To watch live court hearings today, the fastest free options are Court TV’s stream at courttv.com and the Law&Crime Network’s YouTube channel, both of which carry state trial court proceedings throughout the day with no account required. For a specific case or courtroom, you’ll need to go directly to that court’s website, find its daily calendar, and look for a Zoom, Webex, or YouTube link posted alongside the day’s docket.
The Fastest Free Streams Right Now
Court TV runs gavel-to-gavel coverage of selected state trials through its website, completely free. The Law&Crime Network does something similar on YouTube, often covering several high-profile criminal trials in parallel with legal commentary. You don’t need to log in or sign up for either one. Click and watch.
Many state court systems also run their own YouTube channels for oral arguments and selected trial proceedings. Michigan’s Supreme Court posts live proceedings on YouTube and archives them afterward. New Jersey maintains a public streaming portal for its Supreme Court and Appellate Division sessions. The number of states offering this kind of direct access grew substantially after courts built out remote technology during the pandemic, and most have kept the infrastructure running.
The platform a court uses varies. Some standardized on Zoom, others on Webex, a few on Microsoft Teams. When a court streams through one of these, it posts the join link or webinar ID on its daily calendar page. You click, land in a digital waiting room, and watch when the session starts. These links are intended for parties and attorneys, but the public can usually join as view-only attendees.
The U.S. Supreme Court and Federal Appeals
The U.S. Supreme Court provides live audio of oral arguments through its website when the Court is in session. No video. The feed is at supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments/live.aspx on argument days, which generally fall on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays during the October-through-April sittings. The page tells you when no arguments are scheduled. Recordings and transcripts go up on the same portal afterward.1Supreme Court of the United States. Live Oral Argument Audio
Several federal circuit courts of appeals also stream oral arguments live from their own websites. The Ninth Circuit offers live video of oral arguments and events through its court portal. Appellate streams tend to be more available than anything at the federal trial level because appellate hearings are legal arguments between attorneys, without witnesses or juries to worry about.
Why You Can’t Watch Federal Trials
If you’re hoping to catch a federal criminal trial live, you can’t. Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 53 prohibits photographing and broadcasting judicial proceedings from federal courtrooms.2Cornell Law Institute. Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure Rule 53 – Courtroom Photographing and Broadcasting Prohibited The rule has been in place since 1946, and the Judicial Conference has repeatedly declined to change it.3United States Courts. History of Cameras, Broadcasting, and Remote Public Access in Courts A limited pilot allowed cameras in fourteen federal district courts for civil proceedings only between 2011 and 2015, and three districts in the Ninth Circuit were authorized to continue posting video recordings of some civil proceedings afterward.4United States Courts. Remote Public Access to Proceedings Some federal judges provide audio-only access for significant hearings, but video is the exception.
This is why the trials you see streamed are almost always state cases. State courts set their own camera rules, and many let the presiding judge allow broadcasting.
What you can do for a federal case is follow it in near real-time through PACER, the Public Access to Court Electronic Records system. PACER lets you search for cases, pull docket entries, and read filed documents from any federal court. Access costs $0.10 per page with a $3.00 cap on any single document, and if you use less than $30 of access in a quarter the fees are waived.5Public Access to Court Electronic Records. PACER: Federal Court Records Registration is free. Coverage includes every federal district, bankruptcy, and appellate court.
Finding a Specific Hearing
Watching a particular case takes a little legwork before the start time.
Start with the case number. Every case gets a unique identifier when it’s filed, usually including the filing year and a sequential number assigned by the clerk’s office. Federal docket numbers also include the case type and sometimes the judge’s initials.6United States Courts. Accessing Court Documents – Journalist’s Guide If you don’t have the number, most court websites let you search by party name.
Then check the court’s daily calendar. Courts publish schedules listing every hearing set for the day with the case number, courtroom, judge, and start time. Depending on the court, this document is called the daily calendar, court schedule, hearing calendar, or docket. It’s almost always posted by the morning of the hearing, often earlier. Watch time zones if the court is in another part of the country.
Confirm the hearing hasn’t been continued. Cases get postponed constantly, whether from a settlement, a scheduling conflict, or a last-minute motion. Check the online docket for the case the morning of the hearing. If the last entry continues the matter to a new date, you’re done.
Then find the streaming link. Courts that offer remote public access typically post a Zoom, Webex, or YouTube link on the daily calendar page, on the individual case’s docket page, or in a dedicated remote-hearings section of the court’s site. If you can’t find a link and the hearing is in a state court that allows cameras, try searching the judge’s name or courtroom number on YouTube. Some judges run their own channels.
What Happens When You Join
Clicking a court’s link usually drops you into a waiting room or standby screen with the court seal or a placeholder message. The feed goes live when the judge takes the bench. On Zoom and Webex, public observers are set to view-only, with microphones and cameras off. You can’t speak, and no one in the courtroom can see or hear you.
Some courts ask for your name or email before you join, mainly to count viewers. This is standard. Expect a few seconds of audio and video delay. On YouTube or Court TV, there’s no waiting room and nothing to enter. Click play.
Rules for Remote Viewers
Watching from home doesn’t put you outside the judge’s authority. The court can hold remote observers in contempt the same way it can anyone in the gallery.
The main rule is simple: don’t record. Unauthorized recording, screenshotting, or rebroadcasting of a court proceeding is prohibited under court orders and state rules across the country. That covers screen capture software, pointing your phone at the monitor, grabbing audio, and streaming to social media. Judges often announce at the start of a hearing that anyone who records may face contempt proceedings.3United States Courts. History of Cameras, Broadcasting, and Remote Public Access in Courts
On an interactive platform like Zoom, keep your microphone muted and camera off at all times. Courts have had to deal with everything from accidental unmuting to deliberate interference, and judges can remove disruptive observers immediately and ban them from future sessions. Some courts have ended public remote access to specific proceedings after this kind of problem, choosing to add physical seating instead.
Penalties vary. Federal courts have broad discretion to impose fines or jail time under 18 U.S.C. ยง 401.7Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 401 – Power of Court State penalties differ but can include fines and short jail sentences. The practical consequence most people hit first is permanent removal from remote access.
Hearings You Won’t Be Able to Watch
Not every hearing is open. The Sixth Amendment guarantees the right to a public trial in criminal cases, but several categories of proceedings are routinely closed.8Constitution Annotated. U.S. Constitution – Amendment 6
- Juvenile cases involving minors accused of crimes or alleged to be abused or neglected are confidential in virtually every state, with sealed records and closed hearings.
- Family law matters, including custody disputes and adoption hearings, are frequently closed or restricted to protect the privacy of children and families.
- Grand jury proceedings operate in secret by design, with no public access and secrecy rules binding on participants.
- Sealed cases involving trade secrets, national security information, confidential informants, or other sensitive material won’t appear on public calendars.
- Even in otherwise public trials, a judge can temporarily close the courtroom for specific witness testimony, such as from sexual assault victims, undercover officers, or witnesses handling classified information.
If a hearing you’re looking for doesn’t appear on a court’s public calendar or streaming portal, one of these restrictions may be why.
Accommodations for Viewers With Disabilities
Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act requires state and local courts to provide reasonable accommodations for people with disabilities, and that obligation extends to remote proceedings. If you need closed captioning, a sign language interpreter, or another accommodation, you can request it through the court’s ADA coordinator or clerk’s office.
For captioning, courts are expected to use a Communication Access Real-Time Translation provider rather than the auto-generated captions built into Zoom or Webex, which are often inaccurate for legal terminology. When a sign language interpreter is provided for a remote hearing, they join as a participant in the video feed, and the court will usually advise you to pin their video so they stay visible.
Submit requests well in advance. Some courts require 30 days’ notice. Check the court’s website for an ADA accommodation form, or call the clerk’s office directly. Where remote accommodations aren’t feasible, the court may hold the proceeding in person instead to ensure full access.