No page here is authority. The rules and statutes are. This is the list of what the guides rely on, with a link to the official source for each, so that checking us takes one click rather than an afternoon.
Reading a rule and knowing how a particular judge applies it on a particular Tuesday are different things. Nothing on this page is legal advice, and nobody here is a lawyer.
Two different libraries, and this catches people out
The Texas Rules of Civil Procedure are not on the state statutes website. Neither are the Rules of Evidence or the Rules of Appellate Procedure. Those are rules made by the Supreme Court of Texas and they are published by the Texas Judicial Branch, as PDFs.
The statutes site — statutes.capitol.texas.gov — carries the 31 codes, the Constitution and Vernon’s Civil Statutes. Of the rules and statutes these guides rely on, exactly one chapter lives there: Government Code chapter 52, on court reporters. The question box can reach much further than that, and what it returns is not part of this list — see below.
So if you go looking for “Rule 251” in the statutes and cannot find it, nothing is wrong with you. You are in the wrong library.
Rules of Civil Procedure
All of these are in one PDF: Texas Rules of Civil Procedure. It is large and has no per-rule bookmarks, so open it and search for the rule number.
| Rule | What it governs | Explained on |
|---|---|---|
| 21 | Filing and service of every document. Includes 21(f)(11): a clerk may not refuse a filing that does not conform — only identify the error and set a deadline to fix it. | Getting a document filed |
| 21(f)(7) | Electronic signatures. /s/ and your typed name will do — unless the document is sworn or notarized, which catches the continuance affidavit. |
How to e-file |
| 21a | Methods of service, and the three added days in 21a(c) that are for mail only, not e-service. | How to e-file |
| 21c | Privacy protection. Defines sensitive data to include the name of any person who was a minor when the suit was filed — in any civil case, and in a custody case that means your own children. | How to e-file |
| 251 | Continuance. Three routes only: sufficient cause supported by affidavit, consent of the parties, or operation of law. | Asking for more time |
| 252 | What a first application for a continuance must show when the reason is a missing witness. | Asking for more time |
Rules of Evidence
In this PDF: Texas Rules of Evidence.
| Rule | What it governs | Explained on |
|---|---|---|
| 901 | Authentication. You must produce evidence sufficient to support a finding that the item is what you say it is. 901(b) lists ways of doing it. | Getting a document admitted |
| 902 | Self-authenticating documents — the ones that need no separate proof of what they are. | Getting a document admitted |
Rules of Appellate Procedure
In this PDF: Texas Rules of Appellate Procedure.
| Rule | What it governs | Explained on |
|---|---|---|
| 20 | Indigency. The route to a record when you cannot pay the reporter’s fee. | The court reporter and the record |
Government Code
These are on the statutes site and link straight to the section.
| Section | What it governs | Explained on |
|---|---|---|
| § 52.046 | A court reporter’s duties attach on request. Two words, and the reason a hearing can end with no record of it. | The court reporter and the record |
| § 52.047 | Ordering a transcript: written application to the reporter, 120 days, fees, and the indigency route. | The court reporter and the record |
Looking up a statute that is not on this page
The question box will fetch any section of the 27 Texas codes for you if you give it a citation — type property code 92.052, or family code 153.004, and it returns the text of that section from the Legislature’s own server, with the official link and the session it is current through.
Everything listed above was read in the primary source by a person and carries the date it was checked. A statute you look up is different: it is fetched live, nobody here has read it, and it appears because you asked for that number — not because this site decided it applies to you.
Knowing a statute exists is not the same as knowing it helps you. Whether a section applies turns on things its text does not state: what notice you gave and when, what you did first, what the deadline was, and what the remedy actually is. That judgement is the part this site cannot do for you, and it is worth asking somebody who can.
The box will not guess a code for you either. A bare section number belongs to a different law in each of the 27 codes, so it asks you to name the code rather than picking one.
If a link here is dead
Two of the three rule PDFs have amendment dates in their filenames, so those addresses change when the rules are amended. The durable home for all of them is the Judicial Branch’s rules and standards page — start there, and then tell us, because a dead citation link is exactly the sort of error worth reporting.
Rules are amended. The statutes site states the legislative session it is current through, and each rules PDF states its effective date — look at both. Everything on this page was opened and confirmed to render the cited material on 15 August 2026, but that is a statement about the links, not a promise that the rule has not moved since.
Sources. Links verified against the official publisher on 15 August 2026: txcourts.gov for the Rules of Civil Procedure, Evidence and Appellate Procedure; statutes.capitol.texas.gov for the Government Code sections.
Last reviewed 17 August 2026.