M&A Lawyers Index 2.0: Latham and Skadden Lead AI Answers

Latham & Watkins was the firm or lawyer that ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity named most often. Latham & Watkins appeared in 241 of 288 answers (83.7%) measured on October 28, 2026. Skadden came next at 218 of 288 (75.7%). The two confidence intervals overlap, so the data cannot confirm that Latham & Watkins is ahead. Latham & Watkins was named first more often than any other firm or lawyer, in 92 of 288 answers. Google AI Overviews appeared on 65 of 65 searches (100%).

Appearance rate across 288 four-engine answers. The bar is the 95% confidence interval; overlapping bars cannot be told apart at this sample size.

The full list

Own-domain citation is the share of 288 grounded answers that cited the entity's own domains (subdomains included). Citation share is of all 2,564 citations.

The top eight, side by side

Claude named Kirkland & Ellis in 65 of 72 answers. The other engines did so in 24 to 51 of 72. Claude named Davis Polk in 36 of 72 answers. The other engines did so in 15 to 24 of 72.

ChatGPT

72 asked · 72 returned · 72 grounded

Claude

72 asked · 72 returned · 72 grounded

Gemini

72 asked · 72 returned · 72 grounded

Perplexity

72 asked · 72 returned · 72 grounded

Google AI Overviews were captured through 65 U.S. desktop searches and scored only where an overview appeared, so five-engine figures use 288 + 65 = 353 answers.

Google AI Overviews appeared on 65 of 65 searches (100%, CI 94.4–100%). The other 0 searches showed no overview. Within the 65 overviews, Latham & Watkins was named in 41 (63.1%), Kirkland & Ellis was named in 34 (52.3%), Skadden was named in 31 (47.7%), Paul Weiss was named in 23 (35.4%). legal500.com was the most-cited source, with 18 citations and an appearance in 15 of 65 overviews.

Who each question surfaces first

Six questions from the set. Each tile uses that question's own four-engine answers as the denominator.

The four engines produced 2,564 citations in total. chambers.com was cited most often, with 156 citations (6.1%) across 104 answers. Next came lw.com (155), skadden.com (120), legal500.com (109), leadersleague.com (75), privatebankerinternational.com (60).

Four AI engines · share of 288 grounded answers

Google AI Overviews · share of 65 overviews

Citation share by source type

Share of all citations by the type of site cited. Source types were reclassified on October 29, 2026. 'Company / brand sites' now covers only the official sites of companies, brands and schools; publishers, directories, trade bodies and other sites have their own types, and sites that could not be placed are 'Other / unclassified'.

How can firms and lawyers improve their AI visibility?

These steps follow from the measured results above. They describe what the engines cited in this study and are not a guarantee of results.

How this study was measured

24 questions × 3 runs each × 4 AI engines = 288 answers + 65 Google searches · 65 AI Overviews

24 questions, each asked 3 times on each engine, measured October 28, 2026. Market: United States, English. The destination site was not mentioned to any engine. Gemini answers were produced by gemini-3.6-flash; every Gemini answer in this report used that one model. All 72 Gemini answers had search sources. Entities count as named when they appear in the answer text; products and name variants roll up to the tracked name, and people are matched with middle names or initials, nicknames, possessives and suffixes. First-name variants (for example Jeffrey for Jeff, William for Bill) are matched, but only together with the tracked last name. Law firms are also counted by their common short name (for example Weil for Weil Gotshal, Akin for Akin Gump), matched case-sensitively as a whole word; short forms that could mean a tracked lawyer or a common name are not used.

Own-domain citations count a domain plus all its subdomains, with the same rule in every table.

Definitions

• Appearance rate: answers naming the entity ÷ answers returned, with Wilson 95% intervals.
• First mention: average order in which the entity first appears (1 = first).
• Own-domain citation: grounded answers citing the entity's domains ÷ grounded answers.
• Citation share: citations to the entity's domains ÷ all citations.

Limits

• Measured on one day, October 28, 2026. Each engine answered 24 questions 3 times. Answers came from each engine's API (model IDs above); the consumer apps can answer differently.
• Only 13 tracked firms and lawyers were scored. Untracked names that appeared often were not scored, including Goodwin Procter LLP (52), Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP (48), Cooley LLP (31), Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP (28), Debevoise & Plimpton LLP (26).
• AI Overview figures are based on only 65 overviews, so estimates for individual firms and lawyers are less precise than the four-engine figures.
• 7 Google searches could not be fetched by DataForSEO after three tries. They are excluded from the AI Overview figures, so the trigger rate uses 65 searches.
• Reports describe what the engines said, attributed to the engines. They make no judgement about the people or organizations named and are not legal or financial advice.
• Intervals treat each answer as independent, so they understate uncertainty for the 24 repeated questions.

Appendix: The 24 questions

Questions marked "Core question" are the original study questions, asked word for word. The others are added neutral questions.

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