Emerging Legal Technology: How Clio Is Shaping the Future of Law

What is emerging legal technology—and why it matters now

Emerging legal technology refers to new tools (e.g., AI, automation, and legal analytics) that enhance how legal professionals manage, analyze, and deliver legal services. These technologies solve many of the challenges lawyers face today: time-consuming administrative work, rising client expectations, increasing competition, and growing pressure to produce faster, higher-quality outcomes.

But technology adoption in law isn’t happening in a vacuum. It’s being partly driven by clients themselves, who are increasingly open to—and even expect—law firms to use AI in their workflows. Lawyers are embracing these tools not just for the efficiencies they bring, but to meet these evolving client expectations. Recent research from Clio shows that 70% of clients are neutral or prefer that their lawyer use AI, with strong support across generations: 81% of Gen Z, 75% of Millennials, 68% of Gen X, and 59% of Boomers.

This client demand is matched by rapid adoption within the profession itself. According to the 2025 Legal Trends Report, 78% of lawyers now use AI tools, higher than other professions measured by McKinsey’s The State of AI survey. This widespread adoption reflects the broader reality that AI is no longer a novelty. For modern legal practice, it’s a necessity. 

Clio anticipated this shift early, embedding AI directly into its practice management workflows, and continues to lead the charge as the legal industry evolves. 

Benefits of emerging legal technology 

As legal work becomes more complex and client expectations continue to rise, firms are increasingly turning to emerging legal technology to keep pace. These tools aren’t just modern conveniences, they deliver clear, measurable improvements in efficiency, client service, and lawyer well-being. Critically, they do so for firms of every size. 

Increased efficiency and productivity

Emerging legal technology automates time-consuming administrative tasks like document creation, reviewing documents, and calendar management. This automation frees lawyers to focus on substantive legal work that requires expertise and judgment.

Efficiency gains manifest differently across firm sizes:

• Solo practitioners can offload tedious business and client development tasks and focus more on serving those actual clients.
  
• Small firms can replace disjointed tools and collaborate more effectively through a unified system.
  
• Mid-sized firms can scale their operations efficiently, improving visibility and reducing risk by improving insight into employee work product.
  

Across the board, firms are able to handle more matters, streamline workflows, and reduce operational bottlenecks. 

Increased productivity is also paired with improved accuracy when using emerging legal technology. The 2025 Legal Trends Report found that lawyers using AI tools to complete tasks were 129% more accurate than those using traditional software. Lawyers using AI reported seeing a reduction in tedious work (62%), increased accuracy in their work (58%), and feeling empowered to handle complex work (53%).

Enhanced client service

Clients today expect responsiveness, transparency, and modern communication. Legal technology delivers on these expectations through features like automated client updates, secure online portals, streamlined intake processes, and faster turnaround times. When clients can track matter status in real time or receive proactive updates, satisfaction increases, and so does trust. Growing law firms recognize this shift in client expectations and are 58% more likely to consider client experience when purchasing new technology. 

Improved lawyer well-being

Importantly, emerging legal technology addresses one of the profession’s most persistent challenges: burnout. By reducing cognitive load and eliminating repetitive work, it helps lawyers better manage their workload and reclaim meaningful time in their day.

The 2025 Legal Trends Report found that legal technology can reduce overall cognitive load, across emotional strain, memory demand, active focus, and visual effort, by up to 25%. This reduction translates into measurable improvements in productivity, stress levels, and overall quality of life.

How Clio’s Intelligent Legal Work Platform is redefining the industry 

Building on years of innovation and deep industry expertise, Clio has taken another major leap forward with the launch of its Intelligent Legal Work Platform, a connected ecosystem that brings together the business and practice of law, all powered by embedded AI.

Designed for firms of every size, Clio’s platform empowers lawyers to do their best work, streamline operations, and deliver greater value to clients. From solo practitioners to small and mid-sized firms to large enterprises, the Intelligent Legal Work Platform makes advanced AI accessible to all. The platform combines the context of your practice and your matters with AI, enabling it to understand your work and deliver relevant results you can trust.

Clio is uniquely positioned to bring this vision to life. After years of securely managing legal workflows for hundreds of thousands of legal professionals, Clio has expert insight into how lawyers actually work. This experience forms the foundation for building AI systems that are not only powerful, but also ethical and trustworthy.

This experience is now combined with a vast, constantly-updated legal library spanning over a billion documents of case law, statutes and regulations, treatises, court docket entries, procedural court rules, and more.

The result is a shift from a traditional system of record (where software simply stores information) to a system of action that actively helps lawyers advance their work.

From a “system of record” to a “system of action”

Traditional legal software has operated as a “system of record”, essentially a digital filing cabinet that stores information but requires lawyers to do all the thinking and acting. Clio’s Intelligent Legal Work Platform represents a shift to a “system of action,” where technology doesn’t just store data but actively helps advance your work.

Here’s what this shift means in practice:

• Before (system of record): Software stored data, tracked tasks, and organized documents. The lawyer still had to initiate every next step.
• After (system of action): The platform identifies the next step, drafts the first version of suggested documents, surfaces key insights, and moves work forward. This, in turn, reduces the number of items to memorize, clicks, and manual tasks required.

This transition transforms legal software from a passive tool into an active partner in your practice—one that anticipates needs, suggests actions, and handles routine tasks so you can focus on the work that requires your expertise.

Built for firms of every size 

Clio’s Intelligent Legal Work Platform is more than just a collection of tools, it’s a unified, AI-powered operating system designed for the modern legal practice. Built to support firms at every stage of growth, the platform adapts to different team structures and practice models, while giving every lawyer access to a powerful, reliable, and secure AI foundation.

For solo practitioners and small to mid-sized firms

The Intelligent Legal Work Platform comes together through four core products:

• Clio Manage, which streamlines day-to-day practice management and automates routine workflows.
• Clio Grow, which handles intake and client relationship management.
• Clio Draft, which accelerates document creation through AI-assisted drafting and assembly.
• Clio Work, an intelligent legal workspace that delivers critical research, insights, and analysis.

Together, they form a seamlessly connected system that supports the full lifecycle of legal work, from the first client inquiry through matter completion. 

AI embedded at every stage

Building on this foundation, three specialized AI capabilities—Manage AI, Draft AI, and Grow AI (coming soon)—extend the platform’s intelligence across every part of a law firm:

• Manage AI runs the operational side of the firm, turning routine tasks into completed work with accuracy and speed. Court documents become calendar events, matter activity becomes high-quality client updates, and time and expense entries become payment-ready bills.
• Draft AI powers document production at scale, generating accurate first drafts, creating templates and questionnaires for crucial, missing data, and assembling complete document sets in minutes.
• Grow AI drives client development, accelerating intake and conversion so no opportunity is missed. All lead information is captured upfront, instantly screened for suitability, and outstanding items are followed up automatically.

Each of these AI-driven capabilities connects the business and practice of law in a meaningful way, helping firms work smarter, scale faster, and deliver better client service.

For large law firms and enterprises

For enterprise firms with more complex needs, Clio for Enterprise delivers best-in-class solutions built specifically for scale, complexity, and security. From legal AI to adaptive case management, each solution is designed to help large law firms and corporate legal departments operate efficiently and confidently while maintaining the governance and oversight they require.

For more than a decade, Clio has been redefining what accessible innovation looks like in the legal industry. The Intelligent Legal Work Platform highlights its continued role as a leader in making state-of-the-art tools accessible to firms of all sizes.

The future of law is intelligent, connected, and built for you

The rapid rise of AI and emerging legal technology is reshaping the legal profession at large. Yet the most successful law firms are those using these tools to improve their work, not replace it. Clio’s Intelligent Legal Work Platform reflects this shift. By moving from a system of record into a system of action, Clio empowers lawyers to work more efficiently and provide better client service by automating time-consuming administrative tasks that slow them down and relieving their cognitive load.

As competition grows and client expectations continue to rise, lawyers need technology that understands their workflows, anticipates next steps, and drives matters forward. Clio’s specialized AI capabilities—Manage AI, Draft AI, and Grow AI—are built to do just that. With these tools, lawyers at firms of every size can work smarter and deliver stronger outcomes for their clients.

The future of legal practice isn’t just about adopting legal technology, it’s about adopting the right legal technology. With Clio’s Intelligent Legal Work Platform, firms can confidently embrace innovation and stay ahead in a fast-moving and ever-evolving industry.

What is emerging legal technology?

Emerging legal technology refers to new tools—like AI, automation, and legal analytics—that enhance how legal professionals manage, analyze, and deliver legal services.

What is the Intelligent Legal Work Platform?

Clio’s Intelligent Legal Work Platform is a new class of legal software that works alongside lawyers to move matters forward, not just manage them. It connects the business and practice sides of legal services through purpose-built AI so solos and small firms get simplicity and access with Clio Work, while BigLaw firms gain scale, configurability, and advanced capabilities. The result is a shift from disjointed workflows to outcomes that expand access to justice, improve lawyer well-being, and deliver better results for clients.

Benefits of Clio’s Intelligent Legal Work Platform

Clio’s Intelligent Legal Work Platform helps firms reduce administrative work, recover more billable time, improve accuracy, and create a more connected, efficient client experience.

How does Clio ensure AI security and ethical use?

Clio ensures AI security and ethical use through strict data privacy measures, transparent model training practices, and responsible AI design aligned with global legal industry regulatory standards.