Bindinglaw

US · rules

Fed. R. Bankr. P. 8018

Serving and Filing Briefs and Appendices

activein force · 2024-12-01 – presentact-effective-date

(a) TIME TO SERVE AND FILE A BRIEF. Unless the district court

or BAP by order in a particular case excuses the filing of briefs or

sets a different time, the following time limits apply:

(1) Appellant’s Brief. The appellant must serve and file a brief

within 30 days after the docketing of notice that the record

has been sent or that it is available electronically.

(2) Appellee’s Brief. The appellee must serve and file a brief

within 30 days after the appellant’s brief is served.

(3) Appellant’s Reply Brief. The appellant may serve and file

a reply brief within 14 days after service of the appellee’s brief

but at least 7 days before scheduled argument—unless the district court or BAP, for cause, allows a later filing.

(4) Consequence of Failure to File. If an appellant fails to file

a brief on time or within an extended time authorized under

(a)(3), the district court or BAP may—on its own after notice

or on the appellee’s motion—dismiss the appeal. An appellee

who fails to file a brief will not be heard at oral argument unless the district court or BAP grants permission.

(b) DUTY TO SERVE AND FILE AN APPENDIX.

(1) Appellant’s Duty. Subject to (e) and Rule 8009(d), the appellant must serve and file with its principal brief an appendix

containing excerpts from the record. It must contain:

(A) the relevant docket entries;

(B) the complaint and answer, or equivalent filings;

(C) the judgment, order, or decree from which the appeal

is taken;

(D) any other orders, pleadings, jury instructions, findings, conclusions, or opinions relevant to the appeal;

(E) the notice of appeal; and

(F) any relevant transcript or portion of it.

(2) Appellee’s Appendix. The appellee may serve and file with

its brief an appendix containing any material that is required

to be included or is relevant to the appeal or cross-appeal but

that is omitted from the appellant’s appendix.

(3) Cross-Appellee’s Appendix. The appellant—as cross-appellee—may also serve and file with its response an appendix containing material that is relevant to matters raised initially by

the cross-appeal but that is omitted by the cross-appellant.

(c) FORMAT OF THE APPENDIX.

(1) Content. The appendix must:

(A) begin with a table of contents identifying the page at

which each part begins;

(B) put the relevant docket entries after the table of contents;

(C) then put other parts of the record chronologically;

(D) when transcript pages are included, show the transcript page numbers in brackets immediately before the

included pages; and

(E) indicate omissions from the text of a document or of

the transcript by asterisks.

(2) Immaterial Formal Matters. The appendix should not include immaterial formal matters, such as captions, subscriptions, and acknowledgments.

121 Rule 8019 FEDERAL RULES OF BANKRUPTCY PROCEDURE

(d) REPRODUCING EXHIBITS. Exhibits designated for inclusion in

the appendix may be reproduced in a separate volume or volumes,

suitably indexed.

(e) APPEAL ON THE ORIGINAL RECORD WITHOUT AN APPENDIX. The

district court or BAP may, either by rule for all cases or classes

of cases or by order in a particular case:

(1) dispense with the appendix; and

(2) permit an appeal to proceed on the original record with

the submission of any relevant parts that the district court or

BAP orders the parties to file.

(Added Apr. 25, 2014, eff. Dec. 1, 2014; amended Apr. 2, 2024, eff. Dec.

1, 2024.)

Provenance

Source
uscourts.gov
Retrieved
2026-09-03
Edition
2026-08-19
Content hash
e285a3df2da82bdf62336866ce8fb41e6d4688db2a4cd58ba59629994134a710
View the official source →

The link goes to the issuing authority’s own document — the one we read to produce this record. Where a source publishes whole titles rather than sections, your browser may need a moment to jump to the provision.

Unofficial copy of government-published law, reproduced from official sources with full provenance. Not an official publication; verify against official sources before relying on it in a filing. Records in the 'guidance' corpus, and only that corpus, are sub-regulatory (interpretive guidelines, survey procedures) and are not binding law. Validity bounds follow each jurisdiction's declared temporalBasis.

Coverage · API docs

Bindinglaw

Point-in-time US law with the receipt attached. Source URL, retrieval time, content hash, and validity dates on every answer.

curl api.binding.law/v1/law/coverage

© 2026 binding.law · a Jubal, Inc. productAttorneys and firms never pay. Ever.
Fed. R. Bankr. P. 8018 — Serving and Filing Briefs an… · binding.law