The second annual 9Sail Digital Visibility Index ranks all 200 Am Law firms across four components: Growth, Technical, AI Visibility, and Authority, and proves that revenue rank no longer predicts how firms appear in modern search.

9Sail today released the 2026 Am Law 200 Digital Visibility Index (DiVi), the legal industry’s only systematic, cohort-wide measurement of how the country’s largest law firms perform in modern search and AI-driven discovery environments. The full report, including the proprietary methodology, named firm-level rankings, and component-level analysis, is available for download here.

The report’s headline finding: the correlation between Am Law revenue rank and 2026 DiVi score is 0.05,statistically zero. How much money a law firm makes no longer predicts whether prospects can find that firm in modern search.

The 2026 cohort distribution makes the disconnect explicit. Twenty of the 25 firms in the 2026 DiVi top 25 rank outside Am Law’s top 50. The pattern is consistent: the brand value that has historically protected top-revenue firms from competitive displacement in client acquisition has lost its load-bearing function in the digital channel.

A Leading Indicator of Revenue Trajectory

A new structural finding from the 2025-to-2026 paired data: DiVi rank movement may now operate as a leading indicator of Am Law revenue rank movement two to three years out.

Across the 194 firms with comparable rankings in both indices, year-over-year Am Law rank change correlates with year-over-year DiVi rank change at r = 0.158, weakly positive, and the right directional sign for a leading indicator with an undeveloped lag window.

The off-diagonal quadrants carry the forward-looking weight. The 34 firms that climbed in Am Law revenue while falling in DiViTM are the cohort’s most likely 2027-2028 Am Law fallers; their brand-anchored revenue trajectory has not yet absorbed their digital decline. The 26 firms that fell in Am Law while climbing in DiVi are the cohort’s most likely 2027-2028 climbers. The 2027 DiVi report will test the prediction.
The Climbers Name a New Class of Leader
Baker Donelson, a 655-attorney firm headquartered in Memphis and ranked 102nd by Am Law revenue, sits at the top of the 2026 Digital Visibility Index. The firm climbed 99 positions year over year by executing across all four DiViTM components rather than relying on a single dimension. Baker Donelson is the 2026 thesis case: digital visibility is now governed by execution, not by scale.

Cole Schotz (DiVi #2, Am Law #166) and Proskauer (DiVi #3, Am Law #41) round out the top three. Cole Schotz posted +84% year-over-year organic traffic growth, the highest of any firm in the 2026 DiVi top ten. Proskauer is one of only two Am Law top-50 firms inside the 2026 DiVi top ten, demonstrating that Big Law firms can still win the index when they commit to disciplined digital execution rather than relying on accumulated brand equity.

The most dramatic single-year movement in the 2026 index belongs to Jackson Lewis. The national labor and employment firm climbed 152 positions to land at DiVi #8,from #160 a year ago. Eleven of the 25 firms in the 2026 DiVi top 25 gained more than 60 positions year over year. The climbers are not size-clustered, and they span every Am Law tier from #41 to #196.

AI Visibility Is the New Differentiator

The 2026 methodology introduces AI Visibility as a fourth scoring component, weighted at 20% of the composite score. It measures firms’ presence across ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Google AI Mode, and Gemini, plus the depth of their cited content surface and per-attorney citation efficiency.

ChatGPT, AI Overviews, AI Mode, and Gemini each have different leaders in the 2026 data; there is no single “best AI firm.” Holland & Knight holds the highest AI Visibility score in the cohort (95.4) on the strength of 4,100 cited pages indexed across AI surfaces. Baker Donelson holds the second-highest AI Surface Presence score. Mid-market firms dominate the per-attorney citation efficiency dimension, generating disproportionate AI surface relative to their bench size.

The implication for marketing leaders: AI Visibility is now a measurable competitive dimension on which firms are actively winning and losing, and it is moving fast enough that twelve months of inaction translates into measurable year-over-year rank loss in the index.

Methodology

The 2026 DiVi composite score is calculated as a weighted average of four component scores: Growth (30%), Technical (30%), AI Visibility (20%), and Authority (20%). Data sources include Semrush, Google PageSpeed Insights, 9Sail proprietary site crawl, and the ALM-published Am Law 200 (attorney headcount, firm name, revenue rank).

Read the Full Report

The complete 2026 Digital Visibility Index report includes the methodology evolution from 2025 to 2026, in-depth analysis of each of the four scoring components, cohort-level findings, firm spotlights,including Baker Donelson, Cole Schotz, Proskauer, Jackson Lewis, McDermott Will & Emery, and Hinshaw,and a 2027 methodology preview. Download the full report → 2026 Am Law 200 Digital Visibility Report

2026 DIGITAL VISIBILITY REPORT

Digital Visibility Index

Rank	Firm	Am Law Rank	DiVi Score	YoY Move
1	Baker Donelson	#102	86.5	+99
2	Cole Schotz	#166	80.8	+82
3	Proskauer	#41	79.0	+92
4	Freeman Mathis & Gary	#172	78.9	+104
5	Morgan Lewis	#11	76.1	+64
6	Susman Godfrey	#92	75.8	+49
7	Holland & Hart	#111	75.8	+2
8	Jackson Lewis	#79	75.6	+152
9	Goldberg Segalla	#167	75.6	+66
10	Cox, Castle & Nicholson	#190	75.6	+12
11	Cole Scott	#138	75.5	+65
12	Shumaker	#176	75.4	+45
13	Fredrikson & Byron	#145	75.0	—
14	Dickinson Wright	#121	74.9	+2
15	Skadden	#5	74.9	+11
16	Nelson Mullins	#60	74.8	+66
17	Clark Hill	#113	74.5	+22
18	Buchalter	#117	74.2	+27
19	Thompson Coburn	#142	74.1	+52
20	Davis Polk	#14	73.8	−1
21	Holland & Knight	#26	73.8	+17
22	Husch Blackwell	#82	73.6	−7
23	Lewis Brisbois	#72	73.6	+31
24	Marshall Dennehey	#143	73.5	+6
25	Carlton Fields	#155	73.3	−12
26	Alston & Bird	#44	73.2	+15
27	Jones Day	#15	73.1	+23
28	Epstein Becker & Green	#149	73.0	−24
29	Rutan & Tucker	#198	72.6	+29
30	Venable	#68	72.6	+60
31	Maynard Nexsen	#120	72.5	+30
32	Benesch	#116	72.2	+41
33	Davis Wright	#90	72.0	−8
34	Choate Hall	#122	72.0	+44
35	Faegre Drinker	#56	72.0	+98
36	Akerman	#96	71.5	−33
37	Wiley Rein	#160	71.3	+115
38	Greenspoon Marder	#179	71.0	−37
39	Snell & Wilmer	#109	70.9	+38
40	Brownstein	#140	70.9	+66
41	Buchanan Ingersoll	#131	70.9	+102
42	Fenwick	#69	70.8	−32
43	Baker & Hostetler	#59	70.7	+84
44	Ogletree Deakins	#77	70.5	−20
45	Gibson Dunn	#4	70.4	−38
46	Herrick	#196	70.0	+88
47	Williams Mullen	#174	69.8	−19
48	O’Melveny	#57	69.8	+3
49	Spencer Fane	#118	69.6	−38
50	Dinsmore	#112	69.5	+66
51	Debevoise	#35	69.5	+2
52	Haynes and Boone	#85	69.4	−32
53	Ballard Spahr	#89	69.1	+116
54	Saul Ewing	#136	69.1	+82
55	GrayRobinson	#183	69.0	−20
56	Stinson	#130	68.4	+99
57	McCarter & English	#132	68.2	−14
58	Hanson Bridgett	#189	68.0	−31
59	Littler	#62	68.0	−45
60	Hodgson Russ	#185	68.0	+6
61	Troutman Pepper Locke	#33	67.8	+62
62	Wachtell	#46	67.7	−2
63	Crowell & Moring	#86	67.6	+25
64	Chapman and Cutler	#124	67.1	−46
65	Dorsey	#99	67.1	+40
66	Nixon Peabody	#88	67.0	+118
67	Loeb & Loeb	#108	66.8	+114
68	Fried Frank	#52	66.0	−3
69	Gordon Rees	#70	65.5	+57
70	Vorys	#126	65.4	+113
71	Cahill	#107	65.3	−24
72	Offit Kurman	#180	65.3	+65
73	McGuireWoods	#54	65.0	+47
74	Squire Patton	#45	64.9	+15
75	Sidley	#6	64.8	+17
76	Knobbe Martens	#152	64.6	+62
77	Blank Rome	#73	64.4	+36
78	ArentFox Schiff	#91	64.4	−47
79	Mayer Brown	#27	64.1	−42
80	Stoel Rives	#139	64.0	+13
81	Arnall Golden	#184	63.9	−14
82	Seyfarth	#63	63.8	+84
83	Morrison & Foerster	#42	63.5	+35
84	Day Pitney	#161	63.2	−35
85	Stevens & Lee	#187	63.0	—
86	Munger Tolles	#128	62.7	−54
87	Wilmer	#38	62.2	−7
88	Goodwin Procter	#21	62.1	−1
89	Paul Weiss	#13	61.9	−37
90	Stradley Ronon Stevens & Young	#173	61.5	—
91	Foley & Lardner	#43	61.4	−49
92	Smith Gambrell	#164	61.1	−44
93	Bradley Arant	#100	60.6	−10
94	DLA Piper	#3	60.5	+37
95	Weil	#29	60.0	+33
96	Sheppard	#47	59.8	+36
97	Shook Hardy	#93	59.0	+13
98	Arnold & Porter	#53	59.0	+31
99	Thompson Hine	#137	58.9	+57
100	Perkins Coie	#51	58.9	+51
101	Cadwalader	#97	58.8	−38
102	Gunderson Dettmer	#101	58.5	−6
103	Foley Hoag	#134	58.5	−24
104	Mintz Levin	#83	58.2	+86
105	Sullivan & Cromwell	#25	57.9	−100
106	Jenner & Block	#81	57.9	−8
107	Dechert	#39	57.9	−51
108	Lathrop GPM	#154	57.8	−96
109	Dykema	#151	57.5	−15
110	Fennemore Craig	#171	57.3	−81
111	Katten	#66	57.0	−71
112	Cooley	#24	56.9	−95
113	Vedder Price	#123	56.8	−80
114	Winstead	#133	56.5	+16
115	Taft	#61	56.4	+27
116	Fragomen	#74	56.0	+33
117	Bracewell	#125	55.8	+60
118	Tucker Ellis	#194	55.7	−59
119	Patterson Belknap	#158	55.6	+35
120	Fox Rothschild	#71	55.5	+73
121	Winston & Strawn	#49	55.3	+50
122	Lowenstein Sandler	#104	55.1	−48
123	Adams and Reese	#177	54.8	−16
124	Boies Schiller	#153	54.7	+49
125	Hinckley Allen	#200	54.5	—
126	Fisher & Phillips	#110	54.4	+70
127	Baker Botts	#75	54.4	−63
128	Eckert Seamans	#193	54.4	—
129	Quarles & Brady	#115	54.3	−26
130	Paul Hastings	#22	53.9	−58
131	Honigman	#114	53.9	+31
132	Duane Morris	#84	53.9	+43
133	Ice Miller	#144	53.8	−18
134	Norton Rose	#19	53.6	+1
135	Jackson Walker	#105	53.5	+45
136	Hinshaw	#150	53.3	−134
137	Butler Snow	#156	53.3	−18
138	Kobre & Kim	#165	53.3	−76
139	White & Case	#9	53.2	−95
140	Akin	#36	53.1	−39
141	Seward & Kissel	#178	53.1	−27
142	K&L Gates	#48	52.9	−40
143	Michael Best	#163	52.9	−21
144	Sullivan & Worcester	#195	52.7	—
145	Cozen O’Connor	#80	52.7	−21
146	Frost Brown	#119	52.7	−78
147	Burr & Forman	#147	52.6	−6
148	Brown Rudnick	#141	52.6	−2
149	Cleary Gottlieb	#32	52.6	−141
150	Armstrong Teasdale	#181	52.4	−69
151	Hunton Andrews	#64	52.3	+12
152	Bond Schoeneck	#188	52.0	+39
153	Robins Kaplan	#191	51.8	+14
154	Cravath	#50	51.6	+20
155	Simpson Thacher	#10	51.5	+24
156	Kutak Rock	#129	51.2	−120
157	Kasowitz	#168	51.0	−17
158	Baker McKenzie	#8	50.7	−61
159	Kirkland	#1	50.4	−11
160	Latham	#2	50.4	+35
161	Fish	#103	50.2	−14
162	Wilson Sonsini	#37	49.8	−23
163	Dentons	#18	49.7	+2
164	Pryor Cashman	#169	49.6	+18
165	Porter Wright	#192	49.6	−53
166	Barnes & Thornburg	#78	49.5	−145
167	Allen Matkins	#148	49.1	−97
168	Kelley Drye	#146	49.1	−24
169	Ropes & Gray	#7	49.0	+19
170	Goulston & Storrs	#162	48.7	−164
171	Pillsbury	#65	48.6	−3
172	Womble Bond	#76	48.4	+14
173	Orrick	#34	48.0	+24
174	Phelps Dunbar	#157	47.9	−21
175	King & Spalding	#23	47.7	−76
176	Hughes Hubbard	#159	47.6	—
177	Moore & Van Allen	#135	47.4	−73
178	Vinson & Elkins	#58	47.4	−144
179	Greenberg Traurig	#17	47.3	−15
180	Finnegan	#127	47.1	−134
181	Milbank	#28	46.7	−36
182	Bryan Cave	#67	46.6	−71
183	UB Greensfelder	#197	46.5	−26
184	Shutts & Bowen	#170	45.3	+3
185	Atkinson, Andelson, Loya, Ruud & Romo	#182	45.3	−27
186	Williams & Connolly	#87	44.8	−25
187	Kilpatrick Townsend	#95	44.3	+2
188	Hogan Lovells	#12	44.2	−16
189	Reed Smith	#40	44.2	+3
190	McDermott	#16	44.0	−105
191	Manatt	#106	43.9	−6
192	Covington	#30	43.7	−71
193	Procopio Cory	#199	43.6	−23
194	Steptoe	#98	43.4	−85
195	Wilson Elser	#94	43.3	−78
196	Robinson & Cole	#175	43.2	−18
197	Polsinelli	#55	42.2	−47
198	Quinn Emanuel	#20	41.8	—
199	Willkie	#31	40.6	−5
200	Miles & Stockbridge	#186	39.5	−41

DiVi Score measures organic search and AI-answer visibility across each firm’s practice areas. YoY Move is the change in DiVi rank since the 2025 index — ▲ climbers in red, fallers in slate.

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