PACER alerts: how to get an alert when a federal docket changes
Editorial review: . Official sources cited. Text updated: .
Juricio is not an official court website and is not affiliated with the U.S. Courts or PACER. This guide is general information, not legal advice: for a decision about a case, talk to a licensed attorney, and confirm each detail in the official sources cited below.
A PACER alert is a notice that a federal court case has a new docket entry. PACER is the federal judiciary's service for public access to court records, and the alerts come from the RSS feeds some courts publish for free, from the notices courts send to the people in a case, and from the services that read those feeds for you.
Does PACER send an alert when a docket changes?
PACER's help pages point to one way to follow cases without being a party: the RSS feeds that some courts publish. Subscribing to a court's feed is free, and each item carries a short summary of the new docket entry with links to the document and to the docket report, which open in PACER at its usual fee per page.
Parties and their attorneys get something more: the court's notice of electronic filing, with one free electronic copy of each document filed electronically in their case.
Which kinds of alerts are there?
Four, and each one covers something different:
| Alert | Who gets it | What it covers | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| A court's RSS feed | Anyone, with a feed reader | The court's new docket entries: every type, or only some, as the court decides | Free to read; the linked documents cost the PACER fee per page |
| Notice of electronic filing (NEF) | Parties in the case, including those without an attorney, and attorneys of record | The documents filed electronically in their case | One free electronic copy of each document |
| Bankruptcy Noticing Center (BNC) | Those who receive a bankruptcy court's notices: they can register to get them by e-mail | The notices of bankruptcy courts, sent the day the court produces them | — |
| A docket alert service | Anyone who signs up | The cases or names you choose, as far as the courts' feeds report them | Depends on the service |
How do court RSS feeds work?
Each feed belongs to one court: its CM/ECF system lists the newest docket entries of its cases, and a feed reader or an alert service checks the list and shows you what is new. Of the 188 federal district and bankruptcy courts, 116 publish every docket entry in their feed, 54 publish only some types of entries and 18 publish no feed, according to Juricio's check of October 15, 2026.
The details, with the table by kind of court, are in the guide PACER RSS feeds: what they include.
What do alerts built on RSS feeds miss?
- Courts without a feed, and the entry types a partial feed leaves out: no alert built on the feeds can see them.
- Sealed documents: they are not available to the public on PACER.
- The documents themselves: the feed carries a summary and a link; reading the filing means logging in to PACER and paying its fee ($0.10 a page, $0.12 from January 1, 2027).
Which services send docket alerts?
Several services read the courts' feeds and e-mail you what matches your cases or names. Two of them:
- CourtListener, run by the nonprofit Free Law Project, offers docket alerts on federal cases, free up to a limited number of cases. Its help pages say the courts' RSS feeds are a major source for those alerts, so courts with a partial feed or none are gaps there too.
- Juricio reads the public RSS feeds of the federal district and bankruptcy courts that publish one, when the court's robots.txt allows automated reading: priority courts every hour and the others about every 3 hours (a feed that keeps answering with nothing new is read less often, at most 6 hours apart). Members can follow a case or set an alert on a company's name, and get an e-mail after the reading that finds the new entry, usually the same day the court publishes it. Juricio never opens paid PACER pages: to read a document you still use PACER.
Search federal cases Courts with RSS feeds
What if you are a party in the case?
Then the court's own notices are your first source: parties, including those who represent themselves, and attorneys of record receive one free electronic copy of each document filed electronically in their case, through the notice of electronic filing. Some courts also let people without an attorney file documents through CM/ECF.
Questions
Are PACER RSS feeds free?
Yes. Subscribing to a court's RSS feed is free. Opening the document or docket report a feed links to means logging in to PACER, where each page costs $0.10 ($0.12 from January 1, 2027).
Do all federal courts publish an RSS feed?
No. Of the 188 federal district and bankruptcy courts, 116 publish every docket entry, 54 publish only some types of entries and 18 publish no feed, according to Juricio's check of October 15, 2026.
Can an alert tell me about a sealed document?
No. Sealed documents, including sealed indictments, are not available to the public on PACER.
Who gets the court's e-mail notices in a case?
Parties in the case, including those without an attorney, and attorneys of record: they receive one free electronic copy of each document filed electronically in their case, through the notice of electronic filing.
Sources
- PACER: How can I receive case alerts using an RSS feed?: court RSS feeds, what an item includes and how the linked documents open; on the same page, sealed documents and the Bankruptcy Noticing Center (consulted October 22, 2026).
- United States Courts: Electronic Public Access Fee Schedule: in force since January 1, 2020: the free copy that parties and attorneys of record receive through the notice of electronic filing, and the fee per page (consulted October 22, 2026).
- United States Courts: Judiciary Approves Funding for Case Management and Public Access Modernization: news release of June 26, 2026: the fee per page from January 1, 2027 (consulted October 22, 2026).
- United States Courts: Electronic Filing (CM/ECF): who files through CM/ECF, including the courts that allow pro se litigants to file (consulted October 22, 2026).
Other references
- Free Law Project: Docket Alerts for PACER (CourtListener help): what this guide says of CourtListener's alerts (consulted October 22, 2026).