Why Westlaw is better than Lexis?

Asked by: Dr. Jailyn Bayer  |  Last update: December 21, 2025
Score: 4.7/5 (23 votes)

Schulke, legal reference librarian for the San Francisco Law Library for over 17 years, provides valuable perspective. He favors Westlaw over other search engines, noting, "It features more California-specific materials. It's also easier for laypeople to use than Lexis."

Why use Westlaw?

When Should You Use Westlaw? Westlaw Campus Research is a comprehensive legal database that provides access to cases, secondary sources, regulations, and statutes at the state and federal levels. Cases - the written opinions of the appellate and lower court judges.

Are Lexis and Westlaw owned by the same company?

RELX, formally known as Reed Elsevier, owns LexisNexis. Thomson Reuters owns Westlaw, a division of The Woodbridge Company, a holding company for the Thomson family.

What is the advantage of LexisNexis?

Lexis® Search Advantage | Litigation

With every search, your results provide a broader, deeper perspective across your entire spectrum of resources, allowing you to work smarter and faster than ever before. Quickly find precedence within your own work product.

Are headnotes in Westlaw and Lexis the same?

Headnotes in Lexis Advance

The Lexis headnote system is not quite as developed as Westlaw's and does not have as detailed an indexing system. Additionally, while Westlaw uses human-indexed terminology, Lexis relies on an algorithm to develop its headnote system.

Westlaw vs. LexisNexis

24 related questions found

Is Lexis or Westlaw more popular?

Comparing the market share of Westlaw and Lexis Advance

Westlaw has a 26.72% market share in the Legal Research category, while Lexis Advance has a 5.77% market share in the same space.

What is the difference between Westlaw and LexisNexis?

LexisNexis provides access to an extensive collection of legal content, case law, statutes, regulations, verdicts, and more. Westlaw also has expansive content but has a narrower focus specifically on US legal research.

Why do lawyers use LexisNexis?

Use LexisNexis ® tools and resources to find and validate case law and statutes, get experienced perspectives in specific legal practice areas, follow leading practitioners through treatises and online communities, track current news, trends and issues, and pull it all together to make smart, strategic decisions.

Why opt out of LexisNexis?

There are multiple reasons why you might want to opt out of LexisNexis. A few common reasons individuals opt out include concerns about data security, identity theft, spam, scammers, and your personal information being accessible online. Does LexisNexis have the right to sell my data? Yes.

Why use Lexis?

Fact: LexisNexis is the industry's premier resource for primary law with the most comprehensive collection of case law, statutes and regulations. * Plus 40K+ news sources, 86B+ Public Records, 700M+ company profiles and documents, and an extensive list of exclusives across all content types.

Who is LexisNexis' biggest competitor?

Top Competitors and Alternatives of LexisNexis

The top three of LexisNexis's competitors in the Legal Vertical Software category are iubenda with 87.85%, American Legal Publishing with 3.22%, Time Matters with 0.97% market share.

What law firms does Amazon use?

Amazon's Project Kuiper, a low-orbit satellite network designed to increase internet access and challenge Elon Musk's Starlink service, has hired a half-dozen lawyers this year from Big Law firms such as Cooley, Davis Wright Tremaine, McDermott Will & Emery, Paul Hastings, and Wiley Rein.

Do lawyers use Westlaw?

Westlaw is an online legal research service and proprietary database for lawyers and legal professionals available in over 60 countries.

Are Westlaw citations correct?

One mistake students and attorneys alike make is assuming that research systems like Westlaw and Lexis Advance provide properly Bluebooked citations. This is usually incorrect, but the citations these services produce look pretty good.

Does Westlaw show criminal cases?

Westlaw includes an extensive collection of criminal law materials, including primary law, secondary sources, dockets, jury instructions, transcripts of notable trials, sentencing guidelines, and appellate briefs. In each category listed below, a few key databases are highlighted.

Does the government use LexisNexis?

Safeguard citizens and reduce financial losses with LexisNexis® Accurint® for Government, a point-of-need investigative solution that enables government agencies to locate people, detect fraud, uncover assets, verify identity, perform due diligence and visualize complex relationships.

Can I pull my own LexisNexis?

You may order information on yourself by filling out a request, which must include proper identification.

Why do companies use LexisNexis?

LexisNexis helps uncover the information that commercial organizations, government agencies and nonprofits need to get a complete picture of individuals, businesses and assets with industry-leading data and analytic solutions. We offer innovative analytic solutions to serve a wide range of industries.

Does Canada use LexisNexis?

At LexisNexis Canada, we're dedicated to our customers, to innovation and to the rule of law. We're committed to delivering information and workflow solutions to Canadian legal professionals to make their work lives easier.

Which legal database is best?

What are the best legal research software that you can leverage for your practice?
  • LexisNexis. LexisNexis, a digital disruptor in the legal industry, has revolutionized how lawyers conduct research and extract relevant information for various cases. ...
  • Bloomberg Law. ...
  • Westlaw. ...
  • Fastcase. ...
  • FindLaw. ...
  • Justia.

How to do legal research without Westlaw or Lexis?

5 Useful Online Legal Research Tools Not Made By Westlaw or...
  1. Ravel // ravellaw.com.
  2. Picture It Settled // pictureitsettled.com.
  3. Google Scholar // scholar.google.com/ and Google Patents // patents.google.com/

What do lawyers use LexisNexis for?

Compared to other case law research sites (whether they're free or paid), LexisNexis simply boasts more federal case law, state case law, and state trial court orders, making it the premier case law tool for ensuring you have the most up-to-date primary sources of law at your fingertips.

Who owns Westlaw?

West (also known by its original name, West Publishing) is a business owned by Thomson Reuters that publishes legal, business, and regulatory information in print, and on electronic services such as Westlaw.

What is comparable to LexisNexis?

Competitors and Alternatives to LexisNexis Risk Solutions
  • Experian (41st Parameter)
  • TransUnion.
  • Whitepages.
  • Accertify.
  • Kount.
  • Sift.
  • BioCatch.
  • Idology.