New England Biz Law Update
The legal community is quickly adopting artificial intelligence.
According to The State of AI in Legal, a Litify 2025 report, the adoption rate of AI among the legal community increased to 78% in the past two years.
Over the past six years, factors like the transition to cloud technology, remote operations during the COVID-19 pandemic and the artificial intelligence boom forced the legal industry to pivot or fall behind.
By the numbers
In 2020, 92% of law firms respondents to Aderant’s 2020 Business of Law and Legal Technology Survey indicated they were either fully prepared or somewhat prepared for remote operations at the start of the pandemic.
Meanwhile Zoom’s usage rate by May 2020 skyrocketed to 200 million daily meeting participants, and increased to 300 million by June 2020, according to founder Eric Yuan.
The adoption rate of cloud computing among law firms hovered at 60% in 2021 and increased to 94% by 2024 among firms with over 50 lawyers, according to the 2024 ABA Legal Technology Survey. However, that rate remains low, approximately 65%, among solo practitioners.
AI literacy
The State of AI in Legal Report reveals that legal professionals lean heavily on “freemium” AI tools, those marketed directly to users. ChatGPT (66%), Microsoft CoPilot (42%) and Google Gemini (24%) make up for the top three non-industry-specific tools. Enterprise tools marketed to firm decision-makers — those that force from the top-down change management and wide-spread firm adoption — are likely where the industry will turn next. For 50% of respondents, confidentiality, quality and privacy concerns are the top roadblocks to do so; however, investment in AI tools surpassed that of accounting software and timekeeping/billing software.
“Partners and associates are using the tools at a much faster pace than I’ve ever seen lawyers adopt technology. And the reason is simple. The AI legal tools are so helpful that you cannot ignore them,” said Brian Potts, commercial litigator with Husch Blackwell.
Potts is a co-founder of Arbitrus.ai, a private court system with an AI judge that issues binding dispute resolution decisions to those opting out of the traditional court procedure.
With adoption comes sufficient training and usage policy developments. AI literacy will soon become a baseline for not just attorneys, but support staff as well.
“It’s already an expectation at many law firms,” Potts said. “Associates and staff are expected to learn how to use AI tools because they are so good at streamlining workflows and the failure to use them will lead to much higher costs of legal service for clients.”
The Litify survey identifies that the top reason legal professionals are using AI tools is for assisting with case or legal research (66%), followed by summarizing case histories (39%) and document drafting, review and analysis (36%). Conversely, using AI to reduce cost, optimize caseloads and increase billings were reported at a much lower rate.
To prepare the next generation of professionals, law schools are rapidly adding AI curriculum, policies for classroom use and developing oversight committees.
The University of Chicago Law School announced launching AI modules with the goal of bringing students to baseline literacy level for generative AI in early 2026. This development arrives after the institution added several upper-level AI electives like Advanced Legal Writing in the Age of AI, Regulation of AI: Legal and Constitutional Issues and Generative AI and Legal Practice.
“AI literacy is going to be crucial to the practice of law,” Potts said. “I truly believe that the legal professionals who do not lean into AI will get left behind—and quickly.”
