Smokeball
Legal practice management software: less admin, more time for the clients who need you most.
By Smokeball · HQ Chicago, US · 4.0/5 verified-buyer score
Positioning guardrails
Best for
- Solo lawyers and small law firms (roughly 1–20 staff) that want matter management, billing and trust accounting in one place
- Firms standardised on Microsoft Word and Outlook that want document automation, eSignature and eFiling built in
- Practices losing billable time to manual timekeeping that want automatic time capture and accurate invoices
- Growing firms that need lead intake, workflows and firm-level profitability reporting as they add staff
- US, UK and Australian firms that value guided onboarding and local phone support
Ideal size: 1–20 staff people · Solo, small or growing law firm, typically Microsoft 365-based
Not for
- Enterprise legal departments or very large firms needing bespoke, on-premise or heavily customised deployments
- Non-legal businesses, since templates, workflows and trust accounting are law-firm specific
- Buyers who want publicly listed pricing and a fully self-serve purchase without a sales call
Value metrics scorecard
Time-to-Value
About 1 month with guided onboarding
~30 days to first production value
Total Cost of Ownership
$0/yr
Starts at $0 · Per-user annual subscription, quoted by the vendor across four plans (Bill, Boost, Grow, Prosper+); price depends on user count, plan, contract term and optional products.
Implementation Friction
3/5
Engineering + admin effort required
Buyer Score
out of 5 · verified buyers
Full cost breakdown
Mandatory implementation fee
None
Seat tiers
No limit on firm users or clients; plan choice is driven by firm size, workflows and features required.
Add-on costs
- Archie AI assistant (add-on on Boost, Grow and Prosper+)
- Intake (add-on on Boost and Grow; included in Prosper+)
- AutoTime automatic time capture (add-on on Grow; included in Prosper+)
- Workflows (add-on on Grow; included in Prosper+)
- FamilyPro add-on
- eFiling, online payments and email marketing: fees apply
Company & support
Who is behind Smokeball, and how your team gets help once it is live.
Company
- Founded
- 2013 · 13 yrs in business
- Headquarters
- Chicago, US
How you get support
- PhoneAll plans
- EmailAll plans
- Live chatNot listed
- Support portal / ticketsNot listed
- Community forumNot listed
- Help centre / docsAll plans
- Dedicated account managerNot listed
- In person / on-siteNot listed
- Hours
- Business hours
- Response time
- Email support replies within one business day
Onboarding, live training sessions and Smokeball Academy resources are included with every plan.
“Not listed” means the vendor’s public pages don’t mention that channel, not that it is unavailable. Ask about it during evaluation.
Market position
Where Smokeball sits relative to every other solution in the database. Toggle axes to compare on cost, speed, friction, or buyer score.
Quadrant view
Implementation friction × Verified buyer score
Stack fit signal
Compatibility with standard B2B ecosystems.
No supported MCP path today, so it cannot be driven from an AI client.
AI & MCP readiness
What Smokeball ships in AI, and what it asks of your ecosystem.
AI features shipped
Archie is an AI matter assistant that drafts and reviews documents and answers questions inside a matter; Smokeball AI also powers Intake and Communicate. The vendor states customer data is not provided to third parties for AI model training and that AI access follows firm, matter and user permissions.
In your ecosystem
- AI connection
- Not supported
- Model key
- Not recorded
- AI usage audit
- Not recorded
Industry verdicts
How Smokeball speaks to each vertical it serves — same data, sector lens.
Professional ServicesBill hours faster, staff smarter.
Best for in Professional Services
- Solo and small law firms (1–20 staff) in family law, estate planning, personal injury, real estate and civil litigation
- Firms standardised on Microsoft Word and Outlook that want document automation, eSignature and eFiling in one system
- Practices that lose billable hours to manual timekeeping and want automatic time capture plus trust accounting
- Growing firms needing lead intake, workflows and profitability reporting as they add staff
Not for
- Enterprise legal departments and very large firms requiring bespoke, on-premise or heavily customised deployments
- Non-legal businesses, since the product and its template library are law-firm specific
- Buyers who require published list pricing and a fully self-serve purchase
Legal services is Smokeball's only vertical: the company describes itself as powering "people-law" and publishes case studies across family law, estate planning, personal injury, real estate, probate, immigration, criminal defence, business law and general civil litigation, mostly in the US with coverage in Australia and the UK. Typical adopters are solo practitioners and firms of 1–20 staff that want one system for intake, matters, documents, time capture, billing and trust accounting. Best fit is a Microsoft 365-based firm that wants automatic time tracking and document automation; poor fit for large enterprise legal departments or firms needing bespoke on-premise deployments.
Compliance attestations
* IAPP AIGP certifies individuals, not products. It means named staff hold the credential — not that the platform does.
Bottom line
Smokeball is legal practice management software for solo, small and growing law firms, mainly in the US, UK and Australia. It unifies matter and document management, automatic time capture, billing and trust accounting, intake and native Word/Outlook integration, plus Archie, an AI matter assistant. Four quote-based plans (Bill, Boost, Grow, Prosper+) scale from billing-only to full firm management, and onboarding and training are included. ISO 27001 certification and AWS hosting ease security review.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Smokeball cost?
Pricing is quote-based and depends on the number of users, your chosen plan, contract term and any optional products or services. Smokeball publishes four plans — Bill, Boost, Grow and Prosper+ — and asks firms to request a personalised, no-obligation quote. No list price is published.
How long does it take to get up and running?
Every plan includes onboarding, and data migration options are available for firms moving from another system. Training is delivered through live sessions, guided resources and the Smokeball Academy, and migration scope and cost are confirmed in your quote. Firms should budget several weeks for migration, training and workflow configuration.
What AI does Smokeball include, and on which plans?
Archie, the AI matter assistant, drafts and reviews documents and answers questions inside a matter; it is an add-on on Boost, Grow and Prosper+. Smokeball AI also powers Intake and Communicate on higher plans. AutoTime automatic time capture is included with Prosper+ and is an add-on for Grow.
How secure is Smokeball, and is it safe for AI use?
Smokeball is ISO 27001 certified and hosts on AWS across multiple Availability Zones, with AES-256 encryption at rest, TLS 1.2+ in transit, MFA and role-based access control. Archie AI access is limited by firm, matter and user permissions, and Smokeball states it does not provide customer data to third parties for AI model training.
Does Smokeball integrate with Microsoft 365 and other tools?
Yes. Boost and above include native Microsoft 365 Outlook and Word integration, and accounting integrations are available from Boost onward. Smokeball also publishes a marketplace of roughly 179 partners covering payments, bookkeeping, eSign, eFiling, VoIP, legal research and practice-area tools.
Is there a minimum number of users?
No. Smokeball states there is no limit to the number of firm users or clients who can use the software at the same time. Plans are chosen by firm size, workflows and required capabilities, and firms can upgrade or downgrade at renewal.