Intellectual Property Office trade mark and patent decisions.

Crown copyright material reproduced by permission of The National Archives. The contents of the judgment can be used under the Open Justice – Licence. The case law available through this platform only partially represents the activities of the courts and tribunals of the United Kingdom.

Verification methodology

Citation treatment classifications are produced through a multi-stage verification pipeline combining automated computational analysis with manual review. Each citation relationship is cross-referenced against the original judgment text. Adverse treatment classifications — overruled, not followed, and doubted — undergo additional verification stages, with 100% individually verified against source judgments.

Research documents are produced by proprietary multi-model pipelines incorporating redundant verification, citation grounding against primary sources, and treatment cross-referencing across the citation network. Every legal proposition is tied to a specific paragraph of a specific judgment.

The current citation corpus has been validated to an estimated accuracy of 95–97%. Citation treatment data is subject to ongoing review and reclassification as additional judgment text becomes available. Users should independently verify citation treatments for critical matters by consulting the original judgment text, which is always linked from the platform.

The company

Search the Law is operated by Search The Law Group Ltd (Company No. 17161794), a company incorporated in England and Wales. ICO Registration No. ZC133505. The platform was founded in 2025.

The platform launched in early 2026 and is based in Gloucestershire, England. It is built and maintained by a small team focused on making authoritative legal research accessible, accurate, and affordable.

For enquiries, contact hello@searchthe.law.

Important disclaimer

Search the Law is not a law firm, does not provide legal advice, and is not a substitute for qualified legal representation. The information provided is for research purposes only. Always seek professional legal advice for your specific circumstances. If you cannot afford a solicitor, contact Citizens Advice, a Law Centre, or check your eligibility for legal aid.