Legal teams are facing increasing pressure to deliver more with fewer resources. The adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) tools is becoming essential to meet these demands. Recent studies indicate a significant shift in the legal industry's approach to AI:

• A 2025 survey by Secretariat and ACEDS revealed that 74% of legal professionals expect to use AI-driven tools in their jobs within the next 12 months, highlighting AI's growing role in legal workflows
  
• The American Bar Association's 2024 Legal Technology Survey Report found that AI adoption within the legal profession nearly tripled year over year, from 11% in 2023 to 30% in 2024
  

These statistics underscore the accelerating integration of AI into legal practices, driven by the need for efficiency and the ability to handle complex tasks more effectively.

In this article, we'll explore how legal AI tools are transforming the way in-house legal teams operate in 2025, from automating routine tasks to enhancing decision-making processes.

Before we dive into the tools themselves, it’s important to understand what legal AI actually means and what tasks it’s built to handle.

What are legal AI tools?

Legal AI tools are software designed to process legal documents and data using artificial intelligence, including generative AI tools and AI-powered chatbots. They help legal teams and law firms work faster, reduce manual effort, and automate high-volume legal work.

These tools use natural language processing to understand legal text and machine learning to find patterns. They can identify clauses, flag risks, extract key terms, and search documents quickly.

Common tasks include:

• Reviewing contracts and flagging risky clauses
• Extracting key terms and dates
• Streamlining legal document automation to simplify contracts and routine legal work
• Conducting legal research and accessing case law from integrated legal databases

Also read: Top 5 Free AI Tools for In-House Legal Teams

Also read: The Ultimate Software List for Lawyers in 2025

Benefits of legal AI tools

Speeds up contract approvals

“We had to deal with thousands of contracts with just a few of us on the team. Manually checking each one was just draining. We were always running behind, hardly finding time for the more important, strategic work.”‍

‍~Rishab Bothra
In-House Counsel, Open

Automated workflows help legal teams cut down approval times significantly. Open, a fintech company, faced challenges with lengthy contract approval times, especially during investment rounds. By integrating SpotDraft, they achieved a 90% acceleration in contract approvals.

Also read: Smarter Controls and Easier Approvals on SpotDraft

Catch errors before they become problems

Built-in AI review tools flag missing clauses, typos, and inconsistent language, streamlining the document review process.

Also read: Mastering the Contract Review Process: Essential Steps for Success

Lightens your legal team’s workload

“Prior to onboarding Clickthrough, we had multiple sessions with business teams to amend the agreements. This involved a lot of calls, and discussions and took up a lot of time every week”‍

‍~Ekank Mehra‍
‍In-House Counsel at Headout

By automating routine and repetitive tasks like NDAs and vendor agreements, legal teams free up time to focus on complex matters.

Headout, a travel experiences platform, utilized SpotDraft's Clickthrough feature to automate routine contract processes. This automation resulted in a 60% reduction in the legal team's workload, freeing them to focus on more strategic legal matters.

Keep contract language consistent

When everyone uses the same templates and approval flows, contracts stay clean and compliant, even as they go through multiple stakeholders and revisions.

Scales legal support without growing the team

Legal teams often face more work without more people. With the right tools in place, you can handle increasing volumes without burning out or slowing down.

Centralizes all contracts in one place

‍“With the lack of a centralized repository, the only source of truth was the inboxes of the legal team. It created chaos and also an inability to determine which was the right version of the contract. While looking for a CLM tool, SUN Mobility was clear that they were not looking for a document management system. They wanted CLM that was created from a legal lens, built for storing and retrieving contracts.”‍

‍~Shivam Verma‍
‍Associate Legal Counsel, SUN Mobility

A single contract repository means no more hunting through inboxes or shared drives. Everything is searchable, trackable, and always up to date.

Use contract data to make better decisions

Dashboards and contract analytics give you visibility into risks, timelines, and bottlenecks. That means better reporting to leadership and enabling data-driven decisions.

We’ve covered the core benefits, but how do these tools actually help legal teams support the business? Let’s look at some real use cases that show legal AI tools in action.

Benefits are useful, but seeing how legal teams and law firms apply AI in real business settings shows its real impact on legal services.

Also read: The Current State of AI for Legal: Benefits, Challenges and Top Tools

Business use cases for legal AI tools

Accelerating investment readiness

When legal teams need to move fast during a funding round, automation can make all the difference. One team saw a dramatic cut in contract approval time, which kept the investment process on track and investor-ready documents always within reach.

Shortening partner onboarding cycles

Scaling a partner network puts pressure on legal. With self-serve agreements already in place, legal reduced its involvement in routine tasks and let business teams close partnerships without delays.

Speeding up hiring processes

Legal teams can create self-serve templates for HR agreements like NDAs and offer letters. This enables faster candidate onboarding without waiting for manual legal review, especially during high-growth periods.

Reviewing vendor contracts at scale

Legal teams often deal with a surge in vendor contracts during growth. AI tools flag risks in third-party agreements, supporting regulatory compliance and reducing legal exposure.

Improving audit and compliance response

When finance or compliance teams need contract data, AI-powered repositories let legal teams retrieve information quickly. One company used this to prepare audit documentation in minutes instead of days.

Allowing business teams to generate contracts

Pre-approved templates now enable departments to create contracts without legal reviewing every draft. One legal team set this up across functions while still controlling terms and workflows.

Implementation strategies for legal AI

Start with one clear, simple use case

Begin where the impact is easy to measure. Use AI to review NDAs, triage incoming contracts, or automate routine vendor agreements. This sets a strong foundation before expanding to more complex workflows.

Loop in IT and business teams from day one

AI tools often need integrations and system access. IT helps make that happen. Business teams may also use the platform directly, especially in self-service models. Early involvement from both avoids delays and confusion later.

Also read: CLM integrations for efficient teams - SpotDraft

Fix broken processes before adding tools

AI will not solve poor workflows. Standardize templates. Clean up handoffs. Set clear ownership. Once the basics are in place, automation becomes effective and reliable.

Make training mandatory

Teach your team how the AI assistant works and where it fits into their daily work. Use real examples from your contract types and workflows. Focus on practical adoption, not just technical features.

Define metrics and track progress

Set targets like turnaround time, number of contracts reviewed, or average time saved per task. These metrics help you improve continuously and make a strong case for the tool’s value.

Explain the value to different teams

Legal needs to understand the risk control. Business wants faster turnaround. Leadership cares about cost savings. Adjust your messaging so every team understands what’s in it for them.

Test with a small group, then expand

Use a pilot group to run the first workflows. Gather feedback, improve the setup, and document lessons learned. Once the system works smoothly, roll it out to more users.

Once your tool is in place, tracking the right metrics helps you prove its value and keep improving over time.

What to measure when using legal AI tools

“KPI’s need to be adaptive. They give insights to our board, who are not sitting with us day in and day out, as well as the management team that oversees the business regularly. I’m always looking to finetune the parameters, especially since legal and legal ops wins can be difficult to quantify and separate from another department. For example, I look for legal conferences and other legal-only access points to funnel deals to Papaya and add to our specific KPIs.”‍

‍~Jesimin Berman
Director of Legal Ops & Compliance, Papaya Global

AI tools only make sense when they drive real, measurable impact. Legal teams need clear data to justify the investment and prove value to the business. Here’s what to track:

Time saved on repetitive tasks

Compare how long it takes to draft or review contracts with and without AI. Focus on tasks like redlining, clause checks, or routine template creation.

Also read: Save 15+ Hours per Week Reviewing Contracts

Contracts processed per month

Track how many contracts your team handles now versus before implementation. Increased volume without growing the team shows improved capacity.

Turnaround time for approvals

Measure the time from contract creation to final signature. Faster turnaround supports sales, procurement, and HR without delays.

Compliance and clause consistency

Use deviation reports to show how often standard language is used. Fewer edits and fewer errors indicate better control and lower risk.

Usage of self-serve templates

Monitor how often business teams use pre-approved templates. Higher adoption shows that the tool is working across departments.

Data pulled from analytics dashboards

Most AI tools include built-in reporting. Use that data to track trends, spot slowdowns, and present clear numbers in leadership updates.

Quarterly check-ins on key metrics

Set baseline numbers when you start. Then review them every quarter to track changes and adjust your process where needed.

Also read: Legal AI: SpotDraft's Vision for 2025

Popular legal AI tools in 2025

As legal teams look to do more with less, AI tools are stepping in to automate routine tasks and speed up decision-making. Here are five standout legal AI platforms leading the way in 2025.

#1 Harvey

Harvey is a generative AI platform tailored for legal professionals. It assists with legal research, document drafting, and case analysis, leveraging advanced natural language processing and deep legal knowledge.

Key features:

• Automated legal research across multiple domains with accurate citations
• Drafting and summarizing legal documents, including memos and contracts
• Analyzing complex legal cases and providing insights
  

#2 Hebbia

Hebbia is an AI platform designed to help professionals, including legal teams and law firms, optimize search and automate legal work at scale. It uses advanced machine learning to extract insights from documents and streamline tasks like contract review and due diligence.

Key features:

• Advanced semantic search capabilities across various document types
• Real-time collaboration with AI for document analysis
• Extraction of key terms and clauses from contracts
  

#3 CaseMark

CaseMark offers AI-powered tools that assist legal professionals in summarizing documents, creating timelines, and processing medical records, enhancing efficiency in litigation workflows.

Key features:

• Automated summarization of depositions, trials, and medical records
• Generation of case timelines and exhibit lists
• Seamless integration with legal workflows for streamlined document processing
  

#4 Parley

Parley is an AI-driven drafting tool aimed at streamlining the case-building process for immigration professionals. It automates evidence collection and simplifies the drafting of immigration documents, including reference letters tailored to specific requirements.

Key features:

• Automation of visa application drafting, including reference letters
• Extraction of key details from documents for case assembly
• Support for various visa types with personalized language styles
  

#5 SpotDraft

SpotDraft is a contract lifecycle management platform that utilizes AI for legal document automation, helping law firms and legal teams deliver faster and more accurate legal services. It offers features like automated contract analysis, deviation flagging, and instant contract insights, aiding legal teams in efficient contract management.

Key features:

• AI-driven contract drafting and analysis
• Built-in e-signature capabilities, so no need for external tools
• Unified task center for managing contract deadlines and renewals
• Centralized contract repository with advanced search and metadata tagging
• Contract performance dashboards to track cycle times, bottlenecks, and risk exposure
• Integrates easily with legal departments’ existing systems, ensuring data privacy and compliance

SpotDraft – designed to help legal teams do more, faster

SpotDraft gives legal teams the tools to handle high contract volumes without losing control. It combines speed, structure, and visibility in one platform.

Fast contract drafting with minimal input

Teams can create contracts in minutes using structured templates. Enter key details, and the platform generates the full document using approved language.

AI checks contracts for risks and gaps

The system flags missing clauses, unusual terms, and issues that may violate regulatory compliance standards. Legal teams can focus on issues that need real attention.

Review, redline, and approve in one place

“We are able to draft and redline contracts inside the CLM tool. Therefore, we no longer need to rely exclusively on tools such as MS Word and Google Docs. Now, all stakeholders can view and access just one true version of the contract.”‍

‍~Igor Poroger
Director of Legal  - EMEA

All edits, comments, and approvals happen within the platform. This keeps the process organized and avoids version mix-ups.

#4 Sign and store contracts with full visibility

Contracts are signed and stored in a searchable repository. Legal always knows where everything is and who signed what.

Ready to see legal AI in action?

AI is not replacing legal teams. It’s helping them move faster, stay consistent, and get out from under the pile of routine work. From contract review to compliance tracking, legal AI tools are already part of how in-house teams work in 2025.

The key is to start with one clear use case, pick the right tool, and measure what matters. With the right setup, legal teams can stay focused on what really needs their judgment.

If you're looking for a tool built to support growing in-house legal teams, check out what SpotDraft can do. Book a demo and see how it fits into your workflow.