AI Legal Tools That Have Changed the Way I Work

In this blog, I share my honest experience as both a law academician and a lawyer, and the AI tools that have genuinely transformed the way I teach, research, write, and practise law. These are not just popular platforms-they are AI legal tools that have become an integral part of my everyday workflow and have helped me become more productive while creating richer learning experiences for my students.

AI Legal Tools That Have Changed the Way I Work

One of the biggest challenges I face as a law professor is keeping students engaged throughout a lecture. With studies suggesting that the average attention span of Gen Z learners is remarkably short (mind you- its 8 seconds), relying solely on conventional teaching methods is no longer enough to create a meaningful learning experience. As educators, we constantly need to rethink how we teach to make our classrooms more interactive, engaging, and effective.

While there are countless AI platforms available today, only a handful have become an indispensable part of my daily workflow. Here are the ones I keep coming back to.

• ChatGPT-My Everyday Legal Assistant

For me, ChatGPT functions like an assistant that is available 24/7. Whether I am preparing lecture plans, simplifying complex legal doctrines for students, brainstorming research ideas, creating classroom activities, it significantly reduces the time spent on repetitive tasks. It can easily explain difficult legal concepts in simple language using Gen Z friendly illustrations. This has been particularly helpful while teaching subjects such as Company Law, Corporate Governance, where students often struggle with abstract legal principles. All you need is to master the prompt writing strategies. However, I never treat ChatGPT as the final authority. Every legal citation, statutory provision, and case law must always be verified before being relied upon.

Best for: Brainstorming, teaching, research, content creation, and everyday productivity.

• Claude-My Research Partner

While ChatGPT is my go-to tool for day-to-day tasks, Claude has become my preferred companion for research and legal writing. Whether I am working on a research paper, preparing a conference presentation, writing a blog, or reviewing an extensive draft, Claude excels at maintaining context across lengthy documents. It is particularly useful for improving the flow of arguments, identifying logical gaps, and enhancing readability without changing the substance of the work. As someone involved in academic writing, I find Claude especially helpful during the editing stage, where clarity and coherence matter just as much as the legal content itself. Also, you might definitely want to explore Claude for Lawyers.

Best for: Research papers, dissertations, reports, blogs, and detailed legal writing.

• Harvey AI- Built Specifically for Lawyers

Unlike general-purpose AI platforms, Harvey AI has been designed exclusively for legal professionals. It supports lawyers with tasks such as legal research, contract drafting, document review, due diligence, litigation support, regulatory compliance, and risk analysis. Its legal-first approach has made it one of the fastest-growing AI platforms among leading international law firms. Although Harvey is primarily targeted at legal practitioners rather than students, it offers an excellent example of how artificial intelligence is reshaping the legal profession. By automating routine legal tasks, it allows lawyers to focus on strategy, advocacy, and client counselling. However, as with every AI tool, professional judgment remains indispensable. AI should assist legal reasoning, not replace it.

Best for: Lawyers, law firms, in-house counsel, and legal professionals.

• NotebookLM- With this, I never have to worry about credible reading materials

NotebookLM has become one of my favourite tools while working on research projects. Unlike most AI platforms that rely on information available online, NotebookLM works exclusively with the documents you upload. Whether it is journal articles, judgments, statutes, committee reports, lecture notes, or chapters of your dissertation, it creates a personalised knowledge base that you can interact with that too in multiple forms such as audio notes, slide decks, flash cards, mind maps etc. I also have the liberty to ask questions such as:

1. How do these two judgments differ?

2. What arguments have I already developed in my literature review?

3. Summarise the recommendations made across these policy reports.

4. Identify recurring themes in these research papers.

For anyone writing a dissertation, thesis, or research article, NotebookLM can save hours of manual reading while keeping your work grounded in your own sources.

Best for: Legal research, dissertations, literature reviews, and academic writing.

• Google AI Studio-Making Legal Learning More Visual

Law has traditionally been taught through lengthy judgments, statutes, and textbooks. While these remain indispensable, visual learning can make complex legal concepts far easier to understand and remember. Google AI Studio has become one of my favourite tools for generating creative ideas and visually engaging content. I use it to create detailed prompts for AI-generated images and videos, develop storyboards for legal explainers, prepare presentation visuals, and create educational illustrations for my lectures. For example, while preparing content on topics such as Union Carbide vs. Union of India, Google AI Studio helps transform simple textual descriptions into cinematic visual concepts that capture students' attention and make learning more interactive. It has also become an invaluable tool for creating educational content for classrooms, social media, conference presentations, and legal awareness initiatives. After all, today's learners often remember what they see just as much as what they read.

Best for: Legal educators, law students, legal content creators, researchers, and anyone looking to communicate legal ideas through engaging visuals.

• Brisk Teaching-My AI Teaching Assistant

As an educator, lesson planning and creating engaging classroom material can be incredibly time-consuming. Brisk Teaching has become one of my favourite AI tools because it is designed specifically for teachers. From generating lesson plans and classroom activities to creating differentiated assignments, quizzes, rubrics, and feedback, Brisk significantly reduces the preparation time while helping me design more interactive learning experiences.

One feature I particularly appreciate is its ability to quickly generate questions and activities from existing material. Whether I am teaching Company Law, Constitutional Law, or Corporate Governance, Brisk helps me transform dense legal content into engaging classroom exercises within minutes. Instead of spending hours preparing teaching resources, I can devote more time to interacting with students and improving the quality of classroom discussions.

Best for: Law professors, educators, trainers, and anyone designing interactive learning experiences.

• Kahoot!-Turning Learning into a Game

One of the biggest challenges in legal education is ensuring that students retain what they learn in class. After all, listening to a lecture is one thing; remembering it is another. This is where Kahoot! has completely transformed my classroom experience. I do look forward to use Kahoot! to conduct live quizzes at the end of a lecture, turning revision into a fun and competitive activity. Students answer questions in real time using their phones, while a live leaderboard keeps the energy high and encourages participation. The result? Students remain attentive throughout the lecture because they know an interactive quiz awaits them at the end. More importantly, these quizzes provide immediate feedback, helping both the students and me identify concepts that require further discussion. For legal subjects that involve numerous case laws, statutory provisions, and legal principles, Kahoot! has proven to be an excellent tool for reinforcing learning and improving long-term retention. Learning law doesn't always have to be serious-it can be engaging too.

Best for: Live classroom quizzes, knowledge retention, revision sessions, and increasing student engagement.

I believe, Artificial Intelligence has not replaced legal thinking-it has enhanced it. For me, these tools have become collaborators rather than substitutes. They help me spend less time on repetitive tasks and more time on what truly matters: teaching, researching, analysing, and mentoring students. The legal profession will always require human judgment, ethical reasoning, and critical thinking. AI cannot replace these qualities. However, lawyers, academicians, and law students who learn to use AI responsibly will undoubtedly be better equipped for the future of the legal profession.

The author is an Assistant Professor (Senior Scale) at School of Law, UPES and the Lead-Outreach for UPES Artififical Intelligence transformation office.