June 30, 2021 [ IP News-Patent/Utility Model ]
Introduction of Websites for Searching Japanese Court Rulings

We often receive inquiries, from overseas counsels and clients, such as: “Since Japanese court rulings are published in Japanese, there is no means of knowing the details. Is there any means of retrieving them at least in English?”.

In response to such demands, Japanese courts, including the IP High Court, are offering websites that allow you to retrieve Japanese court rulings in English, though they are not exhaustive. We will introduce the address information on such English websites, along with the address information on Japanese websites, as below. We hope that this will be helpful to you.

- Court Rulings Search Site in Japanese:

This search system is for searching information on rulings by the courts of law (this system does not include all of the past rulings, etc.). The rulings, etc. are classified and posted in accordance with the following six types of Collection of court rulings / Preliminary reports.

- Collection of Supreme Court rulings

- Collection of High Court rulings

- Preliminary reports on Inferior Court rulings

- Collection of court rulings in administrative cases

- Collection of court rulings in labor cases

- Collection of court rulings in intellectual property cases

- Supreme Court Rulings Search Site in English:

This is a collection of the Supreme Court rulings that allows you to conduct a search with English keywords, etc.

- Court Ruling Search Site in Japanese:

(Court Rulings Search)

(Grand Panel Cases)

The above “Court Rulings Search” includes almost all of the rulings (in infringement suits and suits against appeal decision) issued since the IP High Court was established on April 1, 2005, and part of the determinations, etc. (some of the Tokyo High Court rulings issued before March 2005 are also included).

As for the outlines and rulings in the grand panel cases at the IP High Court, “Grand Panel Cases” above can be also referred to.

- Court Ruling Search Site in English

(Recent IP Judgments)

(IP Judgments Database)

(Important IP Judgments by Category)

(Grand Panel Cases of the IP High Court)

The English translation of selected IP judgments are available on the webpages described above.

“Recent IP Judgments” page provides the English translation of recently rendered judgment.

“IP Judgment Database” provides the English translation of judgments (full text/extract) and case summaries of the selected IP judgments rendered by the Supreme Court, the IP High Court, the IP divisions of Osaka High Court, Tokyo District Court, and Osaka District Court, and the former IP division of Tokyo High Court (prior to April 1, 2005).

“Important IP Judgment by Category” includes a list of important rulings categorized by themes in each legal jurisdiction.

“Grand Panel Cases of the IP High Court” page provides all the Grand Panel judgments and the summaries in chronological order.

IP High Court posts IP related court rulings as update information in the webpage below.