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For legal teams evaluating federal agency action, the Administrative Procedure Act, or APA, is a foundational statute. Often searched as “what is the administrative procedures act,” the APA establishes the framework for agency rulemaking, certain adjudications, public access to agency materials, and judicial review of agency decisions.
June 2026 marks the 80th anniversary for the APA’s enactment in 1946. Originally enacted as Public Law 79-404, the APA was designed “to improve the administration of justice by prescribing fair administrative procedure,” and its provisions are now incorporated primarily in Title 5 of the U.S. Code.1
More than eight decades later, APA litigation remains a critical area of federal practice. Legal teams use APA claims to challenge, defend, and evaluate federal agency decisions across a wide range of regulated industries and public programs. Enhanced analytics in Lex Machina® help law firms and corporate legal teams understand this litigation landscape with greater precision.
The APA establishes baseline procedural rules for federal agencies. It governs core administrative functions, including agency rulemaking, certain agency adjudications, public access to agency materials, and judicial review of agency action.
Agency decisions can affect environmental approvals, immigration matters, healthcare programs, labor and employment rules, financial regulation, government benefits, education policy, energy projects, and many other areas. The APA gives parties a structured legal mechanism for challenging agency conduct and gives courts a framework for evaluating those challenges.
The APA remains important because federal agencies continue to make decisions that affect major economic, regulatory, and individual interests while Article I tribunals struggle with delays and backlogs, sowing fertile grounds for APA lawsuits.
A growing docket means more opportunities for precedent, more risk for agencies and regulated parties, and more need for reliable analytics that reveal how these disputes are resolved.
Data from the Lex Machina platform shows that APA lawsuits in federal district courts have increased significantly in recent years.
In 2020, parties filed 1,662 APA lawsuits in federal district courts. Filings increased to 1,931 in 2021 and 2,147 in 2022. In 2023, filings rose again to 2,545. After remaining elevated at 2,481 filings in 2024, APA lawsuits reached 2,713 filings in 2025, the highest annual total in any year since at least 2009. And from January through May 2026, more than 1,400 APA lawsuits launched in federal district courts.
The rapid increase in recent years is perhaps not surprising given significant legal and policy developments in the 2020s. For example:
The increase in district-court APA litigation has practical significance for lawyers and their clients. As more companies and individuals challenge federal agency decisions, legal teams need a clearer view of how similar matters concluded.
Which districts see the most APA filings? How experienced is a given judge with complicated issues of administrative law? How often do claimants obtain favorable outcomes? How long do APA cases typically take to terminate? Which judges, law firms, agencies, and parties appear most frequently in this area?
Litigation analytics can help answer those questions with data rather than assumption.
Lex Machina makes it easy for legal and risk professionals to learn exclusive insights and apply data-informed strategies for federal district court cases in which a party asserted a claim under the APA or requested review or appeal of a federal agency decision. The platform now includes enhanced analytics for more than 28,000 APA federal district court lawsuits, including comprehensive case outcome analytics for more than 25,000 terminated APA lawsuits, as of June 2026.
Some cases directly allege violations of the APA. Others request review or appeal of a federal agency decision, even when the posture or substantive area of law differs. Together, these matters form an important category of federal district court litigation for practitioners who represent regulated companies, government entities, advocacy organizations, individuals, and other parties affected by agency action.
Lex Machina’s APA analytics help legal professionals move beyond isolated case examples and evaluate the broader litigation record. Users can analyze filing trends, case timing, outcomes, courts, judges, parties, law firms, attorneys, and other practical litigation data. These insights help legal teams assess risk, benchmark strategy, evaluate venue, identify experienced counsel, and develop more informed expectations about how APA matters proceed.
These enhanced analytics give users deeper visibility into APA litigation activity and results. Legal professionals can evaluate how APA cases terminate, how long they take, which courts and judges handle them, which parties and law firms are involved, and how outcomes compare across similar matters.
For plaintiffs and petitioners, APA analytics can help identify litigation patterns that inform case assessment, forum strategy, motion practice, and settlement posture. For defendants and respondents, including agencies and parties defending agency action, analytics can help evaluate historical outcomes, timing expectations, and opposing counsel experience.
For corporate legal departments, APA analytics may support risk assessment when agency decisions affect business operations, approvals, enforcement exposure, or compliance obligations. For law firms, the same analytics can support client counseling, pitch preparation, business development, and competitive intelligence.
Lex Machina, the LexisNexis® Legal Analytics® platform, delivers data-driven insights for APA cases and many other areas of federal civil litigation. With enhanced APA analytics covering more than 28,000 federal district court lawsuits, legal teams can better understand filing trends, outcomes, timing, courts, judges, parties, law firms, and attorneys involved in this important area of administrative law.
These insights help practitioners evaluate risk, advise clients, identify patterns, and make more confident strategic decisions from complaint through resolution.
Ready to see how APA litigation analytics can support your team? Schedule a personalized Lex Machina demonstration today.
What does the Administrative Procedure Act do? The APA sets baseline rules for federal agency procedures and provides a framework for judicial review of certain agency actions.
What are the four purposes of the Administrative Procedure Act? The four key purposes are fair process, public participation, transparency, and judicial review.
Why is the Administrative Procedure Act important? The APA is important because it helps ensure that federal agencies follow lawful procedures, explain their decisions, and remain subject to court review when their actions are challenged.
Every litigation matter raises important questions. LexisNexis offers solutions to help you answer them at every state of the litigation lifecycle:
[1] 79 P.L. 404; 60 Stat. 237; 79 Cong. Ch. 324
[2] 603 U.S. 369 (2024).
[3] 603 U.S. 799 (2024)
[4] Shay Dvoretzky, Parker Rider-Longmaid & Sylvia O. Tsakos, Supreme Court Decisions Curtail Regulatory Agencies’ Powers, Making It Easier To Challenge Rules, Skadden Insights (Sept. 2024).
[5] See Desirée LeClercq, Judicial Review of Emergency Administration, 72 Am. U.L. Rev. 143 (Oct. 2022).
[6] See Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC), Immigration Processing Delays Prompt Record Number of Mandamus Lawsuits in Federal Court, TRAC Reports (May 15, 2023).