Scales LegalTech

When Accuracy is
Non-Negotiable

Hybrid search with metadata filtering for jurisdiction, case type, and document category. Build retrieval for patent corpora, M&A due diligence, and more.

# Hybrid legal document search
results = client.query_points(
    collection_name="legal_docs",
    prefetch=[
        Prefetch(query=dense_emb, using="dense",
            limit=100),
        Prefetch(query=sparse_emb, using="sparse",
            limit=100),
    ],
    query=FusionQuery(fusion=Fusion.RRF),
    query_filter=Filter(must=[
        FieldCondition("jurisdiction",
            match=MatchValue("california")),
        FieldCondition("case_type",
            match=MatchValue("patent")),
        FieldCondition("filing_date",
            range=Range(gte="2020-01-01")),
        FieldCondition("settlement_amount",
            range=Range(gte=50000)),
    ]),
    limit=20,
)
Code
Step 1

Embed - Parse + Embed Resume / JD

Filter
Step 2

Search - Semantic Search + Strict Filter

List
Step 3

Rank - Rank + Rerank (Optional)

Check
Step 4

Result - Evidence-based Match

Filter Low latency
Target High Accuracy
Dollar Billion+ Vector Scale
Check GDPR/SOC2 Compliant
Check Hybrid Cloud

“We scaled to a billion vectors with sub-second latency. Workflows that took hours now take minutes.”

Herbie Turner avatar

Herbie Turner

CTO / Co-founder

1B+

Vectors in Production


250B+

Tokens Processed


“We ingest thousands of legal docs, and need precise retrieval and accurate citations. Qdrant makes this possible.”

Lesly Arun Franco avatar

Lesly Arun Franco

CTO

90%

Faster Due Diligence


40%

Fewer Legal Hours


Why Teams Choose Qdrant

General-Purpose Databases Weren't Built for Legal AI

Keyword search, rigid filters, and bolt-on vector capabilities break under the demands of modern legal platforms. Teams running semantic search, document analysis, and AI agents hit the same walls.

Alert
Legacy Search Can't Handle Legal Metadata

Legal documents can carry 2,000+ metadata fields: jurisdictions, case types, filing dates, settlement amounts. Other search engines require brute-force vector search with embedding constraints. Post-filter architectures degrade recall as filters multiply.

Qdrant's filterable HNSW applies filters during graph traversal.

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Compliance Blocks Most Cloud Providers

Attorney-client privilege and data residency requirements mean managed cloud solutions are often non-starters. 100% of LegalTech sales conversations surface security and compliance.

Qdrant deploys on-prem, in private VPCs, or hybrid cloud — with SOC2, GDPR, and HIPAA-ready compliance built in.

Why People Migrate to Qdrant

Evaluating Migration?

Our solutions engineers do technical deep-dives with HR tech teams weekly.

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What you can build with Qdrant

From patent analysis to M&A due diligence, legal teams combine Qdrant's retrieval primitives to deliver citation-grade accuracy keyword search never could.

Search
Jurisdiction-Scoped Document Search

"Find California patent cases from 2020 with settlements over $50k" returns ranked results filtered by jurisdiction, date, case type, and amount. Hybrid search grounds results in real documents.

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Patent Prior Art / Claim Charting

Search 200M+ patents by technology class, grant date, and patent family. Scalar quantization at billion-scale. Recommend API for claim-chart matching against prior art.

Search check
M&A Due Diligence

Automated signature validation, contract comparison, and risk flagging across thousands of deal documents. Multitenant isolation per deal room with real-time ingestion during active deals.

How It Works Under the Hood

Architecture patterns with API examples for
legal document search, patent analysis, and multi-tenancy.

Hybrid Search

Legal queries are part structured (jurisdiction, date, case type) and part unstructured (“negligence in product liability” or “prior art for CRISPR gene editing”). This pattern fuses semantic and keyword retrieval with metadata filters in a single query.

View Full Example
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Dense Vectors

Semantic understanding of legal language and concepts

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Sparse Vectors (BM25/SPLADE)

For exact legal terms (e.g. statute numbers, case citations)

# Hybrid legal document search
results = client.query_points(
  collection_name="legal_docs",
  prefetch=[
      Prefetch(query=dense_emb, using="dense",
          limit=100),
      Prefetch(query=sparse_emb, using="sparse",
          limit=100),
  ],
  query=FusionQuery(fusion=Fusion.RRF),
  query_filter=Filter(must=[
      FieldCondition(key="jurisdiction",
          match=MatchValue("california")),
      FieldCondition("case_type",
          match=MatchValue("patent")),
  ]),
  limit=20,
)

RAG-Powered Legal Research

Ground AI assistants in real case law and statutes. This is the pattern Lawme uses for automated legal document drafting — vectorize document chunks, retrieve relevant context per question, and generate cited answers.

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Custom shard keys by jurisdiction

US, AU, UK case law isolated

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Scalar, binary, asymmetric quantization (8-bit)

Up to 32x compression with reranking

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Real-time payload updates

Mark documents as reviewed without reindexing

# RAG: retrieve legal context for AI assistant
review_chunks = client.query_points(
    collection_name="case_law",
    prefetch=[
        Prefetch(query=question_emb, using="dense",
            limit=50),
        Prefetch(query=question_sparse, using="sparse",
            limit=50),
    ],
    query=FusionQuery(fusion=Fusion.RRF),
    query_filter=Filter(must=[
        FieldCondition("jurisdiction",
            match=MatchValue("australia")),
    ]),
    limit=10,
)

# Feed to LLM with grounded context
context = "\n".join([r.payload["text"]
    for r in review_chunks.points])
answer = llm.generate(
    f"Based on case law: {context}\n"
    f"Question: {user_question}"
)

Large Patent Corpus Search

Search hundreds of millions of patents across jurisdictions with scalar, binary or asymmetric quantization.

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Scalar, binary, asymmetric quantization (8-bit)

Keeps hot vectors in RAM, full-precision on disk

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Recommend API for claim charting

Find prior art similar to specific patent claims

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Pay-for-what-you-use pricing

10× more data for the same cost

# Prior art search at billion scale
results = client.query_points(
    collection_name="patents",
    query=claim_embedding,
    query_filter=Filter(must=[
        FieldCondition("grant_date",
            range=Range(lte="2015-06-01")),
        FieldCondition("technology_class",
            match=MatchAny(["H04L", "G06F"])),
    ]),
    params=SearchParams(
        quantization=QuantizationSearchParams(
            rescore=True,
            oversampling=2.0
        )
    ),
    limit=50,
)

# Claim-chart matching via Recommend API
similar = client.query_points(
    collection_name="patents",
    query=RecommendQuery(
        recommend=RecommendInput(
            positive=[claim_vector_id],
            negative=[known_irrelevant_id],
        )
    ),
    limit=25,
)

Powering Search For

AI logo
Aracor logo
Garden logo
Lawme AI logo
AI logo
Aracor logo
Garden logo
Lawme AI logo
AI logo
Aracor logo
Garden logo
Lawme AI logo

“To scale, you need vector search with low latency, high accuracy, and reasonable costs. Qdrant makes that possible.”

Jordan Parker avatar

Jordan Parker

Co-founder Lawme

10x

faster query throughput


75%

reduction in retrieval costs


“Filterable HNSW was the deal-maker. We don't have to think about the vector layer anymore.”

Justin Mack avatar

Justin Mack

CTO / Co-founder, Garden AI

10×

Lower cost per stored GB


<100ms

p95 query latency at 200M+ patents


FAQs

How Does Qdrant Handle Complex Legal Metadata Filtering?
Qdrant applies filters during HNSW graph traversal, not after retrieval. This means filtering by jurisdiction, case type, date range, or settlement amount doesn't degrade recall or spike latency.
How Does Hybrid Search Work for Legal Research?
What Deployment Options Work for Law Firms With Data Residency Requirements?
How Does Qdrant Compare to PGVector for Legal AI?

Talk to an expert about
LegalTech retrieval.

We'll show you the architecture that fits.

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