CourtMesh vs eCourtsIndia
The closest thing to a like for like competitor we have: an Indian court data platform that, like us, publishes a per endpoint API rate card, runs an MCP server and sells a party screening product.
Every claim about eCourtsIndia on this page was checked on 4 November 2026 against the source linked beside it. Where we could not verify something we say so rather than estimate. Their terms can change without notice, so check their own page before you buy.
The short answer
Who each one suits best
If you only read one section, read this one. These are two different tools and the choice is usually settled by what kind of question you are asking, not by which product is better.
eCourtsIndia is better for
Teams that want cause lists, statutes by API, hearing history, advocates and full order text returned from one case call, or a litigating advocate who also wants their lawyer directory and AI clerk. Their API is broader than ours on record depth today.
CourtMesh is better for
Teams putting court data inside their own product who care about published per call prices with GST included, push notifications when a case changes, official SDKs and a free tier that renews each month.
The honest version
What eCourtsIndia does well, and where we differ
Of everyone in this comparison cluster, eCourtsIndia is the company building closest to what we are building. They publish a per endpoint rate card, they run an MCP server for AI clients, they sell a party screening product, and they target the same legal technology and background verification buyers we do. Pretending they are not a serious product would be both dishonest and useless to you.
Start with what they do that we do not. Their API sells cause list search and cause list checks by CNR. It has an acts and sections service with old and new code equivalents, such as IPC to BNS. A single case call returns hearing history, advocates, judges and the full text of each order, and they sell a refresh call that accepts a CNR directly, including a bulk call of up to 50. Their order PDFs are watermarked and digitally signed by default, their pay as you go rate limits are higher than ours, and their MCP server connects by signing in through the client rather than pasting a key. We offer none of those in the API today. Their pricing page also links a lawyer directory and an AI clerk product, which we do not sell as an API.
Where the two diverge is what you are buying. Both rate cards are public, and every figure on this page includes 18% GST so the two can be read side by side: one CourtMesh credit is ₹0.10 with GST included, while eCourtsIndia lists its prices before GST and charges pay as you go at three times its base rate, which it states openly. On that basis CourtMesh costs less per call on case search, case record, PDF and litigation check at both of their price points. Refresh and per order AI summaries are lower with eCourtsIndia at its Enterprise rate. A CourtMesh case record also carries less than theirs, so read the rows below before comparing the case record price alone.
The second difference is keeping cases current. CourtMesh offers watchlists, a changes feed and signed webhooks, with daily monitoring of watched CNRs at no charge within plan caps. Their developer quickstart says their API does not push changes and that monitoring is done by polling. We also publish SDKs for TypeScript and Python and a monthly free allowance that renews, and we offer meaning based search and matter level AI analysis that we found no equivalent of in their API documentation.
Side by side
CourtMesh and eCourtsIndia, dimension by dimension
Dimensions where both products can genuinely be compared, and only claims we could read from a published page on the date shown. A tick marks the side with the advantage on that row.
| What you are comparing | eCourtsIndia | CourtMesh | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Case search, price per call | ₹0.708 on pay as you go and ₹0.236 on Enterprise, with GST included (₹0.60 and ₹0.20 before GST) | 1 credit, ₹0.10 with GST included, and ₹0.08 on Scale | View source |
| Case record, price and depth | ₹1.77 on pay as you go and ₹0.59 on Enterprise. Per their documentation the record includes hearing history, advocates, judges, interlocutory applications, tagged matters and full order text | 1 credit, ₹0.10. Parties, judges, status, stage, next hearing date as last recorded, order count and a summary. Order text is read through the PDF | View source |
| Order or judgment PDF | ₹4.425 and ₹1.475. Watermarked and digitally signed by default per their documentation | 5 credits, ₹0.50, for a PDF we hold. ₹0.40 on Scale. Not signed | View source |
| Live refresh | ₹0.177 and ₹0.059 per CNR, including a bulk call of up to 50 CNRs and a free status check | 1 credit, ₹0.10, one case at a time by case id, with per minute and daily limits. Not available on Free | View source |
| Keeping cases current | Re-pull each CNR yourself with refresh calls and compare the results | Watched CNRs are monitored daily at no charge within plan caps (10 on Free, 1,000 on Pay As You Go, 10,000 on Scale), with a changes feed | View source |
| Webhooks | Their developer quickstart of 24 April 2026 says there are no webhooks or callbacks. None found in their API documentation read on 4 November 2026 | Signed webhooks with retries, a delivery log and secret rotation | View source |
| Litigation check | ₹116.82 on pay as you go and ₹38.94 with a subscription, per accepted report. Takes father's name, date of birth, addresses and company identifiers. Asynchronous | ₹10 on a match, ₹2 on no match, up to ₹8 more for adjudication. Immediate answer, batches of 25, purpose field required on every call | View source |
| AI on a single order | ₹8.85 and ₹2.95 for an order with an AI summary | Full analysis ₹10. The first read of a stored analysis by an organisation is priced by what generating it used, up to ₹40, then ₹0.10 each read | View source |
| AI across a whole matter | None found in their API documentation (read 4 November 2026) | ₹40 for a consolidated analysis across every document on a matter | View source |
| Meaning based search | None found in their API documentation (read 4 November 2026) | ₹1 per search (10 credits). Not available on Free | View source |
| Cause lists | Search at ₹3.54 and ₹1.18, CNR check at ₹0.354 and ₹0.118 per CNR | Not available in the API today | View source |
| Statutes by API | Section text, old and new code equivalents, act name resolution and section search, from ₹0.059 to ₹0.177 per call | Not available in the API today. Free public pages carry each provision, its amendment notes and the judgments that apply it | View source |
| Advocate search | Advocate name filter in case search and cause list search | Not available | View source |
| SDKs | None mentioned in their API documentation, and none found by name on npm or PyPI on 4 November 2026 | TypeScript and Python, both published | View source |
| MCP server | Hosted, 22 tools, connect by signing in through the client | Hosted and as an npm package, 25 tools, API key | View source |
| Free start | ₹200 once, all endpoints. Their FAQ says academic researchers, students, journalists and non profits can use the API free of charge | 2,500 credits once (₹250) plus 500 every month, excluding AI, meaning based search and live fetch | View source |
| Prepaid packs | ₹1,000, ₹2,500 and ₹5,000 plus GST, charged at three times their base rate. Credits never expire | ₹1,000, ₹5,000 and ₹20,000 with GST included, ₹0.10 down to ₹0.083 a credit. Credits never expire | View source |
| Monthly plan | ₹11,800 a month with GST included for 10,000 credits at their base rate. Unused credits do not roll over | Scale at ₹7,999 a month with GST included, 1,00,000 credits. Unused credits roll over up to 3,00,000 | View source |
| Enterprise entry point | Their monthly plan at ₹11,800 with GST included is bought online | Enterprise by contract, from ₹15,000 a month | View source |
| Rate limits | 100 a minute, 3,000 an hour and 50,000 a day on every partner account | 60 a minute and 20,000 a day on Pay As You Go, 120 and 1,00,000 on Scale | View source |
| Uptime statement | Their pricing page states a 99.9% uptime SLA. We found no published terms | A 99.5% monthly target for self serve plans and a 99.9% target in Enterprise contracts. We do not publish an uptime history yet | View source |
| Stated corpus size | States 35.3 crore plus case records on their API page | 318.9 million court records keyword searchable, counted on 3 November 2026 | View source |
| Published coverage you can check before buying | States courts covered and a headline record count | Per court, per year record counts and last ingest freshness published free, no API key needed | View source |
Checked 4 November 2026. Rows reading “we could not find” or “none found” record what was published on the pages we retrieved, not a claim that the capability does not exist; ask eCourtsIndia directly if it matters to your decision. Figures about CourtMesh come from the same constants that drive our own pricing and coverage pages, so they cannot drift apart from what we charge and publish elsewhere.
On comparing record counts
These two numbers do not measure the same unit and should not be read as a score. CourtMesh counts docket records, which includes a case, its status history and its orders. A reported judgment publisher counts documents it has published and edited. A larger number can mean broader coverage or simply a finer unit of counting, so treat both as a claim about scale rather than a ranking, and settle it with a recall test against your own case list.
Be honest about it
When to choose eCourtsIndia instead
We would rather you picked the right tool and came back later than bought the wrong one from us now.
Choose eCourtsIndia when
- You want cause lists, by search or by CNR, through an API.
- You need hearing history, advocates and order text returned from one case call.
- You want section text and old to new code equivalents, such as IPC to BNS, through an API.
- You want a digitally signed copy of an order, as they describe it, rather than a stored PDF.
- Refresh calls dominate your usage and you can use their Enterprise rate or their bulk call of up to 50 CNRs.
- You want a low price on a short AI summary of a single order, or you want to connect an AI client by signing in rather than pasting a key.
Choose CourtMesh when
- You are putting Indian court data inside your own product and the per call price of search, case record and PDF decides the build.
- You want a push when a case changes, through signed webhooks and a changes feed, rather than polling.
- You are screening parties at volume and most names return no match, where a no match costs ₹2.
- You want TypeScript or Python SDKs and a free tier that renews every month while you build.
- You want meaning based search or matter level AI analysis.
- You want per court and per year coverage with ingest freshness published openly, so you can test recall before you commit.
A note on the underlying records
Who owns what in an Indian judgment
This matters to any comparison of Indian legal research products, because it decides what each side can legitimately hold. In Eastern Book Company v. D.B. Modak, (2008) 1 SCC 1, the Supreme Court held that the raw judgment is in the public domain, while a publisher's copy edited version, headnotes, footnotes and paragraph numbering are that publisher's own protected work where they show skill and judgment. Section 52(1)(q) of the Copyright Act, 1957 places the reproduction of judicial pronouncements outside infringement.
The practical consequence runs both ways. CourtMesh ingests primary records from official court portals and does not ingest, reproduce or resell another publisher's headnotes, editorial summaries or paragraph numbering, which keeps our licensing position clean. It also means we have no editorial layer of our own to offer you, and nothing on this page quotes eCourtsIndia's.
Counsel review pending on this section.
FAQ
CourtMesh and eCourtsIndia, asked and answered
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Or go straight to the product: all comparisons, the Indian court cases API, the litigation check API, court case search, coverage and freshness, the MCP server or pricing.
Test it against your own case list
The only comparison that settles anything is a recall test on cases you already know. Sign up, get free API credits immediately, and run it yourself. No sales call, and no obligation to tell us the result.