AI legal research · Aotearoa New Zealand
Every case it cites is a real case.
Legal Beagle searches the New Zealand court record and checks each citation against the actual judgment before it reaches your screen. Built in New Zealand, for New Zealand lawyers.
Jones v Family Court at Whāngārei [2026] NZSC 1
The Supreme Court has warned that citing invented, AI-generated authorities can amount to contempt of court. Checking is no longer optional.
7 days free · card required, not charged until day 8 · then from NZ$49/month · cancel anytime
What you get
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Citations are verified, not hoped for
Every case is matched against the 70,894 real New Zealand judgments and tribunal decisions Legal Beagle holds before you see it. If a citation can’t be verified, it isn’t shown. Each one links straight to the judgment so you can read it yourself.
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It only knows New Zealand law
Built on 3.42 million excerpts from 31,708 New Zealand judgments (1958–2026), 18,313 Employment Relations Authority determinations (2000–2026), 20,873 Immigration and Protection Tribunal decisions (1980–2026) and 176 Waitangi Tribunal reports (1977–2026), plus 295,054 sections of Acts and secondary legislation, each citable to an as-at date. Not a US model guessing at how our courts work — it knows the District Court from the Court of Appeal because it has read both.
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The judgments, not just the answer
When a case matters, download the full judgment, decision or report as a PDF straight from Legal Beagle’s corpus of 31,708 court judgments, 39,186 tribunal decisions and 176 Waitangi Tribunal reports and read the reasoning in full — no separate database, no paywall, nothing to chase up afterwards.
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Fill in the court and Legal Aid forms
Answer plain-English questions and Legal Beagle writes your answers into the original Ministry of Justice form, so what you download is the real form, not a lookalike. More than 170 court, tribunal and Legal Aid forms are covered, from a Family Court affidavit to a Legal Aid tax invoice, as a PDF or a Word file, with Māori names and macrons intact. You can also have it check your wording: it flags spelling and grammar and can suggest a legislation reference, but only from provisions it has actually retrieved, and nothing changes until you accept it. Forms are drafts for you to check before you file or sign.
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Search the way you already search
Narrow by judge (495 identified and profiled), court, court type, city, area of law, or year, then sort by relevance, recency, or how often a case has been cited — the same tick-to-narrow convention as Westlaw or Lexis. Pin the filters you use every day, or save a search as a one-tap preset.
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Works from your desk or your pocket
No app to install. Legal Beagle runs in the browser on your desktop or your phone, so a question that comes up in court or on a call gets answered from wherever you are.
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Priced for a practice, not a partnership
From NZ$49 a month — roughly one billable unit. No procurement process, no annual lock-in, no account manager to get past.
A fast first pass — not a substitute for reading the case. The professional judgement stays yours.
Three steps, about four seconds
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Ask in plain English.
“What’s the current approach to relocation in care of children cases?” No boolean strings.
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It searches the whole record.
Keyword and meaning-based search across the full New Zealand judgment set — not just the cases someone thought to index.
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It checks before it answers.
Each citation is verified against the real judgment. You get the answer, the cases, a link to every one, and the full judgment as a downloadable PDF.
The profession’s own guidance already requires this.
Why it matters
General AI tools invent cases — citations that look right, read right, and don’t exist. The Law Society’s guidance is explicit that lawyers must fact-check AI output and case citations, and that careless use can breach the Conduct and Client Care Rules.
Most lawyers respond by avoiding AI for research entirely, or by using it and then spending the time it was meant to save checking it. Legal Beagle checks first — so the time you save is actually saved, at a fraction of what a Lexis or Westlaw seat costs.
Privacy Act principle 12 — cross-border disclosure. Every buyer asks.
Straight answers on where your data goes
| Who can access it | Only us. Your account and conversation history sit on our own servers; the hosted AI model you pick (such as Anthropic or OpenAI) processes each question to answer it. |
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| Where it is held | Account data is on our own servers. Questions are processed by your chosen AI provider, which can be outside New Zealand (including the United States and other countries). |
| Used for training? | No. We never use your queries to train any model, and we send providers only what is needed to answer. |
| What is retained | Your conversation history, so you can return to it. You can delete it at any time. |
| Where the case law comes from | The public New Zealand court record, published by the Ministry of Justice. No licensed databases, no Law Society material, nothing that can be withdrawn. |
We publish our accuracy testing
Most legal AI tools ask you to take accuracy on faith. Legal Beagle runs a 95-test regression suite against known New Zealand cases — and the report includes the failures, with the reason each one failed.
Ask us for the accuracy report and we’ll send it.
One billable unit a month, at the entry plan.
Three plans. Sign up and start.
| Plan | Monthly | Usage per 5-hour window | For |
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| Starter | NZ$49 | 100,000 tokens | Solo practitioners getting started |
| Pro most used | NZ$99 | 300,000 tokens | Busy practices that need more |
| Enterprise | NZ$399 | 2,000,000 tokens | Firms with heavy usage |
Every plan starts with a 7-day free trial (card required; first charge when the trial ends) · Prices in NZD · token allowance refreshes on a rolling 5-hour window · cancel anytime
Start 7-day free trialQuestions we get asked
How does the 5-hour usage window work?
Each plan includes a token allowance measured over a rolling five-hour window — there is no separate monthly cap. If you reach the limit, the composer pauses and tells you when the window clears; usage older than five hours keeps dropping off, so it refills continuously rather than resetting once a month. Normal research use stays well inside it.
Do I still need Westlaw or Lexis?
If you use their commentary and citators, yes — keep them. Legal Beagle is for the research you’d otherwise do on Google, or not do at all because opening the big database isn’t worth it for a quick question.
How do I know the cases are real?
Every citation is matched against the actual judgment before display, every case links through to the source, and you can download the full judgment as a PDF from the corpus and read it yourself. That is the whole point of the product.
Can Legal Beagle fill in court forms?
Yes. Choose Forms in the app, pick a Ministry of Justice or Legal Aid form and answer the questions. Your answers are written into the original form and you can download it as a PDF or a Word file. Check the finished form before you file or sign it: it is general information, not legal advice. We don’t save what you type into a form. If you use the optional wording check, the text of your longer answers is sent to the AI provider to be proofread, as with any question you ask.
Can I use it for client work?
Yes, subject to the same professional obligations as any research tool. Read the cases before you rely on them, and follow the Law Society’s guidance on disclosure and confidentiality.
Is my client information safe?
Your account and history stay on our own servers and are never used for training. Questions are sent to the AI provider you choose (such as Anthropic or OpenAI) to be answered, and may be processed outside New Zealand. The full detail is in the privacy note.
Who built this?
Mahutonga Media Limited, a New Zealand company. It is made in Aotearoa, by a New Zealander, for New Zealand practice — not a reseller of an overseas tool.
What if it doesn’t work for me?
Cancel any time and you won’t be billed again. Every plan starts with a 7-day free trial — cancel before it ends and you pay nothing.
How does the free trial work?
You get 7 days free on any plan. A card is required to start, but it isn’t charged during the trial. We email you before it ends; unless you cancel, the plan price is charged when the trial ends and then monthly. You can cancel any time under Manage billing.
Try it on a question you’re working on now
Your own matters, your own judgement about whether it earns a place in your practice. If you’d rather see it run first, email us and we’ll show you on one of your files.