The ILTA Technology Survey, officially released in September, reveals legal tech trends 2025 and a legal industry at tipping point. While 2024 showed firms cautiously exploring AI, 2025 data shows they’re moving from testing to real deployment. The biggest shift is in generative AI adoption, where larger firms lead exploration but smaller firms are ahead in actual implementation. Cloud migration continues its steady march, with most firms now adopting cloud solutions with every upgrade. However, new challenges emerge around cost concerns and keeping pace with rapid tech advances, while user resistance remains the top barrier to change.
Key findings show AI will reshape legal work in the next 3-5 years, with half of all firms now having dedicated AI task forces. Security concerns center on user behavior and unsecured home networks, while firms increasingly outsource technical functions. The data reveal a two-speed industry where firm size determines both resources and adoption patterns.
AI Adoption: From Caution to Commitment
The transformation in AI adoption between 2024 and 2025 is striking. Last year’s survey showed most firms “still in the investigative phase” of AI adoption. This year tells a different story entirely.
Larger firms are driving AI exploration, but smaller firms are winning the implementation race. While big firms have the resources to test multiple AI tools, smaller firms appear more agile in rolling out full deployments to their staff and lawyers.
The top three AI tools dominating law firm adoption are Microsoft 365 Copilot, CoCounsel Core and Westlaw AI. This represents a shift from 2024 when ChatGPT was the most popular tool. The preference for these enterprise-focused solutions suggests firms are prioritizing security and integration over standalone AI tools.
Most firms remain in testing or pilot phases, taking a measured approach to deployment. However, the direction is clear: AI is moving from experimental to operational across the legal sector.
The establishment of AI task forces by half of all firms signals institutional commitment. This represents a major organizational shift from 2024, when resistance to change was identified as the biggest hurdle to AI adoption.
Gen AI Predicted Usage at Law Firms
Looking ahead 12 months, firms predict three primary use cases for generative AI: summarizing complex documents, legal research, and creating initial drafts. This mirrors the 2024 survey’s findings around legal research and litigation support, but shows expanded scope into document creation.
The VLAIR study results support the predicted use cases from the ILTA survey, but with some important nuances:
- Summarizing Documents – The VLAIR study shows AI outperformed lawyers in document summarization (77.2% AI vs 50.3% lawyer baseline), with all evaluated AI tools performing better than humans in this task. This validates it as a top predicted use case.
- Legal Research – This is where the support is more complex. While ILTA firms predict research as a top use case, the VLAIR study actually challenges this assumption. AI performed poorly in EDGAR research tasks (55.2% vs 70.1% lawyers), and the study notes that “AI still falls short of expectations in complex legal research tasks.”
- Creating Drafts – The VLAIR study doesn’t directly test document drafting, but it does show AI excels in related tasks like data extraction (75.1% vs 71.1%) and document Q&A (94.8% vs 70.1%). These capabilities would support draft creation, though the study also shows AI struggles with more interpretative work like redlining.
The disconnect between firms’ research expectations and VLAIR’s research findings suggests many firms may have unrealistic expectations about AI’s current research capabilities. This means firms should prioritize document summarization (where AI clearly excels) and be more cautious about research applications (where human oversight remains critical).
Cloud Migration: The New Normal
The cloud adoption story continues to evolve from 2024’s “tale of two firm sizes” to a more unified approach in 2025. The survey shows most firms are either already in the cloud or migrating with every software upgrade.
This gradual “upgrade to cloud” strategy has proven popular across firm sizes. Rather than massive migration projects, firms are choosing cloud solutions when replacing existing systems. This approach reduces risk and spreads costs over time.
Infrastructure choices show clear preferences: Dell and HP dominate hardware selections, while Microsoft Azure captures 79% of cloud server deployments. This represents a significant consolidation compared to 2024’s more fragmented landscape.
Document Management Systems
Document Management Systems continue their cloud journey, with iManage and NetDocuments leading cloud-based DMS adoption. The 2024 survey showed 72% of small firms and 54% of large firms using cloud DMS. Current trends suggest these numbers have grown significantly.
Time and Billing
Time and billing systems show the strongest cloud migration pattern, particularly among small to mid-size firms. The 2024 survey predicted this trend, noting that 97% of small firms planning system replacements would choose cloud solutions.
Strategic Shifts in Legal Tech Trends 2025
Law firms are experiencing a fundamental shift in how they view technology’s role. AI is expected to create significant changes in the next 3-5 years, a dramatic increase in confidence from 2024’s cautious outlook.
The technologies generating the most positive response from lawyers in the past 24 months reveal interesting patterns: cloud DMS solutions top the list, followed by Microsoft Teams and Microsoft Copilot. This suggests that workflow integration matters more than cutting-edge features.
Collaboration tools have become essential infrastructure. Email remains the top collaboration tool between lawyers and staff, followed by video conferencing and chat platforms. The 2024 survey noted increasing adoption of unified communications technology, particularly MS Teams, and this trend has clearly accelerated.
Top Legal Tech Challenges in 2025
New challenges are emerging alongside technological progress. The top technology issues facing firms show some concerning trends:
- Acceptance of change remains the primary challenge, unchanged from 2024. The human element continues to be the biggest barrier to technology adoption.
- High technology costs now rank as a more significant concern than in 2024. As firms deploy more sophisticated solutions, budget pressures are mounting.
- Managing expectations has become a critical issue as technology capabilities expand but don’t always meet the hype surrounding them.
- Keeping up with advancements in technology is increasingly difficult, with more firms citing this challenge than last year. The pace of change is outstripping many firms’ ability to evaluate and implement new solutions.
How To Address Legal Tech Challenges Strategically
These challenges form a cycle where addressing one issue often impacts the others, requiring a holistic approach to technology management. Effective change management reduces resistance to necessary investments, realistic expectations prevent costly mistakes, staying current with technology trends helps identify cost-effective solutions, and managing costs ensures sustainable adoption.
- Acceptance of Change remains the foundational challenge, unchanged from previous years, as the primary barrier to technology adoption. Success here requires focusing on training programs and cultural shifts that help staff overcome their natural resistance to new technologies. Without addressing the human element first, even the most advanced tools will fail to deliver their promised benefits.
- Managing Expectations has emerged as a critical issue as AI and other technologies generate significant hype but don’t always meet inflated promises. Firms must set realistic expectations about what technology can and cannot accomplish, communicating effectively about both capabilities and limitations. This prevents disappointment and resistance that can derail future technology initiatives.
- Keeping Up with Advancements presents an increasingly difficult challenge as the pace of technological change accelerates beyond many firms’ ability to evaluate and implement new solutions. This requires investing in continuous learning and evaluation processes to stay informed about emerging technologies without becoming overwhelmed by constant change.
- High Technology Costs have become a more significant concern than in previous years, with budget pressures mounting as firms deploy more sophisticated solutions. Addressing this challenge involves exploring cost-effective alternatives, implementing strategic budget management approaches, and carefully evaluating return on investment for each technology decision.
Firms that address all four areas simultaneously will be better positioned to leverage technology for competitive advantage while maintaining financial stability and staff buy-in.
Workplace Evolution & Remote Device Security
The hybrid work model has settled into predictable patterns. Most lawyers and staff now work 3-4 days per week in the office, with larger firms requiring more in-office time. Some large firms have moved to four days or full-time office requirements, suggesting a partial retreat from pandemic-era remote work policies.
In-Office Hotdesking
Hotdesking adoption remains stable at 20% of firms, unchanged from 2024. This suggests the workspace flexibility trend has plateaued rather than continued expanding.
Working From Home
Remote work brings persistent security challenges. The top concerns are unsecured home WiFi networks and remote device management. These issues were present in 2024 but have become more acute as hybrid work becomes permanent.
Microsoft Intune has emerged as the leading solution for remote device patching and management, reflecting the continued dominance of Microsoft’s ecosystem in legal tech trends 2025.
Legal Tech Trends 2025: Outsourcing & Automation
Law firms are increasingly comfortable outsourcing technical functions that don’t provide a competitive advantage. Security functions, printer management, and network infrastructure are commonly outsourced, allowing firms to focus internal resources on legal work and client service.
Automation adoption follows firm size patterns established in previous surveys. Larger firms lead in automating new business intake, conflict checking, and document assembly. Smaller firms lag in automation adoption, likely due to resource constraints and smaller volumes that make automation less cost-effective.
This automation gap represents both a challenge and an opportunity. Smaller firms may find themselves at a competitive disadvantage if they cannot achieve the efficiency gains larger firms realize through automation.
Solving Persistent Challenges in Security
Security challenges show remarkable consistency with 2024 findings; user behavior remains the top security concern at law firms. Malware and zero-day threats rank second, followed by compliance issues and data loss prevention.
The persistence of user behavior as the primary security challenge highlights a fundamental issue: technology solutions alone cannot address security risks. Human factors continue to dominate the threat landscape.
Security measures have become more sophisticated, with multi-factor authentication, security awareness training, and phishing tests becoming standard practice. However, a concerning gap exists in backup security, with less than 50% of firms implementing MFA on backups. This represents an easily addressed vulnerability that could prevent significant data loss incidents.
Given the critical importance of security awareness training and phishing simulation testing identified in the survey, Intellek offers comprehensive cybersecurity training solutions through our eLearning catalogue and training partnership with KnowBe4. Our programs help law firms address the persistent challenge of user behavior through targeted education and realistic phishing simulations that prepare staff to recognize and respond to real threats. If your firm needs to strengthen its security awareness training program, connect with our team to explore how we can help you build a more security-conscious workforce.
Chatbot Adoption: Gradual Progress
The chatbot landscape shows modest improvement from 2024’s “limited current interest.” Larger firms are increasingly planning chatbot implementations over the next 12 months, primarily using ChatGPT with guardrails and document interrogation tools.
The main applications remain focused on efficiency rather than client service: ChatGPT with security controls for internal use and systems for analyzing documents. This cautious approach reflects ongoing concerns about confidentiality and the complexity of legal matters that made firms hesitant in 2024.
Looking Forward: A Two-Speed Industry
The 2025 survey reveals a legal industry moving at two different speeds. Larger firms have resources to explore and test emerging technologies, but face complexity in implementation. Smaller firms lack exploration resources but prove more agile in deployment once they commit to solutions.
This dynamic creates both opportunities and risks. Smaller firms that successfully implement AI and cloud solutions may achieve competitive advantages despite resource constraints. Larger firms with greater technical resources may find their size and complexity slow their ability to capitalize on new technologies.
The industry appears to be moving beyond the “resistance to change” that dominated 2024 discussions. While user acceptance remains challenging, the establishment of AI task forces and increasing deployment of emerging technologies suggest law firms are developing better change management capabilities.
Cost concerns and the challenge of keeping pace with technological advancement represent new pressures that may reshape how firms approach technology decisions. The days of leisurely evaluation and implementation may be ending as competitive pressures and client expectations drive faster adoption cycles.
The legal industry’s technology journey continues to accelerate, with legal tech trends in 2025 marking a clear shift from exploration to implementation across multiple technology domains. Firms that can successfully navigate this transition while managing costs and user adoption will be best positioned for future success.
An accomplished Chartered Marketer and content creator with over ¼ century of experience in the field. Alongside marketing the award-winning learning solutions from Intellek, Ricci has been writing about tech and innovation for many years – his thought leadership has featured in Forbes, Entrepreneur, ILTA, Atlassian, and AI Journal – as an author, he is a regular contributor to eLearning Industry, Training Journal, and other industry publications. He is co-host of L&D Insights in Intellek’s webinars and Vice Chair of Education at the Chartered Institute of Marketing.
