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Cal. Rules of Court, rule 8.121 · Article 2. Record on Appeal

Notice designating the record on appeal

Verbatim from the official edition

Text — As posted by the Judicial Council of California (read October 22, 2026)

(a) Time to file

Within 10 days after filing the notice of appeal, an appellant must serve and file a notice in the superior court designating the record on appeal. The appellant may combine its notice designating the record with its notice of appeal.

(b) Contents

(1) The notice must:

(A) Specify the date the notice of appeal was filed.

(B) Specify which form of the record of the written documents from the superior court proceedings listed in rule 8.120(a)(1) the appellant elects to use. If the appellant elects to use a clerk's transcript, the notice must also designate the documents to be included in the clerk's transcript as required under rule 8.122(b)(1).

(C) Specify whether the appellant elects to proceed with or without a record of the oral proceedings in the trial court. If the appellant elects to proceed with a record of the oral proceedings in the trial court, the notice must specify which form of the record listed in rule 8.120(b) the appellant elects to use. If the appellant elects to use a reporter's transcript, the notice must designate the proceedings to be included in the transcript as required under rule 8.130.

(2) If an appellant intends to raise any issue that requires consideration of the record of an administrative proceeding that was admitted in evidence, refused, or lodged in the superior court, the notice must also request that this administrative record be transmitted to the reviewing court under rule 8.123.

(c) Copy to the reviewing court

The clerk must promptly send the reviewing court a copy of any notice filed under this rule.

Notes and commentary — not rule text

History

Rule 8.121 adopted effective January 1, 2008.

Advisory Committee Comment

The Judicial Council has adopted an optional form-Appellant's Notice Designating Record on Appeal (form APP-003)-that can be used to provide the notice required by this rule.

This rule makes the filing of a notice designating the record an "act required to procure the record" within the meaning of rule 8.140(a). Under that rule, a failure to file such a notice triggers the clerk's duty to issue a 15-day notice of default and thereby allows the appellant to cure the default in superior court.

Source of truth

Edition
As posted by the Judicial Council of California (read October 22, 2026)
Official file
https://courts.ca.gov/cms/rules/index/eight/rule8_121
Text hash
sha256 0b39b3767f6266970088c0076e9c1e0b653424ac482592f44e3e53ca53fd5e95
Composed by
compose_crc.py 2026-10-22: the Judicial Council's rule pages read paragraph by paragraph; verify_crc.py's second reading of the Council's per-title PDFs finds every paragraph

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Procedural information only. Not legal advice and not a substitute for the advice of an attorney. Confirm the current text with the official publisher before relying on it.