A Buyer’s Guide to Contract Automation in 2025 : Top Use Cases and Software

Among all the major legal trends in 2025, technology is playing a major part:

• Growing AI usage is increasing the demand for legal professionals skilled in it
• Rising fund allocation to legal tech is changing the internal process of companies
• Increasing security threats are establishing the need for more cybersecurity training.

66% of legal leaders already plan to accelerate their investments in legal technology.  Contract automation software or contract lifecycle management (CLM) solution is one of the most important legal tech implementations for organizations. 

“Although a CLM solution might seem costly in the early stages, companies should have it in place and build workflows within the tool to process contracts better. By doing so, they can keep legal costs low in the growth stages and close deals faster. Moreover, they will have clear visibility into the contract pipeline and use their legal resources to optimize workflows better for yielding maximum results."‍

~ Igor Poroger, the Director of Legal (EMEA) at Vectra AI

In this post, we will look at what contract automation software does and share a list of the best contract automation software on the market. 

What is contract automation software?

Contract automation software (also known as contract lifecycle management (CLM) solution or contract management software) is a digital solution used to streamline the entire contract management process. It automates regular contracting tasks related to contract creation, reviews, execution, reporting, and storage. We will further cover the top contracting processes that can be automated by contract management software.

Benefits of contract automation

Automating your routine contract processes provides the following benefits: 

1. Cost and time savings

Contract management software automates redundant tasks, allowing a legal team to focus on more strategic tasks that bring in revenue. With a contract management solution, you can operate with a smaller legal team and save time and money. 

2. Boosts compliance

Contract management systems regularly generate detailed reports, helping teams stay on top of all compliance issues. They can identify any potential risks and take action in advance. 

3. Reduces risks

Contract management tools provide reports that help to reduce both financial and compliance risks. You can identify early on where things are slowing down or getting stuck.

4. Boost collaboration

Contract management software shapes up processes in a way that promotes easy communication and boosts collaboration. Users can see change history in contracts for clarity, tag each other in comments for communication, and get automated reminders for contract tasks. 

If you're new to the topic and want to understand the basics before comparing tools, read our What Is Contract Automation? guide. It explains how contract automation works, the stages it covers and why legal teams are adopting it.

How to choose the right contract automation software  

Use the following checklist to identify if a particular software will meet all your contract management needs:

• Does it support template creation?

• Does it allow the creation of approval workflows?

• Does it have advanced AI features?

• Is its eSignature legally valid?

• Is the pricing in your budget?

• Does it have clear documentation for smooth implementation?

• Are there testimonials available to support CLM's efficiency?

• Is it user-friendly?

• Can it be integrated with your current tech stack?

• Does it track all necessary KPIs in its reporting and analytics module?

• Does it provide reliable customer support?

• Does it have ample privacy and security features?
• Does it provide any compliance support?

Also read: Best Practices for Contract Automation

Top 5 contract automation software

Automate contract management with SpotDraft

SpotDraft provides all the necessary automation required to improve your contracting workflows. And our proactive customer support teams help you with smooth implementation along the way.

Book a personalized demo with one of your experts to understand how SpotDraft can help your business.