This guide explains what a legal tech stack is, outlines its core building blocks, and offers practical advice for thinking about your own legal tech stack.

A “tech stack” is the set of software and/or digital tools an organization uses to run efficiently. Just as marketing teams rely on CRMs and analytics platforms, or finance teams depend on ERP systems, the spotlight is now on legal to build their own legal tech stacks.

For in-house counsel and legal operations teams, this stack provides the foundation for managing contracts, matters, spend and e-billing, workflows, and more. The right tools not only help legal teams scale but also reduce legal friction – the delays and inefficiencies that slow business down.

What is a legal tech stack?

A legal tech stack is the combination of digital tools that in-house legal teams use to manage their work. The Association of Corporate Counsel (ACC) describes these solutions as “enhancing research, improving accuracy, and automating repetitive tasks”.

Traditionally, legal teams worked with emails, spreadsheets, and shared drives. While these generic tools got the job done, they lacked structure, visibility, and scalability. As legal departments take on more work and face growing expectations, purpose-built software and tools for in-house legal operations have become essential.

A well-designed stack brings structure, interoperability, and data-driven insights – making legal not just a support function, but a proactive business enabler.

The core building blocks of a legal tech stack

While every organization’s needs are different, most modern in-house legal stacks include the following components:

1. Contract lifecycle management (CLM)

CLM helps legal teams draft, negotiate, sign, and track contracts with a single secure repository, reducing cycle times and ensuring compliance.

2. Matter management

Matter management centralizes all legal work including history, policy documents and data in one system for visibility and control.

3. Spend management and e-billing

Spend management and e-billing tools digitize invoices, help to control and report on legal spend, and automates workflows for work with outside counsel.

4. Document management

Document management supports the organization and storage of legal documents in a secure, searchable, and centralized system.

5. Legal intake and self-service (legal front door)

Legal intake and self-service, otherwise known as the ‘legal front door’, provides the business with a structured way to raise or submit requests, self-serve with contract automation, and get visibility.

6. Unified legal workspaces or enterprise legal management systems

A unified legal workspace brings multiple capabilities together in one platform including: legal intake and self-service, CLM, matter management, spend management and e-billing, and document management.

But what about AI? What role does AI have in the legal tech stack?

It’s hard to talk about legal tech stacks without mentioning artificial intelligence (AI). For in-house legal teams, AI is not a separate category of legal tech so much as an enabler that sits across the stack.

How AI shows up in legal tools

AI is increasingly being embedded into many of the tools you may already use:

• Contract lifecycle management (CLM): AI can extract key clauses, flag risks, or suggest fallback language as well as support common tasks like contract summaries and extraction of key contract data with less effort from legal.
• Matter management: AI can auto-classify matters, suggest workflows, or predict likely timelines.
• Legal intake: AI-driven triage can help route requests to the right person or suggest self-service options.
• Knowledge management: AI can surface the right template, playbook, or clause when you need it.

The benefits of AI in legal tech

• Efficiency gains: Automating reviews, summaries, and admin tasks.
• Risk reduction: Identifying anomalies or missing clauses in contracts.
• Decision support: Providing data-driven insights for reporting or forecasting.

Tip! When evaluating your legal tech stack, don’t look for “AI” as a standalone purchase. Instead, ask vendors:

• How does AI feature in your product?
• What tasks can it realistically automate or accelerate?
• How does it ensure accuracy, security, and compliance?

AI is not a silver bullet, but when thoughtfully embedded in your legal tech stack, it can make your tools smarter, faster, and more valuable.

Tip! Use this guide to help you prepare for, choose and implement the best AI tools for your in-house legal function.

How legal tech tools work together

The value of a legal tech stack comes not just from the tools themselves but from how they integrate. For example:

• A sales request enters through intake
• It becomes a tracked matter
• A contract is drafted and automated and executed in CLM
• Data from the process is logged as the work is done and becomes available for real-time dashboards and on-demand reporting

When systems are siloed, teams waste time switching between platforms and duplicating work. A consolidated approach, often delivered through a unified legal workspace, provides:

• A single source of truth for legal work
• Consistent data and reporting
• Easier adoption by the business and the legal team

How to think about your own legal tech stack

Building your stack doesn’t mean buying every tool on the market. Instead, focus on:

• Your pain points: Where are things breaking down? Is it contract turnaround? Tracking spend? Intake chaos?
• Business needs: What’s slowing down the wider organization? Where are disconnects with legal causing delays?
• Your current setup: Even if you rely on spreadsheets and email, list out what’s in place today.
• Opportunities for automation and visibility: Identify areas where tech could save time, reduce risk, or improve collaboration.

Think of your stack as evolving over time – start small, add layers as needs grow, and prioritize integration.

Tip: Use this free tech prioritization planner to help map out the pain points experienced by both your legal team and the wider business. You can then begin to identify the priorities for your legal tech stack and take next steps from there.

Common pitfalls to avoid

When building a legal department tech stack, avoid these mistakes:

• Buying tools in isolation without considering integration
• Over-investing too early before the team is ready
• Chasing features over usability, leading to low adoption
• Ignoring change management, which is critical for success

Next steps: Building your legal tech stack

A legal tech stack doesn’t have to be complicated – but it should be intentional.

The right combination of tools helps in-house legal teams reduce friction, scale efficiently, and become trusted business partners. Start by mapping your current tools, identifying gaps, and prioritizing the areas with the most impact. From there, you can build a modern, connected stack that evolves with your organization.