Kuwait advances digital justice reforms, cuts court backlogs, speeds up litigation
Kuwait has made significant progress in modernizing its justice system through a series of legislative and regulatory reforms aimed at accelerating case resolution, reducing court backlogs and introducing digital solutions while maintaining judicial safeguards and data confidentiality.
The reforms, which gained momentum since May 2025, focused on several areas, including expanding electronic litigation, improving judicial notices, restructuring appeal procedures and updating legal frameworks to create a faster and more efficient justice system.
Major Reduction in Appeal Backlogs
The Court of Cassation introduced specialized chambers to address accumulated appeals and speed up rulings. During the 2025-2026 judicial year, the court settled 17,434 appeals, marking a 17.7 percent increase compared with 14,816 appeals in the previous year.
The Misdemeanor Appeals Chambers at the Court of First Instance resolved 36,093 appeals, a 203 percent rise from the previous year, reducing hearing appointment periods from more than two years to no more than two months.
The Court of Appeal also handled more cases than it received, resolving 33,195 appeals compared with 31,790 filed during the same period.
Digital Transformation of Judicial Notices
The Ministry of Justice also completed a major overhaul of the judicial notification system, one of the key causes of delays in court proceedings.
Electronic links with the Ministry of Commerce and Industry and the Public Authority for Civil Information increased the availability of company contact details from 0.8 percent to nearly 67 percent, covering around 162,000 companies out of 242,000.
The launch of electronic notifications through the Sahl Aamal application has helped connect legal notices with updated official data, reducing failed notifications and speeding up litigation procedures.
Expansion of Electronic Justice Services
Kuwait has also accelerated the move toward fully digital court services, including the adoption of the official electronic seal for Ministry of Justice documents to enhance authenticity and verification.
Electronic notification of criminal judgments recorded a major increase, reaching 27,665 notices between June 7 and July 9, 2026, compared with only 12 during the same period in 2025.
In July 2026, Kuwait launched the first phase of its electronic litigation system for criminal orders, allowing procedures from submission to judgment issuance and notification to be completed digitally.
New Laws to Simplify Litigation
Recent legislative amendments have strengthened Kuwait’s transition toward electronic justice. Amendments to the Civil and Commercial Procedures Law introduced modern methods for serving legal documents and established the legal foundation for comprehensive electronic litigation.
The reforms also allow greater use of digital files, electronic signatures and online communication between courts and litigants, reducing paperwork, saving time and lowering costs.
Further amendments to criminal procedures enabled judges to review criminal order requests electronically, with digital signatures and electronic documents receiving the same legal validity as traditional paper documents.
Measurable Impact on Court Efficiency
The judicial reforms have already contributed to a decline in the number of cases before courts. During the second half of 2025, the total number of cases decreased by approximately 21 percent compared with the same period in 2024.
Performance orders also dropped by around 40 percent, falling from nearly 56,000 orders in the second half of 2024 to about 34,000 orders in the same period of 2025.
The reforms represent Kuwait’s move toward a modern justice model that combines technology, efficiency and legal protection, paving the way for a faster, more transparent and accessible judicial system.
