Client Resources / Pre-Trial Conference
A short meeting with a judge, late in the case, where you are required to attend, required to have authority to settle, and likely to hear a frank assessment of your case.
Reviewed August 2026A pre-trial conference is a meeting with a judge or associate judge, held before trial, with two purposes. The first is to see whether the case can be settled. The second is to make sure that if it cannot, the trial is actually ready to run.
It is mandatory. No case gets a trial in Ontario without one.
This is the part that surprises clients, particularly those who did not attend much of anything earlier in the case. The Rules require the lawyers and the parties themselves to attend personally. Attendance by telephone or video is permitted where personal attendance would involve undue travel time or expense, and in that case a party whose approval is needed to settle has to be available throughout.
Rules of Civil Procedure, rule 50.05.You are not there as a spectator. You are there because the judge may want to speak to you, and because decisions may need to be made in the room.
You must attend with authority to settle, and be prepared to use it quickly.
The pre-trial comes late. Discovery is finished, undertakings are answered, mediation has usually happened, and a trial record has been filed. Expert reports have to be served before it, which is why the months leading up to a pre-trial are often the busiest of the whole case.
Your lawyer also files a pre-trial conference brief setting out the facts, the issues and the positions, and a certificate confirming the case is ready for trial. The conference itself is scheduled within a defined window before the trial date.
Rules 50.02, 50.03.1 and 50.04; expert report timing under rule 53.03.A judge or associate judge, the lawyers, and the parties. Where an insurer is defending, an adjuster or representative of the insurer usually attends rather than the individual defendant, because they are the one with authority over the money.
It is generally held in a courtroom or in judge's chambers, or by video. It is not a public hearing in the ordinary sense and there is no evidence given.
Far less than clients expect, and much faster than a mediation. A pre-trial often runs under an hour.
Counsel summarize their positions, the judge asks questions, and then the judge gives a view. That view is the point of the exercise. A judge who has read the briefs will say what they think of the case, sometimes quite bluntly, and will often suggest a range within which it should resolve.
Then the parties talk. If there is movement, it can happen quickly, which is why you need to be able to make a decision without going away to think about it for a week.
Nothing said at a pre-trial decides anything. The judge is not making findings and cannot impose an outcome.
What makes the exercise work is that the pre-trial judge will not be your trial judge, unless every party consents in writing. That separation is what allows the judge to be candid about the weaknesses in both cases, and it is why what is said stays there.
The view still carries weight. A judge telling your side that a position is unrealistic is information, and it is usually the most objective read on the case anyone will offer before trial.
Be prepared for the possibility that the judge will identify real problems with your case, in front of you, and that your own lawyer will not argue the point very hard.
That is not disloyalty. Pre-trials work precisely because counsel take them seriously rather than posturing, and a judge's assessment is worth more than another round of advocacy. If the judge says something that alarms you, ask your lawyer afterwards what it means for your case rather than trying to respond to it in the room.
Clients routinely conflate the two. They are quite different exercises.
If the case resolves, minutes of settlement are signed and the matter is over. As at mediation, that is binding, so do not sign anything without seeing the net figure.
If it does not, a trial date is set or the matter goes onto a trial list, and a report goes forward to the trial judge dealing with scheduling, witnesses and the steps still outstanding. Many cases settle in the weeks after a pre-trial, once both sides have digested what the judge said.
Generally no. The Rules require the parties to attend as well as the lawyers. Where travel or expense makes personal attendance unreasonable, ask your lawyer about attending remotely, and expect to be available throughout in any event.
Usually not. Your lawyer presents the case. A judge may occasionally ask you something directly, most often about how the injury has affected you or whether you understand a point being discussed.
A pre-trial is not conducted as a public hearing and what is said is not evidence. Its purpose is candid discussion, which is why the pre-trial judge does not preside at the trial without the consent of all parties.
You are entitled to. Nothing is decided and you can proceed to trial. Discuss it with your lawyer afterwards, because a judicial assessment is worth weighing carefully even when it is unwelcome.
A representative with settlement authority does. Where an insurer is defending, that is usually an adjuster rather than the person you sued.
Davidson Cahill Morrison LLP
We prepare clients for pre-trial conferences in malpractice, injury, disability, insurance and municipal matters across Ontario. If you have questions about your own case, we are glad to answer them.
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