Court of Cassation (Yargıtay) decisions can be searched in Turkish at karararama.yargitay.gov.tr by keyword, chamber, docket number (E.), decision number (K.) and date; the decision in your own file appears on UYAP. Only decisions unifying case law (içtihadı birleştirme) bind all ordinary courts, under Article 45 of Law No. 2797; ordinary chamber decisions are persuasive. Cases reach Yargıtay by temyiz within two weeks of service (Law No. 6100 Article 361, Law No. 5271 Article 291). An individual application to the Constitutional Court must follow within 30 days (Law No. 6216 Article 47).
Most foreigners meet a Court of Cassation decision in one of two ways. Either their own lawyer sends a short Turkish text that ends with the word bozma or onama, or someone on the other side of a dispute quotes "a Yargıtay decision" that is supposed to settle the matter. In both cases the same questions follow: where can the decision be found, what does it actually say, does it bind the court hearing my case, and what can still be done afterwards. The rules are changing as well. Law No. 7589 of 16 July 2026 amended both the civil and the criminal procedure codes on cassation review, adding a new paragraph to Article 362 of the Code of Civil Procedure and amending Article 308 of the Code of Criminal Procedure. This article explains how to search for, read and cite decisions of the Court of Cassation, Yargıtay, which of them are binding, how a case reaches the Court, how long the stages take and what remedies remain once the Court has ruled.
Under Article 154 of the Constitution of the Republic of Türkiye, the Court of Cassation is the last instance for reviewing the decisions and judgments of the ordinary (judicial) courts, unless a law refers them to another judicial authority. Article 13 of the Court of Cassation Law, Law No. 2797, repeats this and adds a small number of cases that the Court hears as a first and last instance court, mainly cases against its own members and certain senior officials. Administrative disputes go to the Council of State, Danıştay, and not to Yargıtay; the overall structure of the court system is set out in our explanation of how the Turkish legal system and its courts work.
The Court does not hold a new trial. It examines whether the judgment of the lower court applied the law correctly and followed the rules of procedure. Facts found by the lower courts are reviewed only to the extent that the way they were established raises a legal problem, for example evidence rejected without a lawful reason.
Article 5 of Law No. 2797 provides that the Court consists of 12 civil chambers, hukuk daireleri, and 12 criminal chambers, ceza daireleri, each with a president and members. Until a reform by Law No. 6723 in 2016 there were 23 of each, which is why the search screen still lists chambers up to the 23rd: older decisions carry those chamber numbers. Above the chambers sit the Assembly of Civil Chambers, Hukuk Genel Kurulu (HGK), and the Assembly of Criminal Chambers, Ceza Genel Kurulu (CGK), which under Article 15 decide cases where a lower court insists on its original judgment and resolve conflicting case law within their branch. The Grand General Assembly, Büyük Genel Kurul, resolves conflicts between the civil and criminal sides under Article 16.
Each chamber has a fixed subject area. Under Article 14 of Law No. 2797, the division of work between chambers is prepared by the Board of Presidents, approved by the Grand General Assembly and published in the Official Gazette, Resmî Gazete. The division is revised from time to time, so the chamber that handled lease disputes or a particular offence in 2018 may not be the chamber that handles them today. When you look for decisions on your type of dispute, check the current division of work first and then search the chamber that is now responsible, while keeping in mind that older decisions on the same subject will carry another chamber's name.
Türkiye is a civil law country. Judges apply statutes first and there is no general rule that a previous decision binds a later court. Within that system, however, three types of Yargıtay decision carry very different weight.
A decision unifying case law, içtihadı birleştirme kararı (often abbreviated İBK), is adopted when chambers or general assemblies have given conflicting decisions or when a chamber wishes to depart from its settled case law. Under Article 45 of Law No. 2797, such a request is made by the First President, directly or following a decision of a chamber or general assembly, or by the Chief Public Prosecutor of the Court of Cassation; other persons may apply with reasons, and the First Presidency Board decides whether to proceed. The fifth paragraph of Article 45 is the key rule: decisions unifying case law bind the general assemblies, the chambers and the ordinary courts in similar legal matters. Article 58 requires them to be published in the Official Gazette.
When a chamber quashes a judgment and the lower court refuses to follow it, the dispute goes to the HGK or CGK. In civil cases, Article 373(7) of the Code of Civil Procedure, Law No. 6100, states that compliance with the HGK's decision is mandatory. In criminal cases, Article 307(4) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, Law No. 5271, states that no insistence is possible against a CGK decision given on insistence. These decisions bind the courts in that particular case, and they are widely followed in similar cases.
A routine decision of a chamber binds the parties and the lower court in that file through the quashing and compliance procedure described in section 8 below. For other cases it is persuasive. First instance courts and regional courts of appeal usually follow the settled line of the responsible chamber, because a judgment that departs from it is likely to be quashed, but a single decision quoted out of context proves little.
| Type of decision | Binding effect |
|---|---|
| Decision unifying case law (İBK) | Binds Yargıtay general assemblies, chambers and all ordinary courts in similar legal matters (Law No. 2797, Article 45) |
| HGK decision after a lower court insists | Must be followed in that case (Law No. 6100, Article 373(7)) |
| CGK decision after a lower court insists | No further insistence possible in that case (Law No. 5271, Article 307(4)) |
| Chamber decision quashing a judgment | Lower court may comply or insist; once it complies, it must decide in line with the quashing |
| Chamber decision in another person's case | Persuasive only; shows how the responsible chamber interprets the law |
| Reversal in the interest of the law (civil) | Does not remove the legal consequences of the decision (Law No. 6100, Article 363(2)) |
The Court's own public database is at karararama.yargitay.gov.tr. It is in Turkish only, and the published texts are generally anonymised, so the names of private parties are generally replaced or removed.
The main screen has a keyword box, Aranacak Kelime, and a list of units, Kurullar, where you can tick the HGK, the CGK, the Grand General Assembly, the boards of presidents or individual civil and criminal chambers. If no unit is ticked, the search covers all of them. The detailed search, Detaylı Arama, adds fields for the docket number, Esas Numarası, and the decision number, Karar Numarası, each entered as year and sequence number, a field for the decision date, Karar Tarihi, and sorting by docket number, decision number or date.
Search with Turkish legal terms rather than English words: kira tespit for a rent determination case, boşanma nafaka for divorce maintenance, tapu iptal for cancellation of a title deed. Adding the code abbreviation and article number used in Turkish judgments, such as "TBK 344" for Article 344 of the Turkish Code of Obligations or "TMK 166" for the divorce ground in Article 166 of the Turkish Civil Code, narrows results considerably. Filter by the chamber responsible for the subject (section 1.2 above) and sort by date, because the most recent line of decisions is what a court will look at. If you already have a citation, enter the docket or decision number in the detailed search and confirm that the text matches what was quoted to you.
The database links to the precedent search of the national judiciary network, emsal.uyap.gov.tr, which also contains decisions of the regional courts of appeal. Decisions unifying case law and general assembly decisions designated as precedents are published in the Official Gazette under Article 58 of Law No. 2797, so their official text can be checked at resmigazete.gov.tr. Commercial legal databases used by Turkish lawyers carry the same decisions with better indexing, but they are subscription services and are not an official source.
The public database is a research tool. It is not the place to look for the decision in your own file, which may not appear there at all or may appear months later in anonymised form. Parties follow their case through UYAP, the National Judiciary Informatics System. Lawyers use the lawyer portal; individuals can use the citizen portal through e-Devlet, and a foreigner who holds a foreign identity number from a residence permit can obtain e-Devlet access. The portal shows when the file was sent to Yargıtay, the chamber and docket number assigned to it, and the decision once it is entered.
Seeing a decision on UYAP is not the same as being served with it. Deadlines that run from service, including those for applications after the decision, depend on the rules of the Notification Law, Law No. 7201, which are explained in our article on service of documents under Turkish notification law. A party abroad who has no lawyer in Türkiye should make sure the court has a valid address, because service to the last address in the file is generally treated as valid.
A Yargıtay decision usually opens with the chamber, the docket and decision numbers and the date, followed by the names of the lower courts and their decisions. A narrative section summarises the dispute, the first instance judgment, the regional court decision and the grounds of appeal. In criminal files the written opinion of the Chief Public Prosecutor's Office, tebliğname, is mentioned. Then comes the reasoning, often introduced by the words gereği düşünüldü, and finally the operative part, hüküm, which states the outcome. The reasoning matters more than the summary: it tells you which legal error the chamber found and what the lower court must do next. Our article on reasoned decisions in Turkish law explains why the reasoning carries such weight.
The end of the text states whether the decision was taken unanimously, oy birliği, or by majority, oy çokluğu. A majority decision may be followed by a dissenting opinion, karşı oy. A dissent has no binding force, but a series of split decisions is a sign that the case law may move, and it is often the starting point for a request to unify case law.
Every file that reaches the Court receives a docket number, esas numarası, abbreviated E., consisting of the year of registration and a sequence number. When the chamber decides, the decision receives its own decision number, karar numarası, abbreviated K., again with a year and a sequence number. The two years are often different, because a file registered in one year may be decided in the next. The standard Turkish form is the court and chamber, then E., K. and the date, abbreviated T.: for example "Yargıtay 3. Hukuk Dairesi, E. YYYY/NNNN, K. YYYY/NNNN, T. DD.MM.YYYY". General assembly decisions are cited with HGK or CGK in place of the chamber, and decisions unifying case law usually also cite their Official Gazette date and issue.
In a petition, cite the full set of numbers and attach or quote the relevant passage. A citation without the K. number cannot be checked easily, and courts give little weight to a decision they cannot verify. For use before a court or authority outside Türkiye, obtain the full Turkish text and a sworn translation rather than relying on a summary.
Cassation review, temyiz, normally comes after an appeal to a regional court of appeal, istinaf. This section only summarises the entry rules; the full appeal route, petitions and costs are covered in our guide to appealing final court decisions in Türkiye.
Article 361 of Law No. 6100 allows an appeal on points of law against final decisions of the civil chambers of the regional courts of appeal within two weeks of service. Article 362 excludes several categories, including claims whose value does not exceed a monetary threshold, most civil court of peace matters, çekişmesiz yargı matters, where there is no opposing party, and interim measures. The threshold is revalued every 1 January under Additional Article 1 of Law No. 6100, and the amount at the date the action was filed applies, so the current figure must be checked for each file. The new paragraph 3 of Article 362, added by Law No. 7589, sets special rules where the regional court has given a new decision on the merits. The petition must contain the elements in Article 364, including the grounds of appeal. Review is normally on the file; Article 369 allows a hearing only in listed matters, such as divorce, custody and claims above a revalued value, if a party asks for one, and it also allows the Court to examine breaches of an express provision of law that the parties did not raise.
Article 286 of Law No. 5271 allows an appeal against judgments of the criminal chambers of the regional courts of appeal, but paragraph 2 excludes many of them, for example decisions dismissing an appeal against prison sentences of five years or less, subject to the list of offences in paragraph 3 that remain appealable. Under Article 291, as amended by Law No. 7499 in 2024, the appeal is lodged within two weeks of service of the judgment together with its reasoning. Article 288 limits the ground to unlawfulness, and Article 294 requires the appellant to state why reversal is sought. The opposing party may respond within two weeks under Article 297, and the Chief Public Prosecutor's Office prepares a written opinion to which the defendant or the intervening party may respond within two weeks of service where they appealed or the opinion is against them. For sentences of ten years or more, Article 299 allows the Court to hold a hearing. In criminal matters, specialist representation at this stage is part of our criminal law services.
If the judgment is affirmed or the appeal is dismissed, it becomes final. In civil cases Article 367 of Law No. 6100 provides that a pending appeal on points of law does not stop enforcement of a money judgment as such, but judgments on personal status, family law and rights in rem over immovable property cannot be enforced until they are final. That is why a divorce or a title deed cancellation is registered only once the judgment has become final.
If the judgment is quashed, the file returns to the regional court or the first instance court. In civil cases Article 373 of Law No. 6100 sets the route: the court either complies with the quashing or insists on its earlier judgment, and an insistence decision is examined first by the same chamber and then, if the chamber maintains its view, by the HGK. Article 307 of Law No. 5271 provides the same structure in criminal cases, with the CGK as the final body. Article 307(5) adds an important protection: if only the defendant appealed, or the appeal was made in the defendant's favour, the new judgment cannot impose a heavier penalty than the one quashed.
There is no statutory time limit for the Court of Cassation to decide a file. How long it takes varies considerably with the chamber's workload and the type of case. The Court publishes annual activity reports with statistics, but an average does not predict the duration of a particular file. The deadlines that bind the parties, by contrast, are short and strict:
| Step | Time limit |
|---|---|
| Civil appeal on points of law | Two weeks from service of the regional court decision (Law No. 6100, Article 361) |
| Criminal appeal on points of law | Two weeks from service of the reasoned judgment (Law No. 5271, Article 291) |
| Response to a criminal appeal | Two weeks from service of the petition (Law No. 5271, Article 297(1)) |
| Response to the prosecutor's written opinion | Two weeks from service (Law No. 5271, Article 297(3)) |
| Objection by the Chief Public Prosecutor (criminal) | Three months from receipt of the file; no limit in favour of the accused (Law No. 5271, Article 308) |
| Individual application to the Constitutional Court | 30 days from exhaustion of remedies; 15 days after a justified excuse ends (Law No. 6216, Article 47(5)) |
| Civil deadline ending in the judicial recess | Extended by one week from the end of the recess (Law No. 6100, Article 104) |
The judicial recess runs each summer and affects many civil deadlines; our article on the judicial recess in Türkiye explains which cases are excluded.
In criminal cases, Article 308 of Law No. 5271, as amended by Law No. 7589, allows the Chief Public Prosecutor of the Court of Cassation to object to the CGK against decisions of the criminal chambers, except decisions designating the competent court and decisions of lack of jurisdiction, within three months of receiving the file. The new paragraph 4 lists who may ask the Chief Public Prosecutor to do so: the accused and those entitled to seek a remedy on the accused's behalf, the intervening party and a victim who could become an intervening party. A request is not a right to a decision: the Chief Public Prosecutor decides whether to object.
There is no further ordinary appeal against a civil chamber decision. Article 363 of Law No. 6100 allows the Ministry of Justice or the Chief Public Prosecutor's Office to appeal certain final first instance and regional court decisions in the interest of the law, but under Article 363(2) such a reversal does not change the outcome for the parties. A retrial, yargılamanın iadesi, is possible only on the limited grounds in the Code.
Article 148 of the Constitution and Articles 45 to 50 of Law No. 6216 on the Establishment and Rules of Procedure of the Constitutional Court allow anyone to apply to the Constitutional Court, Anayasa Mahkemesi, claiming that public authorities violated a right protected both by the Constitution and by the European Convention on Human Rights. All ordinary remedies must be exhausted first (Article 45(2)), and the application must be filed within 30 days (Article 47(5)). The application is subject to a fee, must state the right violated, the facts and the stages of exhaustion, and must attach a power of attorney if a lawyer acts (Article 47(2) to (4)). It may be filed directly or through a court or a Turkish mission abroad (Article 47(1)), which is useful for applicants outside Türkiye. Foreigners may apply, except for rights reserved to Turkish citizens (Article 46(3)).
The Constitutional Court is not a fourth instance. Under Article 49(6) it examines only whether a fundamental right was violated, not whether Yargıtay interpreted ordinary law correctly. Typical complaints concern the length of proceedings, unreasoned decisions, lack of access to court or the right to property. If a violation arising from a court decision is found, Article 50(2) sends the file back to the court for a retrial. After the Constitutional Court, an application to Strasbourg may follow within four months, as explained in our European Court of Human Rights application guide.
It is Yargıtay, the last instance for reviewing judgments of the ordinary civil and criminal courts under Article 154 of the Constitution. Administrative cases go to the Council of State instead.
On the official database at karararama.yargitay.gov.tr, which allows searching by keyword, chamber, docket number, decision number and date. The precedent search at emsal.uyap.gov.tr and the Official Gazette are further official sources.
No. The official database is in Turkish only, so a decision you intend to rely on should be translated by a sworn translator.
No. Only decisions unifying case law bind all ordinary courts in similar legal matters, under Article 45 of Law No. 2797; ordinary chamber decisions are persuasive outside the case in which they were given.
E. is the docket number given when the file is registered, and K. is the decision number given when the chamber decides. Each consists of a year and a sequence number.
Bozma means the Court quashed the judgment, in whole or in part. The file goes back to the lower court, which may comply with the decision or insist on its earlier judgment.
Onama means the judgment was affirmed and becomes final. In criminal cases the equivalent wording is a dismissal of the appeal on the merits.
Through UYAP: your lawyer sees it on the lawyer portal and you can see it on the citizen portal through e-Devlet. The public database may not include it, or may publish it later in anonymised form.
Two weeks from service of the regional court decision in civil cases (Article 361 of Law No. 6100) and two weeks from service of the reasoned judgment in criminal cases (Article 291 of Law No. 5271).
There is no legal time limit. Duration depends on the chamber's workload and the case type, so ask your lawyer to check the file's status on UYAP rather than relying on averages.
No. Article 362 of Law No. 6100 excludes low value civil claims and several other categories, and Article 286 of Law No. 5271 excludes many criminal judgments, including most sentences of five years or less upheld on appeal.
In civil cases generally not, under Article 367 of Law No. 6100, but judgments on personal status, family law and rights in rem over immovable property are enforced only once final.
Yes, if you claim a violation of a fundamental right covered by the European Convention on Human Rights, within 30 days of exhausting remedies under Article 47(5) of Law No. 6216. The Constitutional Court will not reexamine how ordinary law was applied.
Yes. Article 46(3) of Law No. 6216 only bars foreigners from applying about rights reserved to Turkish citizens, and Article 47(1) allows filing through a Turkish mission abroad.
Only for what it actually decided. Check whether the chamber that issued it is still responsible for the subject and whether later decisions or a decision unifying case law have changed the position.
Court of Cassation decisions are easy to find and harder to use well. The official database at karararama.yargitay.gov.tr gives anyone access to anonymised texts by chamber, docket number, decision number and date, but the weight of a decision depends on what it is: a decision unifying case law binds every ordinary court under Article 45 of Law No. 2797, a general assembly decision after insistence settles that file, and an ordinary chamber decision is guidance that must be read with its facts and the current division of work. For your own case, the decision is followed on UYAP, and its date of service starts short deadlines, including the 30 days for an individual application to the Constitutional Court under Law No. 6216.
If you have received a Yargıtay decision you need explained, want to know whether a quoted decision really applies to your dispute, or are considering a Constitutional Court application, our legal team can review the file and the deadlines with you.
