Am I hallucinating or is eDiscovery more complicated than ever? The 2026 State of the Industry Report is out! Here’s how to get it!

If I am hallucinating, I’m not alone – over 700 of you did so with the help of AI in 2025! It’s no wonder that Merriam-Webster’s word of the year is “slop”. 🤪 Is that causing investors to slow down investing in AI technology? Uh, no. 😉 For example, OpenAI is an “Emerging Leader” in AI (according to Gartner) and is getting billions of dollars in investments – which means, of course, they’re doomed. 🤣 As usual, generative AI is doing some amazing things – helping rescue a sex-trafficking victim, providing real-time translation of 42 languages, even helping a woman get pregnant after 19 years (don’t go there!) – and amazingly bad things – infect machines and pilfer data, create fake expense reports and automate an “unprecedented” cybercrime spree. In other words, it’s the same as it ever was! 🤣

In the meantime, modern data types are continuing to shake up eDiscovery. The battle over hyperlinked files now seems to follow a pattern of argue, argue…compromise! 😉 AI-generated content is becoming a more common form of ESI in discovery – so, of course, the AI companies are using search terms to respond to discovery requests! 🤯

How much is the landscape changing for eDiscovery? That’s what we’re here to find out in the sixth annual State of the Industry Report at eDiscovery Today! Will genAI be transformative in 2026 (or is it already?), what are we using it for and on how many actual cases? Where does that leave predictive coding? Is discovery of mobile devices and collaboration apps commonplace now? What is impacting eDiscovery business? 🤔 Should hyperlinked files be discoverable? What’s the trend of 2026 & what challenge are we still not talking about enough? And will the answer to either of those questions ever change? 🤫

eDiscovery Today launched its sixth annual State of the Industry Report Survey on December 4th, which consisted of twelve questions and concluded it on January 13th. And 559 of you responded – another new record! Oops, (we) did it again! Here are some of the highlights from your responses:

• The breakdown of respondents was Software or Service Provider (37.4%), Law Firm (30.1%), Consultancy (12.3%), Corporation (11.8%), Government Entity (5.9%) and Other (2.5%). Close to five out of six respondents (82.8%) were from the US.
• The number of respondents for Law Firms, Providers, Consultancies, Corporations and Government Entities have enabled me to once again break out the responses among those five demographics, so you can see each segment’s responses.
• More than a third of respondents (37.4%) expect generative AI & LLM technology to have a transformative effect for eDiscovery – this year! Nearly a quarter (23.3%) thinks it already has had a transformative effect!
• Also, generative AI & LLM technology is once again being applied to seven (almost eight) different eDiscovery use cases by more than 30% of respondents! Though only 17.7% of respondents are using it in all or most of their cases.
• 34.4% of respondents use predictive coding in all or most of their cases, but 26.9% of respondents use it in very few or none of their cases. Is that good news or bad news (or both) for predictive coding advocates? Find out in the report!
• 38.0% of respondents discover mobile devices in all/most of their cases, while 20.6% of respondents do in very few/none of their cases. For collaboration apps, it’s 42.5% and 15.2% respectively. What’s holding mobile devices back? Find out in the report!
• More than a third of respondents (33.8%) expect increased pricing pressure and a push toward price commoditization for AI to be the biggest business-related trend in eDiscovery this year! Good news for customers? Or wishful thinking? 🤔
• Increased Use of AI Technology, Including Generative AI (48.1%) was the clear choice for the biggest eDiscovery related trend for 2026, with another AI-related category (Discovery of AI-Generated Content) second at 22.0%! AI is king! 👑
• And 22.2% once again identified Lack of eDiscovery Competence within Legal as the eDiscovery challenge not being talked about enough, with Evidence Authentication Issues Due to the Rise of Deepfakes a surprising second with 15.0%. Will we ever stop talking about not talking about Lack of eDiscovery Competence? 🤣

As always, there’s a second component to the State of the Industry report. I also reached out to several industry thought leaders with questions about each of these survey areas and I have also included their observations* to add some additional perspective on these notable topics and trends as we head into 2026. Hopefully, this provides a unique perspective from the industry as a whole and from the thought leader community!

So, how do you get the 56-page(!) 2026 State of the Industry report? If you are currently an email follower of the blog, or if you completed the survey, you will be receiving a link to the report in the next two or three days. If you’re not currently an email follower of the blog, you can get a FREE copy of the report (and any report eDiscovery Today publishes) simply by following the blog via email. To follow eDiscovery Today, enter your email address at the top of the right sidebar where it says “Follow Blog via Email” to receive the report as well as emails with links to new posts. It’s that easy!

Thanks to Mary Mack, Holley Robinson and the EDRM team for your support and sponsorship to promote the 2026 State of the Industry Report! Join Mary and me as we discuss the report next Tuesday, February 10th at 1pm! Register here!

So, what do you think? Are you surprised by any of the survey results above? Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

*Observations expressed in this report by thought leaders are their own and do not represent views of their employers, clients or partners.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by my employer, my partners or my clients. eDiscovery Today is made available solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Today should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.