How the Nevada Court System Works
Nevada’s courts come in five kinds. Municipal courts and justice courts handle the smaller, local matters; the district courts — organized into 11 judicial districts — are the main trial courts for everything bigger; and appeals are filed with the seven-justice Nevada Supreme Court, which assigns roughly one-third of them to the three-judge Court of Appeals. Federal courts in Nevada run on a separate, parallel track.
By Ask Nevada Law Editorial · Updated
The system at a glance
Text description of the diagram: Nevada’s state court system has three tiers. At the bottom, two courts of limited jurisdiction operate side by side: justice courts, which handle misdemeanors and traffic matters, small claims, evictions, other civil matters of $15,000 or less, and felony and gross misdemeanor arraignments and preliminary hearings; and municipal courts, which handle traffic and misdemeanor ordinance violations occurring within the limits of incorporated cities. Appeals from both go to the district courts. The district courts are the trial courts of general jurisdiction, organized into 11 judicial districts served by 90 judges, and they resolve criminal, civil, family, and juvenile matters. Appeals from the district courts are filed with the Supreme Court of Nevada, which has 7 justices. Under Nevada’s deflective model, the Supreme Court assigns roughly one-third of those appeals to the 3-judge Court of Appeals. Separately, the federal system in Nevada runs in parallel: the United States District Court for the District of Nevada, with courthouses in Las Vegas and Reno, is the federal trial court; its decisions can be appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, headquartered in San Francisco; and the Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the country.
Municipal courts: city ordinances and traffic
Municipal courts deal with violations of traffic and misdemeanor ordinances that occur within the city limits of incorporated municipalities, as the Nevada Judiciary describes them. There are 17 municipal courts in Nevada, presided over by 30 municipal judges. A case about a city ordinance — a traffic ticket issued inside city limits, for example — belongs to this level.
Justice courts: misdemeanors, small claims, evictions
Justice courts are the state’s other limited-jurisdiction courts — the Nevada Judiciary counts 40 of them, presided over by 67 justices of the peace. On the criminal side they handle misdemeanor crime and traffic matters, and they also conduct the early stages of serious cases: justices of the peace preside over felony and gross misdemeanor arraignments and conduct preliminary hearings before a felony case moves to district court.
On the civil side, NRS 4.370 lists the categories a justice court may hear, and most of them are capped at $15,000 — contract claims, personal-injury and property-damage claims, and several others. The statute also gives justice courts jurisdiction over eviction (unlawful detainer) proceedings, small claims actions under chapter 73 of the NRS, and certain protection-order applications, subject to county-population exceptions spelled out in the statute itself.
District courts: the main trial courts
The district courts are Nevada’s trial courts of general jurisdiction: the Nevada Judiciary describes them as resolving criminal, civil, family, and juvenile matters, and as hearing appeals from justice and municipal courts. Felony prosecutions, divorces and custody cases, and civil disputes above the justice-court ceiling are all district court work.
NRS 3.010 divides the state into 11 judicial districts, each covering one or more of Nevada’s 17 counties (Carson City, a consolidated municipality, is grouped with Storey County in the First). Statutes fix the number of judges per district — 90 statewide, from a single judge in the Sixth, Tenth, and Eleventh districts to 58 in the Eighth (Clark County). Under NRS 3.100, district courts hold court at the county seat of their respective counties, though county commissioners may add locations. The judicial districts map shows which district serves each county.
Many Nevada courts also run specialty court programs. The Nevada Administrative Office of the Courts describes a specialty court as “a program established by a court to facilitate testing, treatment, and oversight of certain persons over whom the court has jurisdiction and who the court has determined suffers from a mental illness or abuses alcohol or drugs” — problem-solving dockets rather than a separate tier of court.
The appellate courts: Supreme Court and Court of Appeals
The Supreme Court of Nevada, with seven justices, sits at the top of the state system. Below it — but reached through it — is the Court of Appeals, a three-judge court that Nevada voters created by constitutional amendment on November 4, 2014; it began hearing cases in January 2015.
Nevada uses what the Nevada Judiciary calls a deflective model: the Court of Appeals “hears roughly one-third of all cases submitted to the Nevada Supreme Court in a deflective model, where the Supreme Court assigns cases to a three-judge Court of Appeals.” In other words, appeals from the district courts are submitted to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court decides which of them the Court of Appeals will hear.
How a case climbs the ladder
The same four rungs apply across the state system, whichever court a case starts in.
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Trial
A case starts in a trial court
Smaller matters start in a justice court (misdemeanors, small claims, evictions, civil claims of $15,000 or less) or a municipal court (city ordinance and traffic violations inside incorporated cities). Felonies, family cases, and larger civil disputes are tried in a district court.
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First appeal
Justice and municipal court appeals go to the district court
The district courts are not only trial courts. The Nevada Judiciary describes them as hearing appeals from justice and municipal courts, so a case that started in a limited-jurisdiction court is reviewed one level up, inside the same judicial district.
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Appellate courts
District court appeals are filed with the Nevada Supreme Court
Nevada does not route appeals from the district courts to an intermediate court first. Appeals are submitted to the Supreme Court of Nevada, the seven-justice court at the top of the state system.
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The deflective model
The Supreme Court may assign the appeal to the Court of Appeals
The Nevada Judiciary describes the three-judge Court of Appeals as hearing roughly one-third of all cases submitted to the Supreme Court under a "deflective model" — the Supreme Court decides which appeals to assign down rather than parties choosing where to file.
Go deeper
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Nevada judicial districts map: which district court serves each county
All 11 districts, every county, and each district court seat — set by NRS 3.010.
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Federal courts in Nevada: the District Court and the Ninth Circuit
The separate federal track: one statewide trial court, appeals to the Ninth Circuit.
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How a Nevada civil case moves through the courts
From filing to judgment, step by step.
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How a Nevada criminal case moves through the courts
Arrest, arraignment, preliminary hearing, trial, and appeal.
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The Nevada eviction process (summary eviction), step by step
The notice-driven summary eviction procedure in justice court — the notices, deadlines, hearings, and lockout timing, cited to the official statutes.
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Small claims court in Nevada: what to expect, step by step
Money-only claims up to $10,000, heard in justice court under simplified rules (NRS chapter 73).
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Nevada court filing fees: what courts charge and where to check
The statutory base amounts, the county-by-county additions, and where each county posts its current fee schedule.