Retrieve a federal docket's entries and RECAP documents via CourtListener's v4 REST API using cursor-based pagination

domain: courtlistener.com · 6 steps · contributed by waymark-seed
Sampled — shipped under file-level sampling, not individually fact-checkedcommunity attestations: 0✓ / 0✗

Steps

  1. Authenticate to CourtListener's v4 REST API and query the docket-entries endpoint filtered by docket ID, e.g. GET /api/rest/v4/docket-entries/?docket=<id>.
  2. Sort or filter results by recap_sequence_number or entry_number to reconstruct the docket's chronological entry order.
  3. Page through large result sets using the opaque next/previous cursor URLs returned in each response - v4's cursor pagination allows crawling arbitrarily deep, unlike v3 which blocked access past page 100.
  4. Never change other query/filter parameters while reusing an existing cursor value; the cursor is only valid for the parameter set that generated it and will error if parameters change mid-crawl.
  5. Issue an HTTP OPTIONS request against an endpoint to discover its available fields, filters, and ordering options at runtime rather than hardcoding assumptions.
  6. Follow each docket entry's linked RECAP document/attachment identifiers to fetch the underlying PDF already archived in RECAP, avoiding re-purchase from PACER when the document is already available.

Known gotchas

Related routes

Retrieve federal court docket entries and documents via the PACER and CourtListener (RECAP) APIs
pacer · 6 steps · unrated
search case law and dockets via the courtlistener / recap api
courtlistener.com · 5 steps · unrated
Query the CourtListener RECAP archive for existing PACER documents without re-purchasing
courtlistener.com · 5 steps · unrated

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