Съдебна статистика на Общия съд - 2025 г.

An intense and productive year

2025 was an intense year for the General Court in many ways.

First, it was a renewal year. In June, two new judges joined the General Court to take up positions that had become vacant in October 2024; then, in September, four judges left the General Court and three new judges joined for six-year terms. Another vacant post has thus been added to the one which has remained open since October 2024. The General Court, theoretically composed of 54 judges, was never at full capacity, with a headcount of 51 judges up until June, 53 judges from June until September and 52 judges since September.

Yet despite having fewer judges, the General Court closed the largest number of cases in a calendar year in its history. Even with a record number of cases brought before the General Court, the stock of pending cases was reduced to its lowest level in 18 years. With a statistical correction which takes into account the delivery of a single judgment for 404 joined cases, the average duration of proceedings decreases significantly.

Lastly, as regards the requests for a preliminary ruling that have fallen within the jurisdiction of the General Court since October 2024, 2025 saw the delivery of the first judgments and the presentation of the first Opinions of Advocates General. The General Court has received a significant number of new requests for a preliminary ruling and has adapted its structure in this area by creating two specialised chambers to replace the preliminary ruling chamber, which was established on a transitional basis until September 2025.

Let’s take a closer look at this record-breaking year.

1. Cases brought: a sharp rise

The figures for 2025 show that the historically low number of cases brought in 2024 (786 new cases) was indeed linked to cyclical factors.

The General Court recorded the highest number of new cases in its history, with 989 cases brought before it, equivalent to a 26% increase on the previous year. Even leaving aside the 65 requests for preliminary rulings submitted in the areas transferred to the General Court, the figure of 924 direct actions and special forms of procedure exceeds those of the last five years. [1]

2025 marked the first full year since the reform of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union, whereby the Court of Justice’s preliminary ruling jurisdiction in certain specific areas was transferred to the General Court.

65 requests for a preliminary ruling were submitted to the General Court on matters within its jurisdiction. Of those requests, 24 concern the common system of value added tax, 18 relate to compensation and assistance of passengers in the event of denied boarding or of delay or cancellation of transport services, eight concern the Customs Code, seven relate to excise duties, seven to the tariff classification of goods under the Combined Nomenclature and one to the system for greenhouse gas emission allowance trading. The number is lower than the estimates made at the time of the legislative request, even though few cases relating to those specific matters were ultimately retained by the Court of Justice on the ground that they also concerned one or more matters other than those referred to in the first paragraph of Article 50b of the Statute or that they raised independent questions relating to the interpretation of primary law, public international law, general principles of EU law or the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. It should be noted that in 2025, out of 76 cases submitted to the ‘one-stop shop’ system, only nine were retained before the Court of Justice and two were dismissed.

The requests for a preliminary ruling came from 17 different Member States, with Germany contributing significantly to the total with 21 referrals, followed by Austria and Poland with seven referrals each, and Bulgaria with six. It is important to note that no fewer than 13 supreme courts, from thirteen different Member States, have referred cases falling within the jurisdiction of the General Court.

As regards direct actions, there has been a slight decrease in the number of cases filed concerning proceedings relating to intellectual property rights (257 compared to 268 in 2024, a decrease of 4%). The number of appeals lodged with the Boards of Appeal of the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) increased (+4.6%), but this increase was effectively counterbalanced by a decrease in the number of decisions handed down by those same Boards (-4.9%). The proportion of decisions taken by the Boards of Appeal of EUIPO challenged before the General Court is around 10%, remaining stable compared with previous years. It should be noted that this field, which has been assigned to seven specific chambers of the General Court since 22 September 2025, accounts for nearly 26% of the cases brought in 2025. Of these cases, 236 related to trademarks and 19 concerned designs. Two cases have been brought in the field of plant varieties against decisions adopted by the Community Plant Variety Office (CPVO). The majority (82%) of these cases involve the parties to the proceedings before the Boards of Appeal (inter partes cases).

There has been a significant increase in civil service cases brought in 2025 on the basis of Article 270 TFEU (109 compared to 76 in 2024, an increase of 43%). This field, which has been assigned to three specific chambers of the General Court since 22 September 2025, accounts for 11% of all cases brought in 2025. In addition to these 109 actions, there are 15 actions which, under the new definition of civil service cases, [2] fall within the scope of the three chambers’ jurisdiction under the heading ‘Civil service +’, as this new definition is not limited to appeals brought solely on the basis of Article 270 TFEU.

In the field of State aid, the number of cases brought in 2025 rose by four compared to 2024 (27 cases), while remaining well below the high levels the General Court has seen in the past. Lastly, as in 2023 and 2024, there were very few competition cases, with 12 new cases brought in 2025.

Litigation relating to restrictive measures continued to fuel the work of the General Court, with 105 new cases brought in 2025 (compared to 63 in 2024). These cases represent an even greater proportion of the total considering that, in some instances, rather than bringing a new action, applicants challenge new restrictive measures in the context of pending actions by filing an amendment to their application pursuant to Article 86 of the Rules of Procedure of the General Court. The vast majority of new cases in this field (84 out of 105) concern the series of restrictive measures adopted by the European Union in the context of the Russian Federation’s war against Ukraine, which includes the involvement of Belarus, the situation in the Republic of Moldova, Iran’s military support for Russia, and Russia’s destabilising activities targeting the European Union or its Member States. The other cases in this area relate to situations in the Syrian Arab Republic (twelve actions), the Republic of Tunisia (two actions), the Democratic Republic of the Congo (six actions) and Libya (one action). The majority of those appeals were submitted in English (57 actions) and French (37 actions).

Cases related to economic and monetary policy, a field which includes inter alia banking law, continue to see a marked decline (12 appeals lodged and one case referred in 2025, compared to 33 cases brought in 2024 and 56 in 2023). Four cases concern the re-adoption of the decision on ex ante contributions to the Single Resolution Fund for 2021, three new cases and the case referred back concern the adoption of decisions in the field of prudential supervision, two cases concern decisions by the Single Resolution Board to initiate resolution proceedings, and one case concerns the alleged failure of the Commission to fulfil its obligation to ensure that national legislation is compatible with EU monetary law. Finally, two appeals were lodged against the Council’s decision on the adoption of the euro by Bulgaria on 1 January 2026 and the related regulations, including one concerning the conversion rate between the euro and the lev.

Litigation relating to the regulation of digital markets and services saw seven cases brought in 2025. Three cases concern Regulation (EU) 2022/2065 on digital services (‘the Digital Services Act’ or ‘DSA’) and relate to the amount of the supervisory fee. Four cases concern Regulation (EU) 2022/1925 on digital markets (‘the Digital Markets Act’ or ‘DMA’). Two of those cases seek the annulment of the Commission’s decisions specifying the measures that the operator had to implement in its capacity as gatekeeper, while the other two cases seek the annulment of the decisions finding non-compliance with the obligations incumbent on gatekeepers.

Finally, as regards urgent proceedings, the number of applications for interim measures remained stable in 2025, staying around the average numbers seen over the last 10 years, with 40 applications.

2. The General Court’s activity: a record year

The total number of cases closed in 2025 is 1 527, but if the 404 essentially identical cases brought in October 2023 and closed in December 2025 (T‑620/23 to T‑1023/23) are treated as a single case, the figure stands at 1 124. It is the highest level in the General Court’s history, significantly higher than the previous record of 1 009 cases closed, which was set in 2018. Compared to the 922 cases closed in 2024, this represents an increase of around 22%.

Despite an unprecedented influx of new cases, the General Court has managed to reduce its stock of pending cases to 1 167, the lowest level since 2007. The case clearance rate, which reflects, in percentage form, the relationship between cases closed and cases brought, stands at 154% in gross figures and, excluding the 404 cases mentioned above, 114%. Applying the same correctional statistic, the theoretical disposition time for the number of pending cases, which is based on the ratio of pending cases to closed cases, is 379 days, the lowest in the General Court’s history. Taking into account the length of written proceedings and, in many cases, the time required to obtain translations of procedural documents, this means that the General Court is now able to proceed with most cases as soon as they are ready, without having to deal with cases in stock first. This also means that, working in a continuous flow, it will be difficult to close as many cases in 2026.

The efforts made by the General Court’s members and staff, with the support of the institution’s staff, have led to a very significant reduction in the duration of proceedings. The gross figure of 18.9 months does not fully reflect this improvement due to the statistical weight of the 404 cases mentioned above, which were essentially identical and took longer than average to resolve. However, if these cases are counted as one, the average duration of proceedings fell from 18.5 to 16.0 months.

Some points to note:

• the percentage of cases settled by five-judge formations, including the preliminary ruling chamber, stands at 35.6% in raw data, but, after statistical correction for the 404 essentially identical cases, it stands at 12.5%, down from 20.2% in 2024 and 13.6% in 2023;

• 8% of cases were closed by three-judge formations, a figure which rises to 82.7% in corrected data, compared to 75.4% in 2024;

• two cases were closed by the Grand Chamber, composed of fifteen judges, and for the first time, two by the Intermediate Chamber established in 2024, which is composed of nine judges;

• there were no cases decided by a single judge, compared to four in 2024 and nine in 2023;

• 39 interim relief proceedings were closed in 2025, which is similar to previous years (42 in 2024 and 40 in 2023);

• 4% of cases closed in 2025 were closed by judgment, which becomes 46.2% when adjusted to take into account the 404 cases that were essentially identical. 78.4% of cases closed by judgment were closed with a hearing, which should be adjusted to 61.7% in corrected data.

232 hearings were held in 2025 (also 232 in 2024, and 286 in 2023) for 689 cases pleaded (300 in 2024 and 419 in 2023).

Three hearings with videoconference were held in 2025 (two in 2024 and none in 2023).

It is useful to highlight some statistics concerning the handling of requests for a preliminary ruling submitted to the General Court, whose jurisdiction covers cases brought after 1 October 2024. In 2025, the General Court closed sixteen cases, eleven by order and five by judgment, while two judges elected to perform the task of Advocate General in these cases delivered six Opinions. The average duration of proceedings was 6.2 months, a figure that can be explained by the short duration of certain proceedings in which the referring court quickly withdrew its request. For cases settled by judgment, the average duration of proceedings was 10.9 months, which remains very low even when considering that five judgments were given without a hearing and without an Opinion.

Of the 1 167 pending cases before the General Court as at 31 December 2025, 276 (23.7%) concern intellectual property, 125 (10.7%) concern restrictive measures, 164 (14.1%) concern ‘Civil service +’, and 88 (7.5%) concern institutional law. Beyond these fields, which account for approximately half of the pending litigation, the remaining cases cover a wide range of areas, further demonstrating the great variety of matters brought before the General Court.

In conclusion, the General Court has achieved positive results after its first year of work since the entry into force of the reform resulting in the transfer to the General Court of preliminary ruling jurisdiction for certain matters. Through the organisational and institutional measures it has implemented and its sustained pace of work, the General Court demonstrates its responsiveness and its ability to anticipate needs in order to ensure the effective handling of cases within its jurisdiction.

[1]     For the purposes of the present comments, the series of 404 essentially identical cases in Spanish (T‑620/23 to T‑1023/23) brought in 2023 and closed in 2025 is considered to be a single case.

[2]     Since 23 September 2023, cases relating to employment relationships between the European Union and its staff have been included. Further, since 22 September 2025, cases concerning relations between the institutions, bodies and agencies of the European Union and their current or former staff, as well as persons who hold or have held a mandate within those institutions, bodies and agencies, have been included.