Legal analysis: Family court refers to an independent court or an independent department of the court of first instance. Generally speaking, the cases heard by family courts are limited to divorce, custody and maintenance of children, adoption and other matters related to family relations, such as issuing restraining orders in domestic violence cases.

Legal basis: Opinions on Carrying out the Pilot Work of Family Trial Mode and Working Mechanism Reform Article 36 The people's courts shall not hear family cases involving personal privacy in public. Family cases involving minors are not conducive to protecting the interests of minors, and the people's courts do not hear them in public.

Before hearing a divorce case, the people's court shall ask the parties whether to apply for a closed trial. If the application is not public, the hearing may be held in private.

In other family cases, if the parties apply to hear the case in private, and the people's court considers it inappropriate to hear it in public after examination, it may do so.