For lawyers, paralegals, students, and journalists alike, this was never a matter of access—most relevant documents are available—but of discoverability.
Bilingual users often resorted to the tedious workaround of running every search twice, once in each language. But what about those who aren’t bilingual, or who are simply more fluent in one language than the other?
The good news? That hurdle is finally coming down thanks to bilingual AI-powered summaries.
Why Bilingual Legal Research Matters
For those unfamiliar with CanLII, it’s Canada’s free and open legal research platform. It provides access to court decisions, statutes, regulations, and legal commentary from every jurisdiction in the country.
Very soon, you’ll be able to search CanLII in French and retrieve relevant results—even when the underlying decision or statute exists only in English.
At first glance, that might sound like a modest upgrade. But in the context of Canadian legal research, it’s nothing short of transformative.
To understand why, consider the example of the Ontario Court of Appeal (ONCA) – the highest appellate court in the province for most legal matters. CanLII hosts a substantial collection of ONCA rulings, which are frequently referenced both in Ontario and across the country.
However, because those decisions are rendered primarily in English, they’ve historically remained invisible to professionals searching only in French. Unless a ruling is reviewed by the Supreme Court of Canada — whose decisions are systematically published in both languages — it may not surface in search results—no matter how relevant it is.
This is how language has quietly but powerfully limited the reach of key jurisprudence across Canada.
That’s why the arrival of AI-powered bilingual summaries on CanLII is so important and significant.
For the first time, a ruling written in English can be instantly summarized in both languages. As these summaries are being progressively indexed into CanLII’s search engine—a French-language query can surface a case written only in English.
This opens the door for French-speaking legal professionals to search in their own language and still access key documents that were previously not surfaced. It’s a meaningful leap toward more inclusive, more connected legal research across the country.
How Can AI-Powered Summaries Help?
When more people can find, read, and learn from legal decisions across the country, regardless of language, the entire system benefits. Whether you’re a litigator, a student, a journalist, or simply someone trying to understand how the law works, this change brings the full picture closer.
And the ripple effects don’t stop there. This innovation also lifts a burden for institutions that publish legal information. What requires significant resources to produce is now delivered instantly, ensuring that rulings and statutes are accessible across languages from day one.
As a result, courts and judges see their decisions reach farther. When a judgment becomes discoverable in both languages, it is more likely to be read, cited, and built upon—broadening the influence of their jurisprudence.
The Rollout So Far
The first wave of bilingual AI-powered enrichments arrived in March 2025, when CanLII added bilingual summaries for Saskatchewan case law. Just a week later, the rollout expanded to include more than 88,000 decisions from Ontario, making these two provinces the initial testing grounds for this transformative development in legal research.
While these early deployments were limited in scope, they marked the beginning of a broader nationwide expansion that will continue steadily through 2025 and 2026.
Because of the sheer volume of documents, AI enrichments in Quebec, Ontario, and British Columbia will be capped at roughly 30 % of their total case law collections. That level will remain the target for those three large jurisdictions because producing AI-powered summaries for their entire historical corpus would require a prohibitive investment. In these three provinces, documents most likely of setting precedents will be processed in priority. For the rest of Canada, where case law collections are significantly smaller, the scope of documents to be enriched is set at 100%.
Where Can You Find Them on CanLII
Today, most decisions and statutes on CanLII already feature concise, AI-powered summaries that help readers quickly grasp the core issue and reasoning behind the text. What’s changing is that these summaries will now be automatically generated in both English and French, even if the full text of the document is only available in one of those languages.
When you open a document, you’ll find the AI summary in the “AI Analysis” tab, which appears in the interactive sidebar on the left-hand side of the screen (or at the top of the page on mobile). Inside that tab, you’ll find the summary clearly displayed—with a language toggle right above it. This toggle lets you instantly switch the summary between French and English, without affecting the rest of the interface or the main document.
As an illustration, figure 1 below shows a case from the Ontario Court of Appeal where the text of the ruling is in English, but the AI-generated powered summary is being displayed in French.
Figure 1
Looking Ahead
The introduction of AI-powered bilingual summaries marks a turning point in Canadian legal research. By dismantling the invisible barrier of language, CanLII is making legal information more discoverable, inclusive and useful—no matter where you are or which official language you use. And this is only the beginning. As the rollout continues through 2025 and 2026, more jurisdictions will be covered, and more searches—whether in English or French—will yield results originally only accessible in the other language. With every new deployment, we move closer to fulfilling the promise of fast, simple and open access to law.
