Brazil's judiciary spent R$ 164.6 billion in 2025, the largest figure since the CNJ (National Council of Justice) began tracking spending in 2009. For taxpayers, the bill lands in full: the courts' own revenue came to R$ 68.2 billion, enough to cover 41% of spending and down 8.9% from 2024. In other words, of every real spent, about 59 cents come from the public budget, according to the CNJ's Justice in Numbers report as covered by Folha de S.Paulo.
Payroll drives the record. Personnel costs totaled R$ 148.5 billion, or 90.2% of all spending, and rose 9% over 2024, Folha reports. Practically speaking, of every R$ 10 the courts pay out, about R$ 9 go to salaries and benefits.
In brief: the CNJ is the judiciary's own oversight body, and Justice in Numbers is its annual survey of budgets, staffing and productivity across all Brazilian courts. The 2025 figures were presented to the council in June. Because comparable data only start in 2009, every record cited here refers to that window.
One of the most criticized line items is the so-called verbas indenizatórias, allowances paid on top of judges' salaries, such as travel per diems, plane tickets and housing aid. They consumed R$ 9.8 billion last year, nearly double what the courts invested in technology, according to Folha. In many cases these extras push paychecks past the constitutional ceiling, the maximum salary allowed in Brazilian public service.
In March, the STF (Supremo Tribunal Federal), Brazil's top court, limited such payments above the ceiling. Even so, the ruling still allows extras of up to R$ 421,900 per year for each judge, according to an analysis by Poder360.
The squeeze on state budgets
State budgets set a record of their own: courts took in R$ 95.9 billion in 2025, or 6.53% of all spending by Brazil's states, up from 4.66% in 2013, according to Poder360 using Treasury data. The increase works out to roughly R$ 28 billion, enough to build more than 1,400 emergency care clinics (UPAs) or up to 3,400 schools. Adjusted for inflation, the state-level bill grew 61.6% between 2021 and 2025.
Record caseload, shaken trust
The CNJ report also shows the other side of the ledger. Courts received 40.9 million new cases in 2025, a series record, and closed more than they took in: for every 100 cases filed, about 110 were resolved. Average productivity, 2,366 cases closed per active judge, tops the average of 252 recorded in the European countries tracked by the Cepej, the Council of Europe's justice efficiency commission.
Total spending equaled 1.3% of Brazil's GDP and 2.7% of everything the federal government, states, the Federal District and municipalities spent last year, the report shows. The figures arrive amid criticism over "supersalaries" and the involvement of senior judges in the Banco Master scandal, as Folha notes. A Datafolha poll cited by the paper found that 38% of Brazilians say they do not trust the judiciary, 43% trust it a little and 17% a lot.