About Lexpert

Lexpert

Overview

Lexpert is a Toronto-based legal rankings, directory and media brand serving Canada's business-law community. Its flagship product is the Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory, the annual peer-survey guide to Canada's leading lawyers and law firms, first published in 1997. Around that directory, Lexpert publishes legal-business journalism and analysis on lexpert.ca — sections include Legal Insights, Big Deals coverage of major transactions, Lawyer Spotlight profiles and Lexpert TV — and produces magazine-format Lexpert Special Editions distributed with The Globe and Mail's Report on Business magazine, as well as two awards programmes, the Lexpert Rising Stars awards for leading lawyers under 40 and the Canadian Law Awards. Lexpert is published by Key Media through its Canadian arm, HAB Press, which acquired the brand from Thomson Reuters in April 2019, in the same transaction as its sister titles Canadian Lawyer and Law Times. The brand is actively operating in 2026: the 30th edition of the Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory was released for 2026, lexpert.ca was promoting a Lexpert Special Edition: Finance 2026, and the site carried material for the Canadian Law Awards 2026 when this profile was prepared.

History

Lexpert's rankings rest on survey research that law-firm accounts of the directory date to 1994; the Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory itself was first published in 1997 and appeared annually thereafter. For most of its life the brand belonged to Thomson — later Thomson Reuters — where it sat in the Thomson Reuters Media Solutions division alongside Canadian Lawyer, Law Times, the Canadian Law List and the group's human-resources titles. Lexpert print special editions, profiling ranked lawyers and analysing practice areas, were distributed as supplements in The Globe and Mail's Report on Business magazine, a channel the brand still uses. On April 1, 2019, HAB Press Limited acquired Lexpert, Canadian Lawyer, Canadian Lawyer InHouse, the Canadian Law List, Law Times, Canadian HR Reporter and Canadian Occupational Safety from Thomson Reuters, including their digital, print, event and directory assets. HAB Press is the Canadian arm of Key Media, the Sydney-founded business-media group; Tim Duce, Key Media's president and CEO for North America and the U.K., told Media in Canada the group saw potential for the acquired brands to complement its existing offering and be positioned for long-term success. Under Key Media, Lexpert presented the first Canadian Law Awards in 2020 — nominations opened in December 2019, and the inaugural gala, planned for the Fairmont Royal York in Toronto, was held virtually on October 6, 2020 — while the directory continued its annual cycle uninterrupted, reaching its 30th edition in 2026.

Content and Coverage

The directory is the core product. Lexpert describes its method as peer recognition: lawyers across Canada are surveyed and invited to evaluate colleagues in specific practice areas, and those identified by their peers are listed as Lexpert-ranked. For the 30th edition, Lexpert reported issuing 24,829 survey requests to lawyers at law firms across Canada and receiving 18,222 completed surveys, a response rate of 73.39 per cent — figures from Lexpert's own announcement of the 2026 rankings. The 2026 directory profiles leading practitioners in 69 practice areas and leading law firms in 42 practice areas, from corporate and commercial law to litigation, regulatory and tax work. Around the rankings, lexpert.ca publishes Legal Insights — analysis and commentary, much of it by practising lawyers, on subjects such as AI due diligence and corporate reputation management — and Big Deals, its running record of significant Canadian transactions and the firms advising on them. Print-format journalism appears in the Lexpert Special Editions carried by Report on Business magazine: the line has included Finance, Litigation and Energy editions, and winners of the brand's awards are featured in dedicated special editions, as the 2020 Rising Stars were in the Lexpert Special Edition: Energy & Rising Stars. The awards are the brand's other public face. Lexpert Rising Stars: Leading Lawyers Under 40 honours younger lawyers each year for their contributions to their firms, the profession and the community; the programme runs under Lexus sponsorship, and lexpert.ca carried highlights of the 2025 event. The Canadian Law Awards, presented by Lexpert and organised by Key Media, opened nominations in December 2019 in more than 30 categories — among them Canadian Deal of the Year, Law Department of the Year and Managing Partner of the Year — judged by an independent panel; the first edition, held virtually in October 2020, presented awards in 29 categories assessed by 57 judges, on Lexpert's own report.

Audience and Reach

Lexpert addresses the senior end of the Canadian legal market. In its own description, the directory's rankings and profiles are consulted by in-house counsel, corporate decision-makers, law firm leaders and international clients seeking reliable guidance on whom to instruct in Canada. The same audience — general counsel, managing partners and the lawyers who advise on major transactions — reads its Big Deals coverage and special editions and attends its awards events; the Canadian Law Awards' first in-person gala, in 2022, was a sold-out event at Toronto's Arcadian Court. No independently audited audience or circulation figure for Lexpert is published, and this profile asserts none: the measurable evidence of reach is the directory's own research base — more than 18,000 completed peer surveys for the 2026 edition, on Lexpert's own reporting — and the profession's habit, visible in hundreds of law-firm announcements each year, of publicising its lawyers' Lexpert rankings.

Digital Presence

Lexpert's home is lexpert.ca, operated on Key Media's publishing platform, where the directory rankings are searchable online and the brand's news, insights, deals coverage and videos are published continuously. Lexpert TV carries event coverage and interviews, including highlights packages for the Canadian Law Awards — the 2026 edition was featured on the site when this profile was prepared — and the Lexus-sponsored Rising Stars. The brand invites readers to sign up for its free daily newsletter, and its awards have their own web presences: the Canadian Law Awards at lawawards.ca and Lexpert Rising Stars at risingstarscanada.com. Print survives in the directory tradition and in the special editions inserted in The Globe and Mail's Report on Business magazine, but the centre of gravity is now the website, where the annual rankings are released.

Ownership and Organisation

Lexpert is owned by Key Media, the international business-media group founded in Sydney, Australia, in the early 2000s, and is published in Canada by HAB Press Limited, Key Media's Toronto-based Canadian arm. The April 2019 acquisition from Thomson Reuters Media Solutions made Lexpert part of a Canadian legal portfolio that also includes Canadian Lawyer, Canadian Lawyer InHouse, the Canadian Law List and Law Times — all presented as partners on lexpert.ca — alongside Key Media Canada's human-resources titles. Key Media describes itself as a platform-neutral niche publisher reaching professional audiences online, in print and at events; its Canadian legal titles share a Toronto newsroom and cross-promote one another's surveys, rankings and awards, with the Canadian Law Awards presented by Lexpert and supported by Canadian Lawyer and InHouse. The directory operation runs its annual peer-survey cycle from Toronto, and the brand's editorial output is bylined by its own contributors and by practising lawyers across the country.

Contact and Availability

The Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory is published annually; its rankings are freely searchable at lexpert.ca, and law-firm releases for the 2026 edition directed media enquiries about the directory to the Lexpert directory team at cdndirectory@lexpert.ca. Lexpert Special Editions are distributed with The Globe and Mail's Report on Business magazine in Canada. The Canadian Law Awards and Lexpert Rising Stars accept nominations through their respective websites, lawawards.ca and risingstarscanada.com. Lexpert is published in English from Toronto, Ontario, by HAB Press (Key Media).