Notice pleading refers to pleading standards that merely notify the opposing party and court of the general issues in the case. In contrast to fact pleading standards, notice pleading standards do not require pleadings to include hyper-detailed facts in support of each claim. Notice pleading rejects the rigid approach that pleading is a game of skill—that requires precision and particularity—in which one mistake by counsel at the pleading stage may be decisive to the claim’s outcome; instead notice pleading relies on liberal discovery rules and summary judgment motions to define disputed facts and issues and to dispose of unmeritorious claims.
The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and majority of state courts use the notice pleading standard. However, notice pleading jurisdictions vary in the exact level of factual detail required in pleadings. For example, Rule 8 (a)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure requires a pleading to contain “a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief.” The Supreme Court has interpreted this language to mean that the pleading must contain sufficient factual allegations to make the pleader’s right to relief “plausible.” See Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544 (2007) and Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662 (2009). Some have argued that the federal “plausibility” standard is too demanding and unduly prevents some plaintiffs from discovery devices that would unearth important facts. For more on this, see this Virginia Law Review Article, this Villanova Law Review Article, and this Wake Forest Law Review Article.
[Last updated in September of 2023 by the Wex Definitions Team]