RECAP PACER Federal Docket Search API

A CourtListener API token is required (since Oct 27, 2026). CourtListener now needs an API token for every search. Get a free one at https://www.courtlistener.com/profile/api/ and put it in the courtListenerToken input. Without it the run stops before anything is searched, with the message missing_courtlistener_token; no result rows are charged (only the platform actor-start fee).

Use it for litigation due diligence on companies — output is federal docket search results (case, court, dates, cause, nature of suit).

Search federal PACER dockets via the RECAP archive — case records without PACER fees.

Factual public records — assembled for research and monitoring.

📊 Sample Output

caseName	court	courtId	dateFiled	docketNumber	assignedTo
Mantle I.P. Holdings, Ltd v. Cardsmiths, LLC	District Court, S.D. New York	nysd	2026-09-24	1:26-cv-08344
CB Brand Strategies, LLC v. Flexiquor LLC	District Court, D. Colorado	cod	2026-09-24	1:26-cv-04738	Cyrus Y. Chung
WASHINGTON v. TREEHOUSE FOODS, INC.	District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania	paed	2026-09-24	5:26-cv-07384	John Michael Gallagher
Gerome v. WEIS MARKETS	District Court, E.D. Pennsylvania	paed	2026-09-24	2:26-cv-07381	Timothy J. Savage
Fricker's Progressive Concepts, Inc. v. Frikn Coffee LLC	District Court, N.D. Oklahoma	oknd	2026-09-24	4:26-cv-00590	Mark T. Steele
isoValent LLC v. Reddit, Inc.	District Court, D. Delaware	ded	2026-09-23	1:26-cv-01189	Unassigned Judge

Real rows from run WIS8rvubE8vMDBZUP on build 0.0.15 (2026-09-25), unedited apart from masked emails/phones and shortened long text; fields the source does not publish are empty.

⚙️ Sample inputs

This is the Store example input — the same input Apify's automated check runs — so it is proven to return rows on the current build. Paste it into the input form, or send it through the API, CLI or a schedule:

{
  "searchType": "r",
  "query": "patent infringement"
}

🔧 Input reference

Field	Type	Default	What it does
searchType	string	"r"	o = court opinions, r = RECAP dockets.
query	string	"patent infringement"	Full-text search (case name, party, topic).
court	string		Court ID filter (e.g. 'scotus', 'cafc').
dateFiledAfter	string		Only records filed on/after this date (YYYY-MM-DD).
maxResults	integer	200	Maximum records to return.
courtListenerToken	string (secret)	—	Required free CourtListener token (5 req/min, 50/hour, 125/day on the default tier); without it the run stops before any search or charge. A rejected token stops the run before anything is searched or charged beyond the start fee.

🧾 JSON sample record

One real record from run WIS8rvubE8vMDBZUP (emails/phones masked, long text shortened):

{
  "caseName": "Mantle I.P. Holdings, Ltd v. Cardsmiths, LLC",
  "court": "District Court, S.D. New York",
  "courtId": "nysd",
  "dateFiled": "2026-09-24",
  "docketNumber": "1:26-cv-08344",
  "citation": null,
  "citeCount": null,
  "judge": null,
  "attorney": [],
  "url": null,
  "snippet": null,
  "dateTerminated": null,
  "cause": "",
  "chapter": null,
  "assignedTo": null,
  "natureOfSuit": ""
}

💰 Pricing

Event	Price (USD)	When it is charged
Docket entry (apify-default-dataset-item)	$0.1	Charged per result row returned.

Pay-per-event: you pay only for what the run delivers. A run that delivers nothing bills no result events (only the actor-start event, when the actor defines one). Example: a run that delivers 100 results costs 100 × $0.1 = $10.00 plus the start fee.

🔗 Related Actors

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• Regulatory Enforcement to Markdown — RAG Data API
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27 more in this family on the NexGenData Store page.

⏰ Run this as a monitoring subscription (recommended)

Regulatory data is monitoring data. Schedule a weekly sweep (0 8 * * 1) and catch new dockets as they post — an always-on official-records feed.

📊 What you get

Clean JSON, one record per docket (full output has 16 fields):

• caseName — Case Name
• court — Court
• courtId — Court Id
• dateFiled — Date Filed
• docketNumber — Docket Number
• citation — Citation
• citeCount — Cite Count
• judge — Judge
• attorney — Attorney
• url — Url

Pricing: $0.100 per docket (Pay-Per-Event) — about 10 dockets per $1.

🤖 Use with AI agents

Point Claude, the OpenAI Agents SDK, an n8n flow or any MCP-aware client at it and pull official records on demand.

Agentic payments (x402): Supports agentic payment via x402 — agents can call this actor with USDC, no API key required.

🔗 Related regulatory actors

US courts & enforcement records — one schema:

Court Opinions · Federal Dockets · Federal Judges · Oral Arguments · Court Records Search · Federal Litigation Records · FTC Enforcement · Enforcement RAG

Agent front door — Legal MCP: Legal MCP

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Public official records and enforcement data, assembled for research and monitoring.

🤖 Use with AI agents

Structured JSON for LLM and agent pipelines (Claude, the OpenAI Agents SDK, n8n or any MCP-aware client).

Sample agent prompt:

Search federal court dockets for antitrust cases in the Northern District of California (I have a CourtListener API token).