Thank you to Westlaw for sponsoring iPhone J.D. this month. There is some good news for iPhone J.D. readers who use Westlaw: the app now works on iPhone. Westlaw has long worked well with the iPad. The iPad was first introduced in the Spring of 2010, and just a few months later, WestlawNext for iPad was introduced. That app was useful when it was introduced, and has improved substantially over the years, adding new features and improving the interface. Last month, just before ABA TECHSHOW, Thomson Reuters updated the Westlaw app so that it now runs on both the iPad and iPhone.
Even though this is a universal app, when run on the iPhone you see something fairly different than what you see on an iPad. On an iPad, the Westlaw app is a full featured research tool, one that you can use to do virtually all of the same type of research that you might to on a computer. Indeed, when I am at my desk, I will often have Word open on my computer as I am drafting a Memorandum but I will use Westlaw on my iPad to do legal research. I like the clean look of the iPad app, and it is nice to be able to lean back in my chair and do research on my iPad.
The iPhone screen is pretty small to do full legal research (although of course you could do it in a pinch). So instead, the iPhone version of the app focuses on just a few things.
Of course, there is a search feature. You can enter a case citation, or search terms, and quickly see results. So if you are talking to another attorney about a reported decision and you want to look at the language of the opinion, you can just take your iPhone from your pocket and quickly pull up the case and then scroll down to the relevant language. Even better, if you want to re-run a search that you previously did on your computer or on the iPad, your most recent searches are listed so that you can just tap to run them again.
Looking at an opinion on the iPhone is different from the iPad. For one thing, the headnotes are not displayed at first, which makes it faster to scroll down to the text of the opinion. But if you want to see the headnotes, you can just tap the "Related Content" link to see them.
If you tap the three dots at the top right corner, you can email an opinion (in MS Word, PDF, Word Perfect or RTF format), or you can print. (A tip for iPhone 6s owners: tap Prepare to Print, then use 3D touch to push down on the preview of the opinion, and you will see a PDF version of the opinion that you can easily email or open in another app.)
If you use the folders feature of Westlaw, you can see all of your folders on the iPhone app, including all of the items you saved there on your computer or iPad, and you can add a case to a folder.
Searching for opinions and statutes is the most useful part of this app for me, but the app also lets you stay up-to-date with Westlaw alerts, docket updates, and gives you the ability to track companies and follow practice area developments.
One feature I would love to see on the iPhone app is a History button so you can quickly pull up the most recent documents that you viewed on an iPad or computer. A West representative told me that the company is considering adding some limited History functionality such as easier access to recent documents in a future update.
Note that if you want more features, you can still just access Westlaw using the Safari browser on an iPhone, which gives you access to most of the full Westlaw features — including history. The interface of Westlaw in Safari is actually pretty good, but for the functions that are available in the iPhone app, you get an even better experience in the native app.
The iPhone version of Westlaw is a well-designed and useful app for lawyers, providing access to sophisticated legal research tools on the device that is always available whenever you reach into your pocket.