How to Find Court Records Online: PACER, State, and Fees

To find court records online, start by identifying whether the case is federal or state, then search the matching system: PACER at pacer.uscourts.gov covers every federal district, bankruptcy, and appellate court, while each state runs its own judiciary portal for state and local cases. Both let you search by party name, case number, or filing date once you register or open the public search page. Free alternatives exist for federal filings and published opinions, and some records simply won’t appear online no matter where you look.

Figure Out Which Court Has the Case

A case only exists in the records of the court where it was filed, so the first step is narrowing that down. The U.S. system splits into federal and state branches, each with several levels.

  • Municipal and local courts handle city ordinance violations, traffic tickets, and petty misdemeanors. Some states call them magistrate or justice courts.
  • State trial courts, known as circuit, superior, or district courts depending on the state, handle most civil lawsuits, felony and misdemeanor criminal cases, family law matters, and probate.
  • State appellate courts review trial court decisions. Their records are mainly briefs, oral argument recordings, and written opinions.
  • Federal district courts handle cases involving federal law, constitutional questions, and disputes between citizens of different states where the amount in controversy exceeds $75,000.
  • The 13 U.S. Courts of Appeals review federal district court decisions and are accessible through the same PACER system.

If you’re unsure which system to search, think about what the case involved. A state drug charge, a divorce, a landlord-tenant dispute, or a personal injury lawsuit almost certainly went through state court. Tax fraud brought by a U.S. Attorney, patent disputes, and immigration cases are federal. When in doubt, search both.

What You Need Before You Search

The more identifying detail you bring, the faster the search goes. A case number points to exactly one proceeding and is the fastest way in. Without it, you’ll search by name.

  • Full names of the parties. Spelling matters, though some databases use phonetic matching that catches common variations.
  • Approximate dates. Knowing roughly when a case was filed or active filters out unrelated results, especially for common names.
  • Case type: civil, criminal, family, bankruptcy, or probate. Many portals let you narrow by category.
  • Court location, meaning the county or federal district where the case was filed. Even within a state you often need to search a specific county.

Some state databases also allow searches by attorney name or bar number, useful when you know who represented a party but not the case details. Searching by judge name is less commonly supported.

Searching Federal Court Records on PACER

The Public Access to Court Electronic Records system, known as PACER, is the official portal for federal court records. It covers every federal district court, bankruptcy court, and appellate court, with access to more than one billion filed documents.1Public Access to Court Electronic Records | PACER: Federal Court Records. Public Access to Court Electronic Records You need a free account to use it. Registration at pacer.uscourts.gov takes a few minutes.

Once you’re registered, you can search a specific court’s database by party name, case number, or filing date. If you don’t know which federal court handled the case, the PACER Case Locator searches a nationwide index across all federal courts at once.2Public Access to Court Electronic Records | PACER: Federal Court Records. Find a Case It will tell you which court has the file, and you can then pull up the full docket and individual documents from that court’s system.

PACER charges $0.10 per page for accessing documents and case information, capped at $3.00 for any single document. Even a 200-page filing costs no more than $3.00 to download. If your total charges for a quarter stay at $30 or less, the fees are waived entirely, and the courts report that about 75 percent of PACER users pay nothing in a given quarter.1Public Access to Court Electronic Records | PACER: Federal Court Records. Public Access to Court Electronic Records

Free Alternatives to PACER

A few free tools cover much of the same ground. The RECAP Archive, run by the nonprofit Free Law Project, collects federal court documents that PACER users have previously downloaded and makes them freely searchable at CourtListener.com. The archive contains tens of millions of documents, including every free opinion available in PACER. The RECAP browser extension also checks whether a document you’re about to buy on PACER is already available for free in the archive.

For appellate opinions specifically, Google Scholar provides free full-text access to opinions from U.S. federal district, appellate, tax, and bankruptcy courts, as well as state appellate and supreme court opinions.3Library of Congress. Google Scholar – How To Find Free Case Law Online Choose the “Case law” option on Google Scholar’s homepage, then use the “Select courts” filter to narrow by jurisdiction. This works well for finding published judicial opinions but won’t give you docket entries, motions, or other case filings the way PACER does.

Searching State and Local Court Records

Most state court systems now offer some form of online case search, though quality and depth vary. Some states run statewide portals covering every county from one interface. Others require you to visit each county court’s website and search separately. A few still have limited or no online access for certain case types.

To find your state’s system, search “[state name] court records online” or go to the state judiciary’s official website. The National Center for State Courts at ncsc.org maintains links to state court websites. Once you find the right portal, the process mirrors PACER: enter party names, case numbers, or date ranges, and the system returns matching cases with docket information.

One common limit: many state portals show only case summaries, docket entries, and sometimes party names, not the actual filed documents. You’ll see that a motion was filed on a certain date but won’t be able to read it. Getting the full document often requires an in-person visit or a formal records request. Some states charge per-document fees for online access; others provide basic case information free and charge only for downloads.

When You Won’t Find the Record Online

Some records simply aren’t in any public database. Juvenile proceedings, adoption cases, matters involving trade secrets, and cases under protective orders are routinely kept from public view. Family court filings often contain financial and child-related details that courts shield. Grand jury proceedings are secret by rule.

If your search turns up nothing, the difference between sealed and expunged matters. A sealed record still exists but requires a court order to view; law enforcement and certain criminal justice agencies may still access it under specific circumstances. Expungement is more drastic: the record is deleted entirely and no longer legally exists. If a case has been expunged, no search method will produce it.

Age of the case matters too. Courts that adopted electronic filing relatively recently may have older cases stored only on paper in archive rooms, retrievable through a formal request and extra processing time. Some states also restrict remote access to sensitive case categories such as criminal and family law matters, so the electronic record is viewable only on a courthouse public terminal, not from home.4Judicial Branch of California. Who? Where? How? Viewing a Courts Electronic Case Records Physical trial exhibits are generally viewable only in person at the clerk’s office where the case was heard.

What It Costs and When Fees Get Waived

Federal court fees are standardized across districts:

State fees vary widely. Standard photocopy fees at state courthouses generally run between $0.25 and $1.00 per page. Certified copies, which carry an official court seal and are often required for legal filings, run from a few dollars to $25 or more per document depending on whether the fee is per page or flat. Some online portals charge per-document download fees as well. Call the clerk’s office before a trip to confirm current fees and payment methods.

If you can’t afford the fees, waivers exist. In federal court, 28 U.S.C. ยง 1915 allows courts to authorize proceedings without prepayment for anyone who files an affidavit showing inability to pay, known as proceeding “in forma pauperis.”6Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 28 USC 1915 – Proceedings in Forma Pauperis Most state courts have their own waiver processes, usually requiring proof that your income falls below a threshold tied to the federal poverty level. File the waiver application at the same time as your initial request to avoid delays.

Practical Tips for a Faster Search

Start online even if you expect to end up at the courthouse. An initial search can confirm the case number, exact court, and what documents are in the file, which makes an in-person visit far more productive. Clerks are much more helpful when you show up with a case number rather than a vague description.

Try name variations. Court databases handle misspellings and name changes inconsistently. If your target has gone by multiple names, a hyphenated surname, or a name with common alternate spellings, run separate searches for each. Some systems use phonetic matching, but don’t count on it.

Check both the trial court and any appellate court that reviewed the case. Appellate opinions are often free on Google Scholar and summarize the key facts and lower court rulings, which can help you pinpoint exactly what to request from the trial file.

For older cases that predate electronic filing, expect paper or microfilm. The clerk’s office can tell you whether records from a specific period are electronic or require a manual archive search, which takes longer and sometimes carries a search fee.