Every federal MDL from the Judicial Panel's own reports · updated September 1, 2026Find your lawsuit →
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Methodology and sources

Every number on this site traces to a dated public document. This page says which documents, how we read them, and where the limits are.

The docket data

The United States Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation publishes an “MDL Statistics Report: Distribution of Pending MDL Dockets by Actions Pending” as a PDF on the first business day of each month, at jpml.uscourts.gov. It lists every pending MDL with its docket number, transferee district and judge, the litigation title, actions pending, and total actions historically.

We download each report and parse the table with a text extractor that preserves the layout. District and judge cells are blank on continuation rows in the Panel's PDF, so those values are carried forward from the row above. Litigation titles that wrap to a second line are rejoined. Each month's parsed record count is checked against the total printed on the report itself; a month is accepted only when the two match exactly.

The current series runs from Jan 2024 to Sep 2026: 32 monthly reports, 229 distinct dockets, 166 of them on the latest report. One report is missing from the series (Nov 2024): the Panel's PDF for that month omitted the numeric columns, so the count is unrecoverable from the public document. Charts show it as a gap rather than an estimate.

What the figures mean

  • Actions pending is the Panel's count of individual civil actions centralized in the MDL on the report date. It is a count of cases, not people, and includes cases that are stayed, in settlement processing, or awaiting dismissal.
  • Total actions, historical is every action that has ever been part of the docket.
  • Change columns subtract the same docket's figure on the earlier report. “n/a” means the docket was not on the earlier report.
  • First in series is the earliest report in our series showing the docket; for dockets older than Jan 2024 it is not the MDL's creation date.
  • Left the report means the docket is absent from a later report. The Panel closes an MDL when its cases are resolved or remanded; we keep the history.

The monthly report contains no information about rulings, trial dates, settlements or the merits of any claim. None of that is inferred from the counts.

Lawsuit records

The 22 plain-language lawsuit records add sections the docket report does not carry: what the filings allege, where the litigation stands, and who the court documents say it covers. Those sections are written from, in order of preference, court orders and case management orders, the transferee court's own MDL page, federal agency publications (FDA, EPA, CDC, HHS), official settlement-administrator sites, company statements and securities filings, and wire-service or legal-trade reporting. Plaintiff-side law-firm pages are used only to summarize what plaintiffs allege, and are labeled as such. Every record lists its sources with the date each was accessed.

Status labels are assigned from those sources on a stated date: active (cases proceeding), settled (a global or program settlement announced by the court or the parties), claims open (a settlement administrator is accepting registrations or claims), mostly dismissed (court rulings have ended the federal claims for most plaintiffs), closed. A label is a summary of the record, not a prediction.

Who qualifies quotes the eligibility definitions in the public record: master complaints, plaintiff fact sheets or profile forms, court orders on eligible claims, or a settlement's class definition. Where none of those is public yet, the section says so. Nothing on this site states that any individual has a valid claim.

What this site does not do

  • It does not project settlement amounts or per-person payouts. Where a concluded settlement's total has been stated by the court, the administrator or the paying company, the record may cite that figure with its source and date.
  • It does not host or accept claim forms. Settlement pages link to the court-appointed administrator.
  • It does not give legal advice, and it is not a law firm. See how we make money.
  • It does not use urgency language. Limitations periods exist and vary by state; that is stated as a fact where relevant, not as a countdown.

Corrections

If a figure, a status, or a source on this site is wrong, email hello@mlighthouse.com with the page and the document that shows the correct fact. Corrections are made on the page with the date of the change.

Current report: September 1, 2026.