Public Access to Court Electronic Records (PACER)

Search for a Case

Learn options to find case information.

Search for a Case

Filing Electronically

Find court specific information to help you file a case electronically and developer resources.

Filing Electronically

Manage Your Account

Create a PACER account or log in to manage your account and pay a bill.

Manage Your Account

Move to NextGen CM/ECF

Is your court migrating to NextGen CM/ECF? Follow these steps to prepare in advance.

Move to NextGen CM/ECF

Frequently Asked Questions

What is PACER?

The Public Access to Court Electronic Records (PACER) service provides electronic public access to federal court records. PACER provides the public with instantaneous access to more than 1 billion documents filed at all federal courts.

Registered users can:

The PACER Service Center can assist you at (800) 676-6856 between the hours of 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. CT Monday through Friday or by email at pacer@psc.uscourts.gov.

What if I cannot find the case I am looking for?

If you cannot locate a case when searching a federal court’s case records by case number or party name, try using the PACER Case Locator. This will generate a listing of nationwide court locations and case numbers where a party is involved in federal litigation. If you cannot find the case party through the PACER Case Locator, then contact the federal court where you think the case was filed for assistance. 

How much does it cost to access documents using PACER?

Access to case information costs $0.10 per page. Depending on format, billable pages are calculated in two different ways. For HTML-formatted information, a billable page is calculated using a formula based on the number of bytes extracted (4,320 bytes = 1 billable page). For PDFs, the actual number of pages is counted (1 PDF page = 1 billable page). 

The cost to access a single document is capped at $3.00, the equivalent of 30 pages for documents and case-specific reports like docket report, creditor listing, and claims register. The cap does not apply to name search results, reports that are not case-specific, and transcripts of federal court proceedings.  

NOTE: If you accrue $30 or less of charges in a quarter, fees are waived for that period. 75 percent of PACER users do not pay a fee in a given quarter. 

The $0.10 per-page charge is based on the number of pages that result from each search and accessing each requested report or document online. The charge is not based on printing that search or document. Read some examples of how charges are generated:  

Enter party name "johnson, t" and receive two pages of matches. The charge is $0.20. 

Enter case number 01-10054 and select Docket Report. The docket is 10 pages, so the charge is $1. You may enter a date range to limit the number of pages by displaying entries for the date range rather than all entries in the report. 

Select a link within the docket report to view a document. The PDF document is five pages, so the charge is $0.50. 

This charge applies to the number of pages that results from any search, including a search that yields no matches (a charge of $0.10, one page, for no matches). 

Read the fee schedule for electronic public access services. Find out when PACER is free, tips to limit fees, or options to access records if you cannot afford PACER fees.

Announcements

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