AI in Law Firms: How Is It Being Used Today?

What Is Artificial Intelligence (AI)?

AI development is all about teaching machines to think and learn, just like humans do. So, instead of just following instructions, AI can understand language, recognize things, make decisions, and even get better at legal practice over time.

In the legal field, generative AI is one of the best tools legal professionals can have. For example, AI tools like Briefpoint automate the preparation of discovery responses and request documents. 

How Is AI Being Used in the Legal Field?

AI offers a multitude of benefits for the legal industry, including the power to automate routine tasks and analyze large volumes of data. Here are some of the legal tasks AI can streamline:

1. Document Review

AI is making document review faster, easier, and less stressful for legal teams. Instead of spending hours combing through piles of paperwork, AI uses natural language processing (NLP) to quickly analyze and sort documents.

It can pull out important details, flag inconsistencies, and even spot risks in contracts—all in a fraction of the time it would take a person.

This is extremely helpful in areas like litigation and due diligence, where there’s a ton of paperwork and tight deadlines. AI doesn’t just save time; it also reduces errors and helps legal professionals focus on more complex, strategic work.

2. Document Automation

Generative AI tools like Briefpoint make document drafting much easier for legal professionals. These tools can quickly create standard legal documents, saving litigators tons of time and effort. This process, known as document automation, takes the repetitive work out of the equation.

Lawyers can focus on more complex, strategic work while leaving routine drafting to AI. For law firms managing tight deadlines and heavy workloads, document automation is quickly becoming an essential part of modern legal practice.

For instance, Briefpoint lets you draft discovery requests and responses within minutes instead of hours. The process is simple:

• Upload your discovery request
• Add objections and responses to your request
• Download your draft in Word and add the finishing touches

Briefpoint takes care of everything in between, such as filling out routine information. It also comes with Bridge, a built-in feature that lets you select interrogatories, send them to your client in plain English, and then plug their responses back into your draft.

3. Litigation Analysis

AI tools are helping lawyers analyze litigation more effectively by using data from past cases. These tools can identify patterns, predict outcomes, and assess the strengths and weaknesses of a case based on available legal context.

They provide valuable insights that help legal professionals make well-informed decisions and craft stronger strategies.

With this kind of analysis, lawyers can better understand how similar cases have been handled, anticipate potential challenges, and give clients more accurate advice. It’s a practical way to save time and improve the quality of legal work, especially for firms handling complex or high-stakes cases.

4. Legal Research

AI is making legal research faster, easier, and much more efficient. Legal research platforms like Casetext and Bloomberg Law are designed to sift through massive legal databases to find the most relevant cases, statutes, and precedents in no time.

Instead of spending hours digging through books or online archives, lawyers can just type in questions in plain language, and the AI delivers accurate results.

What’s more, these tools help uncover hidden connections and make sure no critical details are missed. They’re also constantly updated so that lawyers can stay on top of the latest laws and rulings without extra effort.

5. Contract Analysis

AI tools are changing the way lawyers handle contracts, which helps make the review and analysis process faster and more reliable.

These tools can quickly scan contracts to detect risks, highlight key terms, and check for compliance with regulations. They’re especially handy for large-scale projects like corporate transactions or mergers, where accuracy and speed are critical.

Advanced tools like Kira Systems and LawGeex can even flag problematic clauses and suggest edits to help legal teams make informed decisions without spending hours on manual review. This not only reduces errors but also frees up time for more strategic tasks.

For law firms and corporate legal teams, AI-powered contract analysis tools are becoming essential, allowing them to handle high volumes of contracts efficiently while minimizing risks.

6. Client Services

AI is changing the way law firms connect with clients, making interactions faster, more efficient, and easier to manage.

Chatbots and virtual assistants can handle basic questions, schedule appointments, and even provide updates on case progress, all while being available 24/7. This means clients get the help they need without waiting.

These tools are also great for client intake, helping collect essential client data, automating documentation, and simplifying onboarding. For example, AI can analyze the information provided by clients to identify their legal needs or pair them with the right lawyer.

Routine tasks no longer need to take up valuable time, allowing law firms to focus on building stronger client relationships and delivering better outcomes. Whether answering common questions or guiding clients through their legal journey, AI makes the entire process smoother and more client-friendly.

7. Administrative Tasks

AI is simplifying the behind-the-scenes work that keeps law firms running. Managing schedules, tracking deadlines, and organizing files can take up valuable time, but AI tools handle these tasks seamlessly.

Billing and invoicing are also easier with AI, as it automates time tracking, generates invoices, and keeps billing accurate. For document management, AI helps organize and store files in a way that makes them quick to find when needed.

These tools lighten the load for legal teams and free up time for higher-priority work. Whether keeping calendars in order or making billing a breeze, AI handles the details so firms can operate more efficiently.

Here are some examples of tasks AI can handle for you:

• Keeping calendars and schedules organized
• Sorting and storing legal documents
• Automating invoicing and time tracking
• Monitoring deadlines and reminders
• Managing routine client follow-ups

What Are the Benefits of Using AI in Law Firms?

From case analysis to litigation, AI can augment and improve almost all parts of the legal process. Below are the potential benefits an AI tool can provide for the legal industry:

• Better accuracy: AI minimizes human errors in document analysis and legal research, which allows for more consistent documents and reduces problems arising from inaccuracies.
• Cost reduction: By automating routine tasks, machine learning AI can lower operational costs.
• Mass data capture: AI’s ability to analyze large datasets can uncover trends and patterns, providing valuable insights for case strategy and legal advice in most legal departments. Pairing this feature with generative AI can also help increase the accuracy of legal drafting.
• Improved drafting and workflow efficiency: AI improves legal drafting by identifying inconsistencies, suggesting improvements, and automating repetitive tasks. Combining AI-driven data capture with generative AI tools leads to higher-quality documents and faster turnaround times.
• Better client services: AI-powered tools help make client communication easy, which leads to faster responses and personalized services. Clients benefit from quicker updates, improved case insights, and a more seamless overall experience.

Lawyers vs Artificial Intelligence

AI can handle a lot of tasks that used to take up lawyers’ time, like reviewing documents, analyzing legal data, or even drafting contracts.

But when it comes to things like nuanced judgment, ethical decision-making, and persuasive courtroom arguments, AI doesn’t hold a candle to the skills of a good lawyer.

The strength of AI lies in its ability to process massive amounts of information quickly and accurately, but it can’t think critically or understand the human side of legal work. Lawyers bring empathy, creativity, and strategic thinking to the table—qualities that machines simply can’t replicate.

Instead of viewing AI as a replacement, it’s better to see it as a tool that improves what lawyers can do. By taking care of repetitive or time-consuming tasks, AI frees up lawyers to focus on the big-picture aspects of their work.

In the end, the combination of skilled lawyers and smart AI tools is the real innovation. AI isn’t here to replace lawyers—it’s here to make their jobs easier and more impactful.

What Does AI Integration Look Like for You?

Integrating AI into the legal field isn’t just about adding a new tool—it’s about changing the way work gets done to make things faster, easier, and more efficient.

For law firms, it means less time spent on repetitive tasks and more time to focus on the work that matters most.

Briefpoint makes this process simple by offering AI tools that are easy to use and fit right into your existing workflows. Here’s what AI integration can look like:

• Saving time: Automate tasks like drafting legal briefs, reviewing contracts, or managing client intake so that you can focus on bigger priorities.
• Improving accuracy: Let AI handle the details, reducing errors in research, document analysis, and compliance checks.
• Getting better insights: Use AI to analyze data, uncover patterns, and create stronger case strategies.
• Smoother workflows: AI tools work alongside your existing processes to make everything run more efficiently.
• Helping clients faster: Provide quicker responses and updates, improving the overall client experience.

With tools like Briefpoint, integrating AI doesn’t have to be complicated. It’s about making your workday easier and more productive, so you can focus on delivering great results.

Savings of Implementing Briefpoint Into Your Firm

Discovery responses cost firms $23,240, per year, per attorney. The $23,240 estimate assumes an associate attorney salary of $150,000 (including benefits – or $83 an hour), 20 cases per year/associate, 4 discovery sets per case, 30 questions per set, 3.5 hours spent responding to each set, and 1800 hours of billable hours per year.

Under these assumptions, you save $20,477 using Briefpoint, per year, per attorney.

Test Briefpoint yourself by scheduling a demo here.