Oklahoma's Supreme Court has established a three-year pilot in which speech-to-text software records district court hearings, while only a certified court reporter can certify the transcript that counts as the record

What the order sets up

The order finds that speech-to-text recording and cloud storage "could greatly benefit the operation of the District Court" where a court reporter cannot be present, and it orders a three-year, vendor-supported pilot in designated counties. The Administrative Office of the Courts is to equip courtrooms in those counties with the software. The pilot counties are chosen by the Administrative Director of the Courts, with the Chief Justice's approval. The order does not list them.

Rules 1.600 to 1.606 are attached as Exhibit A and are to be codified at Part XIV of the Oklahoma Supreme Court Rules. Rule 1.601(2) authorizes the technology "in all stages of civil or criminal proceedings." Rule 1.606 limits the whole set to district courts in the pilot counties, and it carves out case management, settlement conferences, continuing legal education and court administration.

Who certifies the record

Rule 1.605(1) is the one that matters to the profession. Only a certified court reporter may review, prepare and certify a transcript, and that certified transcript is the official record of the case. The recording and any machine-made preliminary transcript are, under Rule 1.605(2), judicial work product that does not constitute the official record.

So the software captures. A person certifies. For a certified reporter, the order reads as a change in where the work sits, not a removal of the credential from the record. The order itself says the pilot is meant to serve counties with a court reporter vacancy.

Access to recordings is closed

Rule 1.605(3) says the recordings, preliminary transcripts and their metadata "shall not be provided to parties pursuant to an administrative records request, Open Records request, or subpoena." Parties "may instead order a transcript of the hearing from a certified court reporter." Rule 1.605(4) adds that they are not filed in the case record and are not made available through OSCN.

Retention follows 20 O.S. section 1006 under Rule 1.605(5). We did not open that statute. For a litigator, the practical reading, which is ours and not the order's, is that a contested transcript in a pilot county could not be checked against the audio through ordinary discovery tools. Whether a court would allow access by some other route is not addressed in the rules we read.

No training on the recordings

The training bar sits inside a definition. Rule 1.600(2)(a) defines Speech to Text Recording and then says the recording, any part of the recording process, and the data or files generated in connection with it "shall not be used to train, develop, or improve any artificial intelligence or machine learning model."

That wording runs to the recording and its data generally. The rules we read do not say how a vendor would be held to it, and the order does not name a vendor. Any contract terms sit outside the document.

Judicial discretion, operator duties and waiver

Rule 1.602 lets the judge weigh, case by case, whether to permit the technology. The listed factors include whether the proponent was unable "after diligent effort" to procure a certified reporter, whether "a physical liberty or other fundamental interest" is at stake, and any waivers and stipulations. Rule 1.604 lets parties waive any right the rules provide or stipulate to a different procedure the court approves.

Rule 1.601(4) makes the judge or a designee the Operator, whose stated duty is to verify that the equipment works and that recording is taking place. Rule 1.603 requires log notes for each hearing, including operator name, case number, hearing type and the names of the judge, attorneys, parties and witnesses at first instance. Those logs are described as helping a certified reporter find portions of the recording.

Justice Combs dissented, writing that the majority adopted the rules "without asking or seeking input from the reporters Task Force formed in 2017." The order itself gives no reasons beyond its findings.

What we did not verify

We read the full order, Exhibit A (Rules 1.600 to 1.606) and the Combs dissent on the Oklahoma Supreme Court Network (OSCN), the court's own copy, and every quotation here was checked against that text. We also opened the Justia reproduction, which carries the same text. We have not seen a signed copy of the order on the court's letterhead, and OSCN does not mark its page as the official reporter version (it shows the P.3d cite as blank). We relied on a Journal Record report of 13 October 2026 only for context, and did not re-open it.

We did not find a start date, a list of pilot counties or a vendor in the order. A social media snippet in the sweep notes said the order takes effect on 1 November 2026. The order text we read does not say so, and we make no claim about a start date. We did not open 20 O.S. section 106.4 or section 1006, and we have not seen the Combs separate writing beyond the two paragraphs reproduced with the order.

We refuse to claim how many counties will take part, that any reporter will lose work, or how a court will treat a challenge to a pilot-county transcript. Those are inferences at most, and we have marked the one we offer.

Informational analysis for working professionals, not legal advice. Confirm how any rule applies to your situation with qualified counsel.

Related briefings

• Iowa Supreme Court Chapter 27 judicial AI rules
• Philippines Supreme Court AI judiciary framework
• New York Part 161 AI litigation rule
• North America AI regulation tracker
• AI Regulation News hub