According to the ICC’s preliminary statistics for 2025, 881 cases were filed under the ICC Rules last year, with 1,869 cases ongoing by the end of the year, seated in 123 cities, and involving parties from 147 countries or independent territories. These statistics show that the ICC is one of the most popular choices of arbitral institution for commercial parties globally. The modernizations introduced by the 2026 Rules are no doubt aimed at ensuring that this will continue to be the case.
The principal focus of the 2026 amendments is on speed and efficiency, which will be widely welcomed as the ICC Rules are sometimes perceived to have lagged behind other arbitration rules on these measures. The focus on efficiency is apparent in many of the changes, but most obviously in the introduction of a new early determination mechanism and an option to agree to highly expedited proceedings.
In this overview, we outline the key changes relevant to commercial parties.
No mandatory Terms of Reference
One of the most striking changes in the 2026 Rules is the removal of the requirement for the tribunal to prepare Terms of Reference (ToR), previously a defining feature of ICC arbitration. The ToR recorded key procedural information at an early stage and defined the scope of the dispute, including the list of issues to be determined. However, their mandatory nature was seen by many as introducing unnecessary cost, delay, and rigidity. The removal of the requirement to produce ToR is therefore likely to be viewed positively by both parties and practitioners. It also brings the ICC Rules into line with other leading sets of institutional rules.
All roads lead to resolution
The 2026 Rules offer parties a broader menu of procedural pathways to customize their arbitration and, in particular, to influence the timeframe within which their disputes must be resolved. They introduce two new mechanisms (highly expedited arbitration and early determination) and make adjustments to existing mechanisms (emergency arbitrator, expedited procedure and the standard mechanism).
As a result, there are now five different paths to choose between when deciding on a case strategy: (1) emergency arbitration; (2) early determination; (3) highly expedited arbitration; (4) expedited arbitration, and (5) the standard process. This approach of offering users a menu of options is increasingly seen by arbitral institutions as a way of dealing with a criticism of arbitration that it has fallen into a ‘one size fits all’ approach to resolving disputes.
Of course, not all these options are mutually exclusive. For example, emergency arbitration operates before the tribunal is constituted and can therefore sit alongside the other tracks.
New “highly expedited” procedure
The emphasis on improving efficiency is most apparent in the introduction of a new “highly expedited” arbitration procedure (HEAP), which sits alongside the existing expedited procedure provisions. The HEAP is available on an opt-in basis and is designed to deliver a final award within three months from the initial case management conference (although there is scope for the President of the ICC Court to extend this period).
Under this streamlined process, the claimant’s Request for Arbitration must contain its Statement of Claim and, where possible, must be accompanied by the evidence the claimant relies upon. The respondent is then required to file certain preliminary information within 20 days of receipt of the Request and Statement of Claim and its Answer and Statement of Defence within 30 days of such receipt, accompanied where possible by the evidence upon which it relies.
Disputes under the HEAP are resolved by a sole arbitrator. There is no scope for joinder of additional parties or consolidation of related disputes. The tribunal has a broad discretion to adopt the procedural measures it considers appropriate following consultation with the parties. This includes the power to decline requests for document production, to limit the number, length and scope of written submissions and witness evidence, and to determine the dispute solely on the basis of documents without a hearing or examination of witnesses or experts.
Where the parties agree that particular disputes or categories of dispute should be subject to the HEAP mechanism, it should result in an award at a speed rarely seen outside the expert determination process, but with the safety valve that time can be extended if needed and the advantage that it results in a judicially enforceable award.
Parties should consider carefully whether disputes are suitable for the HEAP mechanism. It is unlikely to be realistic for a seriously substantive dispute to be resolved within three months and the safety valve may not fully address this time pressure.
Expansion of the existing expedited procedure
The ICC has also expanded the scope of its existing expedited procedure. The expedited procedure provisions will now apply automatically to all arbitrations where the arbitration agreement was entered into on or after 1 June 2026 and the amount in dispute is less than USD 4 million (for arbitration agreements entered into before that date but after 1 January 2021, the threshold was USD 3 million). This means a larger proportion of disputes will now fall within this fast-track regime, unless the parties opt out.
The ICC’s preliminary dispute resolution statistics for 2025 indicate that the average amount in dispute for newly registered cases was approximately USD 50 million, while pending cases involved an average disputed amount of approximately USD172 million. However, the ICC also reports that over 40% of cases in 2025 fell below the USD 4 million threshold. For cases that are within scope, this mechanism is potentially useful. That said, since the amount in dispute is often not indicative of the complexity of the dispute, there may well be cases in which this timeframe is challenging. Parties to complex agreements who anticipate that disputes could involve amounts of less than USD 4 million may wish to consider whether to opt out of this mechanism in their arbitration agreement.
New mechanism for early determination
Another significant development is the formal introduction of a mechanism permitting parties to apply to the arbitral tribunal for the early determination of a claim or defence where that claim or defence is manifestly without merit or manifestly outside the arbitral tribunal’s jurisdiction. This provides parties with a clear procedural avenue to address unmeritorious arguments without having to conduct a full arbitral process.
Whilst it was previously understood that tribunals possessed an inherent power to summarily determine claims or defences, the inclusion of an express power is a welcome development, removing ambiguity and providing parties with greater certainty.
For parties who choose London seated arbitration, it is worth noting that the threshold adopted by the ICC, namely that the claim or defence must be “manifestly without merit” differs from (and is arguably higher than) the standard of “no real prospect of success”, which is the threshold set out in the new early determination mechanism introduced by the Arbitration Act 2025. There is room to debate whether the “manifestly without merit” test sets too high a bar for summary determination, but it is consistent with the approach taken by a number of other leading arbitral institutions which require a “manifest” deficiency, whether framed as “manifestly without merit” (LCIA Rules), “manifestly without legal merit” (ICSID and SIAC Rules), or “manifestly unsustainable” (SCC Rules).
Adjustments to Emergency Arbitration provisions
Adjustments have been made to the Emergency Arbitration provisions such that they can now be invoked in cases where the President of the ICC Court is satisfied, on a prima facie basis, that an arbitration agreement binding that party may exist (previously they applied only to signatories to the arbitration agreement or their successors).
The amendments also confirm that the provisions do not apply where the arbitration agreement arises under an investment protection law, in addition to the pre-existing exclusion for investment treaties. This is justified on the basis that States cannot move quickly enough to respond to an emergency arbitration process.
A new mechanism has also been introduced enabling a party to seek (potentially without notice to the other parties) a preliminary order directing another party not to frustrate the purpose of the application for emergency measures.
Time limit for awards
The 2026 Rules remove the traditional six-month deadline for issuing a final award in standard proceedings. Instead, it falls on the President of the ICC Court to determine the applicable time frame for issuing the award, taking into account the procedural timetable and any justified requests made by the tribunal.
To the extent that the six-month deadline was aimed at ensuring efficiency, this change appears at first glance to be at odds with many of the other changes introduced by the 2026 Rules. However, the ICC reports that, in practice, the default six-month time limit was rarely applied and states that the aim of vesting authority to fix and extend time limits with the President is to enhance efficiency and strengthen the oversight of procedural timelines.
Overview of routes to resolution
The key features of the five different pathways to resolving issues under the 2026 Rules are summarised in the table below.
