Feature Spotlight: Experience Brief Analysis on Lexis+®

This post was originally published in October 2020 and was updated in April 2023. 

Drag and Drop Your Way to Stronger Legal Strategies 

When Lexis+^® launched, it did so with a host of innovative online legal research tools—the most anticipated of which is Brief Analysis. It delivers powerful legal insight by analyzing legal briefs (yours or your opponent’s) almost automatically. The result is a dashboard-style report from which you’re able to craft stronger legal strategies by pinpointing legal concepts, finding similar briefs, getting research recommendations and more.

This AI-powered legal analysis starts by just dragging and dropping your brief file into the Lexis+ Brief Analysis window. Pretty neat, huh?

See the Brief Analysis Guided Tour

Jumpstart Your Brief Analysis 

So, how exactly does Brief Analysis help?

Brief Analysis extracts legal concepts and citation data from your brief and makes recommendations using similar briefs as models to pull additional language to support your arguments.

Here’s an example: Once you upload your file, the tool’s artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities begin searching the document for key concepts.

These extracted concepts are what can be considered the most important topics to address in your strategy—a significant time save versus a manual process. The power of AI comes into play as it identifies where each concept resides within a document, then mines the massive Lexis+ online law library database to determine what concepts live in similar documents.

Because AI really understands the context of language, it doesn’t merely focus on single words, instead, it incorporates common variations of the words or phrases to ensure you leave no stone unturned.

Identify Weaknesses in an Opposing Argument & Strengthen Your Own

Brief Analysis shows you exactly where to begin your research, thanks to targeted recommendations of relevant cases, practical guidance, or treatises to explore. Read that again—this tool shows you which cases are likely to prove vital to your legal arguments, either fortifying yours or dismantling your opposition’s.

Think about how much time you can save.

The case recommendations you get from Brief Analysis are even more useful because they show you exactly where in your uploaded document those cases apply. The relevant passages are highlighted, and an adjacent column displays the cases, complete with links to get you to full case summaries.

And Brief Analysis helps kick up your writing game by mining the vast Lexis+ legal database to find similar briefs you can use as a framework for your own.

Using a sophisticated algorithm, Lexis+ uses the concepts extracted in your brief and locates other briefs that contain similar topics and subject matter, to build you a firm bedrock on which to build your legal argument.

Finalize Your Legal Research 

And where does all the intelligence in Brief Analysis come from? None other than the venerable Shepard’s® Citations Service.

Find updated citations with newer or stronger authority, double-check thoroughly researched briefs to verify nothing is missed and validate citations in your documents.

Here’s how it works: Once your legal brief is uploaded, Lexis+ goes to work. Using the Cites In Your Document tab, you’re able to see the citations in your specific brief.

More importantly, you’ll see each citation’s Shepard’s Signal™ indicator, which tells you the strength of the law behind each case. The cases with the most negative treatment (and are potentially the most harmful/helpful to your strategy) will be sent to the top, giving you a quick idea on where to start building your argument—and the confidence that you’re on solid legal footing.

Want a closer look? See Brief Analysis in action in this Lexis+ training video.

Brief Analysis helps build stronger arguments in less time. Contact us to see how it can help your firm or try it today. 

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