Top 10 AI Tools Every Legal Professional in Netherlands Should Know in 2025
Last Updated: September 11th 2025
Too Long; Didn't Read:
Dutch legal professionals should adopt top AI tools in 2025: 79% already use AI and the global legal‑AI market grew from USD 1.45B (2024). Tools can reclaim ~240–260 hours per lawyer, ensure EU/GDPR fit, and help avoid AI‑Act fines up to €35M.
Dutch legal teams can no longer treat AI as an experiment - 2025 is the year to get strategic. With roughly 79% of law‑firm professionals already using AI and the global legal AI market growing from USD 1.45B (2024) toward larger forecasts, tools that speed research, spot risky contract language, and summarise evidence are reshaping how cases and compliance are managed (NexLaw: AI in Legal Research (2025)).
Firms with a clear AI strategy are pulling ahead, creating a competitive divide that Dutch practices should heed (Thomson Reuters: AI Adoption Divide - 2025 report).
For Netherlands‑specific teams, national transparency moves - like the Public‑sector AI use and algorithm register - already affect procurement and client duties, so pairing policy with practical skill building (see the Nucamp AI Essentials for Work bootcamp - course details) turns risk into advantage.
| Bootcamp | Length | Early bird cost | Register |
|---|---|---|---|
| AI Essentials for Work | 15 Weeks | $3,582 | Register for the Nucamp AI Essentials for Work bootcamp |
“This transformation is happening now.”
Table of Contents
- Methodology: How we selected the top 10 AI tools
- Lexis+ AI (LexisNexis) - AI research, citation‑backed answers and judicial analytics
- CoCounsel (Casetext / Thomson Reuters) - contextual research and drafting assistant
- Harvey AI - enterprise legal LLMs, secure workflows and auditability
- Spellbook - Word add‑in for contract drafting, redlining and clause libraries
- Ironclad - contract lifecycle management with AI extraction and approvals
- Relativity - eDiscovery, predictive coding and privilege workflows
- Everlaw - cloud eDiscovery with collaboration, trial prep and AI summarisation
- Diligen - contract analysis, extraction and trainable models
- Smith.ai - AI‑assisted virtual receptionist and client intake
- ChatGPT and Claude (OpenAI & Anthropic) - general‑purpose LLMs for drafting and ideation
- Conclusion: Choosing and governing AI tools in Dutch legal practice
- Frequently Asked Questions
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Methodology: How we selected the top 10 AI tools
(Up)Selection began with what matters most for Dutch legal teams in 2025: clear regulatory fit, data sovereignty, and demonstrable value. Tools were screened first for EU AI Act and GDPR readiness - does the vendor support EU data residency, appoint an EU representative when needed, and supply the documentation that avoids massive penalties under the AI Act (non‑compliance can lead to fines up to €35 million)? We then evaluated confidentiality controls (self‑hosting or provable model‑control, strong encryption, RBAC and deletion policies) and vendor transparency about training data provenance, drawing on best practices for patent and IP work.
Practical performance and ROI were next: speed, accuracy and time‑savings in research and review (the sector cites ~240 hours reclaimed per lawyer) guided which tools moved forward.
Final gates were human‑in‑the‑loop safeguards, vendor due‑diligence evidence and national procurement fit for Dutch public‑sector rules; only products that met compliance, security and measurable productivity criteria made the Top 10 shortlist.
| Criterion | Why it mattered / source |
|---|---|
| Regulatory fit (EU AI Act & risk tier) | Guide to the EU AI Act for lawyers - Bloomberg Law |
| Confidentiality & data residency | Safeguarding confidentiality in legal AI tools for patent practice - AlphaLect |
| Performance, ROI & use cases | How AI is transforming the legal profession - Thomson Reuters |
Lexis+ AI (LexisNexis) - AI research, citation‑backed answers and judicial analytics
(Up)Lexis+ AI is a clear fit for Dutch practices that need fast, verifiable research plus secure document handling: Protégé brings conversational search, Shepardize® citation validation and litigation analytics into a private workspace so answers are grounded in LexisNexis content rather than vague web scraps - a crucial safeguard when Dutch courts and clients demand traceable authority (Lexis+ AI product page).
Its Retrieval‑Augmented‑Generation and citation‑validation workflow aims to cut hallucinations and, in early user testing, helped lawyers reclaim as much as 11 hours per week - a vivid reminder that the right tool can free time for strategy, not just faster searches (How Lexis+ AI Delivers Trustworthy Linked Legal Citations).
For Netherlands teams worried about procurement and data protection, Lexis+ AI's multi‑model approach, Azure/AWS deployment and privacy‑by‑design controls (private Vaults, encryption, DMS integration with iManage/SharePoint) make vendor due diligence and EU‑fit conversations more concrete; recent RAG and graph enhancements also beef up citation reliability and headnote coverage for jurisdictional work (LexisNexis enhancements overview).
| Feature | Detail (source) |
|---|---|
| Protégé Vault limits | Up to 50 Vaults; 1–500 documents per Vault; non‑Vault uploads (≤10) purged at session end; Vault results retained 90 days |
| Documented ROI | Forrester TEI: Law firms 344% ROI over 3 years; Corporate legal 284% ROI over 3 years |
“We are committed to a diverse and wide set of large language models in the legal space - and the speed at which we investigate new models, experiment with them and deploy them is unmatched.”
CoCounsel (Casetext / Thomson Reuters) - contextual research and drafting assistant
(Up)CoCounsel (Thomson Reuters) is a strong option for Dutch firms that need an AI assistant grounded in trusted sources and built for real‑world workflows: it combines Westlaw and Practical Law content with agentic “Deep Research” workflows, Microsoft Word drafting features and playbooks so teams can move from research to a negotiated draft without jumping between tools - Thomson Reuters reports up to 2.6x speed on document work and that nearly all users find more key information with advanced review tools (CoCounsel by Thomson Reuters legal AI assistant product page).
Security and confidentiality are central: CoCounsel runs on private, dedicated servers with encryption and contractual limits on partner access, and library pilots note session wipes and “eyes‑off” controls to reduce leakage risk - practical assurances that matter during Dutch procurement and AI Act reviews (see local vendor checks like the vendor due diligence checklist for AI tools in the Netherlands and independent library notes on CoCounsel's privacy safeguards at King County Law Library CoCounsel privacy safeguards review).
For Netherlands practices balancing transparency, client confidentiality and speed, CoCounsel's citation‑backed drafts, playbooks and in‑Word workflow can reclaim hours for strategy rather than editing - sometimes turning an hour's task into a five‑minute starting draft.
“A task that would previously have taken an hour was completed in five minutes or less.”
Harvey AI - enterprise legal LLMs, secure workflows and auditability
(Up)Harvey AI positions itself as an enterprise‑grade legal LLM that Dutch firms and in‑house teams should vet seriously for 2025: its platform combines domain‑specific models, agentic workflows and a Vault that can upload and analyse up to 10,000 documents per project with extraction across 50 fields - useful when handling large NL due‑diligence sets or multi‑jurisdictional contracts.
For Netherlands procurement and GDPR/AIA checks, Harvey emphasises in‑region hosting (including EU), enforceable Security Addenda, “no model training” on customer inputs, SAML SSO, audit logs and other controls shown in its security portal, which help satisfy data‑sovereignty and auditability demands (Harvey AI security and compliance portal).
Available via Microsoft Azure and built to integrate with DMS and CLM systems, Harvey aims to give lawyers citation‑backed research, transparent RAG workflows and configurable automations that clearly expose AI reasoning - so compliance teams can sign off and fee‑earners can reclaim hours for higher‑value strategy (Harvey AI enterprise legal product page).
| Feature | Detail (source) |
|---|---|
| Data sovereignty | In‑region hosting options (EU, US, Australia) and retention controls |
| No model training | Contractual guarantee that customer data is not used to train underlying models |
| Vault limits & extraction | Up to 10,000 documents/project; extraction across 50 fields per document |
| Enterprise controls | SAML SSO, audit logs, IP allow‑listing, Security Addendum, SOC2/ISO/GDPR alignment |
“When it comes to AI and technology, it's all about learning by doing. You won't figure everything out right away, but the more you engage with it, the more opportunities you'll see.”
Spellbook - Word add‑in for contract drafting, redlining and clause libraries
(Up)For Dutch contract teams wrestling with tight procurement rules and GDPR‑sensitive precedents, Spellbook's Word add‑in now feels tailor‑made: its new Library turns a firm's past deals into a searchable clause repository that lives inside Microsoft Word, so a lawyer can ask for a “termination clause for software agreement” and insert an adapted, on‑brand version without hunting deal folders or inbox threads - a real time‑saver when clients expect speedy, auditable drafts.
Spellbook's Smart Clause Drafting also syncs with OneDrive or Dropbox, adapts selected language to the agreement's tone and structure, and reduces the “it reads like ChatGPT” problem by surfacing firm‑specific precedents (see Artificial Lawyer's coverage of the Library launch).
For budget teams pondering value, vendor demos and tailored quotes matter - reviewers have flagged custom pricing and trial options when evaluating fit for in‑house or law‑firm deployments (see a detailed pricing overview at HyperStart).
“AI has made strides in speed and efficiency, [but] it has largely failed to mirror the nuanced preferences, structure and tone of individual legal practitioners.”
Ironclad - contract lifecycle management with AI extraction and approvals
(Up)For Dutch legal teams juggling procurement rules, GDPR and the Public‑sector AI register, Ironclad offers an enterprise CLM that combines familiar workflow controls with AI‑first extraction and approval automation - so contracts stop being a filing‑cabinet problem and start driving measurable speed and compliance.
Its workflow designer, native e‑sign and integrations with OneDrive/Dropbox/Salesforce keep contracting inside approved systems, while AI features like Smart Import (up to 2,000 documents per batch), AI Playbooks and AI Assist speed drafting, redlining and clause detection (including governing‑law jurisdiction properties) so teams can find risk‑items without hunting folders; read more in Ironclad's product and AI overviews for implementation detail (Ironclad Products Overview, Ironclad AI Overview).
A vivid reality for NL in‑house counsel: Ironclad reports models trained on over a billion contracts, turning clunky post‑signature searches into a single, auditable repository so procurement and privacy teams can sign off faster and fee‑earners reclaim time for strategy rather than triage.
| Feature | Detail |
|---|---|
| Smart Import | AI‑powered upload and extraction - up to 2,000 documents per batch |
| AI Assist & Playbooks | Draft, edit, redline, detect clauses and route approvals |
| Integrations & Compliance | OneDrive/Dropbox/Salesforce, e‑sign, GDPR and SOC2‑style security guidance |
“If we didn't have Ironclad, could we extend a day to have 48 hours, instead of 24? Because that's what we'd need.”
Relativity - eDiscovery, predictive coding and privilege workflows
(Up)RelativityOne is a go‑to platform for Dutch litigation and in‑house teams that need defensible, scalable eDiscovery - its secure, cloud‑based solution ingests data from Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, Slack and even ChatGPT Enterprise and then uses AI and analytics to prioritise review, redact PII and meet tight production deadlines (RelativityOne e-Discovery platform for legal teams).
For multi‑lingual Netherlands matters the built‑in translation (100+ languages) and media transcription turn hours of audio or video into searchable, review‑ready text, while Review Center's AI‑driven queues and templates reduce setup time and keep reviewer workflows simple (Relativity Review Center documentation and features).
Relativity's generative‑AI offering, aiR, is designed to surface the documents that matter, explain its predictions with citations from the record, and flag privilege so teams can balance speed with defensibility - useful when Dutch teams must show transparent, audit‑ready processes to clients and procurement officers (Relativity aiR generative-AI overview and blog).
The result: a platform that turns a mountain of ESI into a focused set of high‑value threads so lawyers spend time on strategy, not sifting.
| Feature | What it delivers |
|---|---|
| Relativity aiR (Review & Privilege) | Generative AI that ranks documents, provides textual citations and written rationale for decisions |
| Review Center | AI‑powered queues, templates, integrative learning classifier and rich progress reporting |
| Predictive coding / TAR workflows | Iterative training with control sets (TAR 1.0/2.0 styles) and Brainspace integration for training/validation |
“It's the best Review platform and analytics tool that I have used, with full customization capabilities. Love it.”
Everlaw - cloud eDiscovery with collaboration, trial prep and AI summarisation
(Up)Everlaw's cloud‑native platform is a strong fit for Dutch litigation and in‑house teams that must move from document chaos to courtroom clarity: fast, defensible processing (900K–1M docs per hour), near‑instant searches, automatic OCR/transcription and AI‑driven summaries make early case assessment and trial prep genuinely practical, while Storybuilder turns evidence into a shareable narrative rather than a stack of PDFs - all important when procurement and privacy teams in the Netherlands ask how data will be handled.
EverlawAI's Deep Dive and the EverlawAI Assistant deliver citation‑backed answers and summaries that admit when evidence is missing, reducing hallucination risk and speeding strategy; local relevance is eased by Everlaw's EU region presence and enterprise security posture (SOC 2 Type II, FedRAMP mentions), and the company's 2025 Innovation Report highlights that leading generative‑AI adopters reclaim roughly 260 hours a year - enough to transform how Dutch teams bill and prioritise work.
See Everlaw's product page, read the Deep Dive announcement, or download the 2025 Ediscovery Innovation Report to evaluate fit for NL practice.
| Feature | Detail (source) |
|---|---|
| Processing speed | Industry‑leading ingestion: 900K–1,000,000 documents per hour |
| AI summarisation & Deep Dive | Near‑instant document summaries, citation‑backed answers; Deep Dive opens early case exploration |
| Trial prep | Storybuilder for collaborative narratives, deposition management and timelines |
| Translation & transcription | AI transcription and foreign‑language translation across 135+ languages (multimedia support) |
| Security & deployment | SOC 2 Type II, FedRAMP listings and EU region options |
“Pinpointing facts in a vast corpus is gold and doing it in seconds is game-changing.”
Diligen - contract analysis, extraction and trainable models
(Up)Diligen is a machine‑learning contract‑analysis tool that Dutch law firms and in‑house teams should watch in 2025 for fast, auditable review at scale: it surfaces hundreds of clause types out of the box, can be trained on firm‑specific language in minutes via its Prodigy self‑training workflow, and automatically generates contract summaries in Word or Excel to speed diligence and compliance reporting (Diligen contract analysis platform).
The product is built to scale - from a handful of agreements to hundreds of thousands - and supports APIs and integrations (Box, NetDocuments) so NL teams can plug extraction into existing CLMs or procurement pipelines; it's also been embedded in managed services (see the Epiq partnership that applies Diligen to GDPR, lease and M&A reviews) (Epiq Diligen-powered contract analysis service).
For Dutch procurement and privacy checks, the key appeal is pragmatic: rapid clause identification, easy custom training for local legal language, and exportable outputs that make audit trails and client reporting straightforward - turning a mountain of legacy contracts into searchable, actionable insight in hours rather than weeks (Diligen Prodigy self-training system).
| Feature | Why it matters for NL teams |
|---|---|
| Pre‑trained clause models (150+) | Fast time‑to‑value for common clauses like indemnities, termination and assignment |
| Self‑training (Prodigy) | Customise detection for Dutch‑specific phrasing in minutes |
| Summaries & export (Word/Excel) | Produces audit‑ready outputs for procurement, compliance and client delivery |
| Scalability & integrations | From 50 to 500,000 contracts; API/Box/NetDocuments support for CLM workflows |
“We are excited to partner with Epiq with the goal of providing law firms and legal departments with more efficient, fast, accurate and affordable ways to gain insight into their contracts,” stated Laura van Wyngaarden, Diligen co‑founder and COO.
Smith.ai - AI‑assisted virtual receptionist and client intake
(Up)For Netherlands legal teams that must balance fast client intake with strict GDPR obligations, Smith.ai's hybrid AI‑and‑human model is worth a close look: its AI Receptionist and live North America‑based agents provide 24/7 lead screening, appointment booking, call recording and high‑accuracy transcriptions while pushing intake data into CRMs and workflows via hundreds of integrations - useful when speed to counsel matters.
Smith.ai has complied with the GDPR since 2018 and documents measures such as AWS hosting, SSL encryption and receptionist NDAs on its Smith.ai GDPR compliance details, making vendor due diligence simpler for procurement teams.
Real-world signals - 20M+ calls handled, 1.24M work hours saved and case notes claiming 10–15 minutes saved per call - show how intake automation can free fee-earners for strategy; Dutch firms should confirm language support and any required EU data‑residency terms during onboarding, then trial a plan to measure real intake uplift (Smith.ai receptionists pricing and plans).
| Feature | Why it matters for NL legal teams |
|---|---|
| GDPR controls (SSL, AWS, NDAs) | Supports EU compliance checks and simplifies vendor due diligence |
| Hybrid AI + live agents (24/7) | Captures leads and handles complex calls without losing client trust |
| Integrations & transcripts | Auto‑populates CRM intake, provides auditable call records for matter opening |
“Smith.ai is our inbound sales team. Having a trained and personable voice has transformed our ability to answer the phone and convert callers to clients.”
ChatGPT and Claude (OpenAI & Anthropic) - general‑purpose LLMs for drafting and ideation
(Up)ChatGPT and Claude now sit at the centre of many Dutch legal workflows in 2025, but they are not interchangeable: both excel at rapid drafting, ideation and iterative editing, yet the real choice for Netherlands firms is between consumer convenience and enterprise controls that meet EU procurement, GDPR and AI‑Act demands.
Anthropic's Claude has been widely adopted in large, secure deployments with SSO, RBAC, zero‑data‑retention options and private VPC routes via Bedrock/Vertex - features that let teams keep data inside EU boundaries and show auditors concrete controls (Claude enterprise deployments and case studies for secure EU hosting).
Meanwhile, recent industry policy shifts mean free ChatGPT/Claude chats can become training fodder unless routed through commercial terms - so a single misplaced draft could be retained for years unless you use an enterprise contract or opt‑out settings (AI provider privacy settings and training data retention coverage).
Practical steps for Dutch teams: standardise on enterprise plans that offer EU hosting, contractual “no‑training” clauses or ZDR, integrate LLMs through approved APIs (or Office 365 where Anthropic is now available), and treat every AI prompt to client matters as a potential permanent record - because speed without governance becomes a compliance problem, not a productivity win.
| Organisation | Primary use | Impact |
|---|---|---|
| TELUS | Internal apps & automation | 500k+ staff hours saved, $90M benefit |
| Bridgewater Associates | Investment research assistant | 50–70% faster reporting |
| Zapier | AI agent orchestration | 800+ agents, 10× growth in tasks |
“If you choose to allow us to use your data for model training, we'll retain this data for five years.”
Conclusion: Choosing and governing AI tools in Dutch legal practice
(Up)Choosing and governing AI in Dutch legal practice comes down to two practical truths: the EU AI Act is no longer theoretical, and regulators here are already making it concrete - see the Netherlands' official AI Act Guide for a clear breakdown of new obligations and timelines (Netherlands AI Act Guide - Government of the Netherlands), while the Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens stresses AI literacy, impact assessments and demonstrable safeguards as core expectations (Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens AI Act guidance).
Practically, that means classifying tools (risk tier matters), running DPIAs and Fundamental Rights Impact Assessments for high‑risk uses, locking vendor contracts to prohibit model training on client data, insisting on EU data‑residency and human‑in‑the‑loop controls, and documenting every decision - non‑compliance can carry heavy penalties (tiered fines run into the millions).
A vivid reminder: the Netherlands already publishes an algorithm register with hundreds of government systems, so expect the same demand for transparency from clients and procurement teams; equipping fee‑earners with operational AI skills (prompts, secure workflows, vendor checks) is therefore as important as policy.
For fast, practical upskilling that pairs governance with hands‑on tool use, consider targeted training like the Nucamp AI Essentials for Work bootcamp (Nucamp AI Essentials for Work bootcamp - Register) to turn compliance requirements into everyday, billable advantage.
| Bootcamp | Length | Early bird cost | Register |
|---|---|---|---|
| AI Essentials for Work | 15 Weeks | $3,582 | Enroll in Nucamp AI Essentials for Work bootcamp |
Frequently Asked Questions
(Up)Which AI tools should Dutch legal professionals know in 2025?
The article highlights ten tools especially relevant for Netherlands legal teams in 2025: Lexis+ AI (research and citation‑backed answers), CoCounsel (Thomson Reuters contextual research and drafting), Harvey AI (enterprise legal LLMs and secure workflows), Spellbook (Word add‑in for clause libraries and redlining), Ironclad (AI‑first CLM and approvals), Relativity (eDiscovery, predictive coding and privilege workflows), Everlaw (cloud eDiscovery, trial prep and AI summarisation), Diligen (contract analysis and trainable extraction), Smith.ai (AI‑assisted virtual receptionist and intake) and general‑purpose LLMs such as ChatGPT and Claude (drafting and ideation with varying enterprise controls).
How were the Top 10 AI tools selected for Dutch legal teams?
Selection prioritized what matters for Netherlands practice in 2025: regulatory fit (EU AI Act risk tiering and GDPR readiness), data sovereignty (EU hosting/data residency and contractual protections), confidentiality controls (self‑hosting, encryption, RBAC, deletion policies), vendor transparency about training data, measurable performance and ROI (speed, accuracy and time‑savings), human‑in‑the‑loop safeguards, vendor due‑diligence evidence, and national procurement fit for Dutch public‑sector rules. The process also referenced concrete penalties under the AI Act (potentially up to tens of millions of euros) and sector signals such as documented time reclaimed and third‑party TEI/ROI studies.
What compliance and procurement steps should Netherlands legal teams take when adopting AI?
Dutch teams should classify tools by AI Act risk tier, run DPIAs and Fundamental Rights Impact Assessments for high‑risk uses, insist on EU data‑residency and contractual 'no model training' or zero‑data‑retention clauses, require vendor documentation (SDAs/Security Addenda, audit logs, SOC/ISO evidence), enforce encryption and RBAC, maintain human‑in‑the‑loop controls, and document decisions for procurement and client transparency. They should also account for national measures like the Public‑sector AI/algorithm register and be aware that non‑compliance can lead to substantial fines.
What productivity gains and ROI can law firms expect from these AI tools?
Reported impacts vary by tool and use case but are significant: the sector cites roughly ~240 hours reclaimed per lawyer in typical AI workflows; Lexis+ AI early tests showed up to about 11 hours reclaimed per week for some users; Everlaw highlights adopters reclaiming roughly 260 hours per year; Thomson Reuters reports up to 2.6x speed on document work with CoCounsel; vendor and analyst studies (e.g., Forrester TEI) show multi‑hundred percent ROI over multi‑year periods (LexisNexis TEI examples: ~344% ROI for law firms over 3 years, ~284% for corporate legal). Actual gains depend on scope, integration, governance and change management.
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Ludo Fourrage
Founder and CEO
Ludovic (Ludo) Fourrage is an education industry veteran, named in 2017 as a Learning Technology Leader by Training Magazine. Before founding Nucamp, Ludo spent 18 years at Microsoft where he led innovation in the learning space. As the Senior Director of Digital Learning at this same company, Ludo led the development of the first of its kind 'YouTube for the Enterprise'. More recently, he delivered one of the most successful Corporate MOOC programs in partnership with top business schools and consulting organizations, i.e. INSEAD, Wharton, London Business School, and Accenture, to name a few. With the belief that the right education for everyone is an achievable goal, Ludo leads the nucamp team in the quest to make quality education accessible

