Portugal
EU-level rules also apply — The EU AI Act applies directly and Portugal has no standalone national AI statute. Per Legal 500, ANACOM leads coordination among fourteen sectoral authorities designated under article 77. The CSM Recommendations cite Annex III point 8(a) to classify judicial AI as high risk.
Regulation Tracker · Country · Europe
Portugal
Developingcivil lawupdated 2026-09-04verified 2026-09-04
EU-level rules also apply — see the European Union record →
As of 4 September 2026 Portugal's rules come from the judiciary rather than the bar: the High Council of the Judiciary adopted Recommendations on AI in judicial activity on 8 April 2026, requiring judges to declare AI use in decisions and to use only validated tools. The Guimaraes Court of Appeal censured a lawyer for six invented precedents.
As of 2026-09-04, Portugal has 1 binding rule, official guidance in 5 categories, 0 proposals and 2 positions set only by case law across the 20 categories in the map. Binding rules cover horizontal AI statute. In 10 categories we found nothing; in 2 the position is not yet determined.
How to read this page
- Binding rule Binding rule means a rule in force from a court, statute, regulator or equivalent authority.
- Official guidance Official guidance means an official non-binding position from a judiciary, regulator, bar or public body.
- Proposed / consultation Proposed / consultation means a public bill, draft rule or consultation that is not yet in force.
- Set by case law Set by case law means no rule was found, but courts have set the position in decisions.
- Nothing found Nothing found means the category was checked and no rule, guidance, proposal or case-law position was found.
- Not yet determined Not yet determined means research did not establish a reliable position yet.
The rules, category by category
CSM Recommendations on the use of AI in judicial activity, approved by the Plenario on 8 April 2026: ten principles covering effective human control, non-substitution, judicial responsibility, independence, confidentiality, bias prevention, proportionality, training and transparency; only systems supplied by the case-management system or the CSM may be used.
CSM Recommendations, principle 2 and Recommendation 7: AI may never replace judges in deciding, evaluating facts or evidence, or interpreting and applying the law; AI-generated content must not enter decisions without full personal validation, and no profiling or risk-scoring beyond what the law authorises is permitted.
CSM Recommendations 4, 5 and 9: judges should use only AI systems provided through the statutory case-management system or by the CSM, which are subject to CSM control and presumed to meet security, traceability and no-reuse requirements. The CSM also approved an AI monitoring group and a supervision structure.
CSM principle 9: judges must receive training on AI in the administration of justice. Bar training is voluntary.
CSM Recommendation 9: AI systems used by judges must embed security, access control, traceability and no-reuse measures, and systems supplied or validated by the CSM are presumed compliant. There is no vendor guidance for lawyers beyond the CCBE technical guide.
The Guimaraes Court of Appeal on 10 February 2026 called citing six non-existent appellate and Supreme Court rulings absolutely inadmissible, stressed higher standards for legal professionals and suggested referral to the bar. For judges, CSM Recommendation 6 requires complete, critical personal review of any AI draft.
The Guimaraes Court of Appeal on 10 February 2026 ordered 5 UC in costs, about 500 euro, and suggested bar referral for six invented precedents. On the bench side, the CSM opened an inquiry in February 2025 into three Lisbon appeal judges over a judgment in which twelve of fourteen cited rulings did not exist.
No rule requires parties or lawyers to disclose AI use in filings as of 4 September 2026; the CSM declaration duty applies to judges' decisions only.
No court guidance for self-represented litigants on AI found as of 4 September 2026.
No evidence rule or guidance on AI-generated or deepfake evidence found as of 4 September 2026.
No bar rule or guidance on client data in AI tools as of 4 September 2026; commentary in April 2026 criticised the bar for issuing only generic communications. For judges, CSM Recommendations 8 and 9 bar judicial data in non-validated systems.
No AI-specific competence rule for lawyers; the general duties in the bar statute apply. The bar ran a voluntary course on responsible AI in legal practice from September to November 2025 with more than two thousand registrations.
No rule or guidance on supervising AI-assisted work by staff found as of 4 September 2026.
No rule or guidance on informing clients about AI use found as of 4 September 2026.
No rule or opinion on billing for AI-assisted work found as of 4 September 2026.
No ruling or regulation on consumer AI legal products found as of 4 September 2026.
The Portuguese Bar Association has published no generative-AI guidelines as of 4 September 2026; it offers training and links to EU material, and members rely on the CCBE guide.
The data-protection commission is reported to have warned in May 2025 about personal data in AI training and to lead an international generative-AI working group, but no document specific to legal services was located. CSM Recommendation 9 sets GDPR principles for judges' AI use.
Not researched because the research budget was exhausted.
Official documents recorded for Portugal (2)
- CSM Recommendations on the use of artificial intelligence in judicial activity (Recomendacoes no uso de IA)
CSM · revised 2026-04-08 · verified 2026-09-04
- Tribunal da Relacao de Guimaraes, 10 Feb 2026: six non-existent appellate rulings generated by AI
TRG · revised 2026-02-10 · verified 2026-09-04
Court incidents on the record in Portugal
- Yichang District Court (Hubei)2026-07-21 Warning
Cite this page
SafeLegalAI Legal AI Regulation Tracker, "Portugal" (updated 2026-09-04, verified 2026-09-04), https://safelegalai.com/regulation/country/pt (accessed 2026-09-04). Data: CC BY 4.0.
SafeLegalAI is a research publication by Cognesio LLP, not a law firm. Nothing here is legal advice, and no lawyer–client relationship arises from reading it. Rules change; always check the official document linked on each record and take advice on your own situation. Researched and drafted with AI assistance; verified against primary sources and edited by Cognesio LLP. The linked official documents are the record — our summaries are not the law and are not legal advice.