Reviews of Fastcase

"A Comprehensive, Affordable, and Powerful Legal Research Tool "

Overall: My overall experience with Fastcase has been nothing short of absolutely fantastic!

Pros: Fastcase provides attorneys and other legal professionals with a comprehensive, affordable, and powerful tool for conducting legal research. Don't make the mistake of thinking the traditional "big players" of the legal research realm are better because they cost more. They're bloated with stuff you don't really need and lock you in with long-term, auto-renewing contracts. Fastcase is a very transparent company that will not disappoint.

Cons: My only con about Fastcase is that statute and rule annotations are not yet available in my State.

"A free tool to try for Washington Lawyers"

Pros: I like that it is an additional service provided to members of the Washington State Bar Association, but it doesn't appear to be any more comprehensive or useful than Casemaker. The search window is very helpful if you don't know boolean commands.

Cons: It just isn't that powerful. I haven't had it find anything useful that I didn't already first find more quickly with another tool.

"Easily Integrated Legal Research App"

Overall: Excellent.

Pros: Very convenient. Fastcase is provided through our Bar Association and we access it through our Bar log in. The natural language search is intuitive and easy to use. The database also has administrative decisions which is something that we need for our research. I always use Fastcase 7 because I find that the UI is much more modern and user friendly.

Cons: Sometimes decisions that should be available are not in the database.

"Great Legal Research Tool"

Pros: This is a very user-friendly legal research database. It has the standard citation, keyword and wildcard search capabilities. You can search across jurisdiction and there is a large library of secondary sources (available at additional cost, of course). It's part of my bar membership, and is a welcome benefit as an alternative to some of the larger, more expensive options.

Cons: Sometimes the searches don't return the number of results it should. It just seems to go a bit wonky, but adding / removing a term definitely helps.

"Sufficient for case searches"

Overall: Basic state searches are free through my bar discount. I can get a national subscription far cheaper than other search engines. For the price point, it does great.

Pros: It offers basic search tools and does a great job of highlighting bad cases. It is easy to navigate. You can also set up specific alerts to receive email notifications of when a case is cited.

Cons: It doesn't have all of the bells and whistles of other legal search engines, but it gets the job done.

"Simple and Effective"

Overall: I access Fastcase through a subscription with my state Bar. At first, I had a difficult time using Fastcase because I learned how to use LexisNexis and Westlaw. Fastcase is pretty basic, so I had to unlearn the labyrinth of options and features that Westlaw and LexisNexis have. After getting over a rather stumped learning curve and using Fastcase for about 20 minutes, it has been easy to use. It's easy to access, easy to use, and the viewing and print options are easy. The updating functionality is less sophisticated than the competitors, but it serves my purposes. I'm not building multi-state or complicated arguments, and my focus on North Carolina statutes and case law. Fastlaw is not a Cadillac program, but I don't need a Cadillac. It's basic and dependable and it gives me the information I need quickly without trying to sell me a bunch of add-ons.

Pros: Straightforward user interface and search function. With other products, I feel like basic information about how to search gets lost in bright colors and hidden behind other features being pushed. The Fastcase I use is just a search engine, plain and simple. It provides relevant results and a few features for authority checking. My FAVORITE feature links case law to statutory research. This streamlines a lot of my research since I typically enter my search from the statute, then update through case law research.

Cons: It is barebones, so the functions of other major law research companies (like Westlaw or LexisNexis) are lacking. But Westlaw and LexisNexis are also expensive, and I don't use those added features from the big companies enough to justify those costs. This isn't something I dislike, so much as it is something that makes Fastcase more attractive. It fits a practice that doesn't rely on intensive research.

"Good alternative to the pricey options"

Overall: Fastcase gives my small firm access to all cases and statutes (more than we really need) at an excellent value. As a small business owner, it is critical to keep my monthly overhead low, and this product delivers. They do continue to improve, adding new features and upgrades, to keep their product relevant and at the leading edge of technology.

Pros: I like that Fastcase makes it very easy to locate, read, quote with citation, and save research. It allows you to search for cases by name/citation, and has annotated statutes, which is really useful. It is less robust than the pricier options available, but the value for this product is excellent as it has keyword(Boolean), natural language and citation look up options. In family law, going to the annotated statutes is a great jumping off point to find the cases that address your client's specific issues. You can save your research by downloading, emailing or printing very easily.

Cons: It is less robust than some other products, but for primary source research (case law and statutes) it is really great and covers all state and federal courts.

"How I Learned to Love Fastcase"

Overall: My overall experience is I have found Fastcase to be a reliable and up to date legal research tool.

Pros: I have used Fastcase for years for my legal practice and subscribed to recent upgrades for case notifications. The comprehensive national research base separates the software from much more expensive commercial sites with no $ signs popping up for case research.

Cons: My first impression of the updated format for research was too complicated and difficult. With a little trial and error, I am now navigating Fastcase with ease.

"Excellent reach tool"

Pros: This tool is the best computer research tool that I have use over many years. There are so many features and I am a senior lawyer so it is difficult for me to do more than basic non complex research. Younger lawyers more adept at using computers would find fastcase a pleasure to use, however for me sometimes it is a hurdle. I do however frequently recommend this to attorney who have used the more well know and longer stand research companies

Cons: The difficulty for me to learn all of its attributes.

"Value proposition"

Pros: I am a California lawyer. Fastcase is a free member benefit after becoming a member of the California Lawyers Association. So for less than $10 per month, I have a subscription giving me full access to all of Fastcase (this includes CA cases and all states and Federal law as well.) There is no better value - this saves me over I have found.

Cons: Like any new software, there is a learning curve. So prepare to be patient when starting.

"Terrific enhancements"

Overall: I use the software to do research for my divorce litigation cases.

Pros: I have been using this software for several years. Especially in the past year, the enhancements made to Fastcase have been astounding. It is now much more powerful than previously, and much more intuitive.

Cons: The feature "more like this" I find very helpful, but it doesn't exist on Fastcase. You find a phrase or sentence that is on point, and you press a button "more like this," and the application takes you to cases which express the same point. Very powerful, and would be helpful to have on Fastcase.

"Extremely valuable resource"

Pros: This software is extremely affordable compared to Lexis and Westlaw. While those sites may offer access to more databases, I don't need access to those databases. Fastcase has access to all relevant legal databases including nationwide court cases and statutes.

Cons: Logging in takes me three steps, because I access it from another site, but otherwise, no gripes.

"Good Legal Research Software"

Overall: Overall, Fastcase has been beneficial in my law practice as a research tool.

Pros: The software is easy to use and can be personalized based on jurisdiction, if needed.

Cons: I have noticed that after having selected my jurisdiction when searching, it sometimes allows caselaw and research from other jurisdictions to be included. I'm not sure why this happens but it doesn't minimize the overall usefulness of the software.