How to do Patent Search


Why it is necessary to do patent search before applying for a patent application? 


Patent is granted to the invention issued by the patent office and the patent holder has exclusive rights for limited time period to sell, assign, and license  others to trade business; and right to sue/infringement case those using patent without the consent of patent holder.


How to do Patent search?

To conduct a patent search start by keywords, invention, type and search on Google patents, USPTO and other relevant website.

Patent search contains information that has been never disclosed and published include technical data, research, data drawings, machines, and mechanical drawing. 

Being a inventor you should have the prior knowledge or art, if someone has extensively engaged in your technology field. For entrepreneur should monitor nearby a competitors, new products what they applied research they have created in the respective discipline. 

Art of searching the patents 


 Art searching of patent is a pre-disclosed information for patentability. Prior art searching includes patents articles from renowned scholars, publication, journals, presentations at conferences.  

Filing application one must study the third-competitors patent what is described in their invention. 

All the art of searching patent is a lengthy and a time consuming process as it involves thousands of references and conduct deep research, process has to consider new development, new process or product.


Types of free patent search engine 

USPTO: United States Patent and Trademark Office.

Espacenet: European Patent database

The lens: Patent search a extensive network of patents covering countries at large 












Note. The above patent website all have some free information. Additionally, if you want any further information regarding detailed report then you have to pay a prescribe fee. However, the free access to databases have a quality of information depends from country to country. For further access of full document you can pay the prescribe fee. 

What is Patent equivalents 

 This subsequent grant on inventions is known as patent equivalence it is granted of published patent application from various countries and each country may have different regulation for filing interpretation of the invention. It may have multiple patents in some countries because of difference in patent flow. While applying inventors must know prior out of patents search that two include foreign patents or patent equivalents.

Steps for patent searching /How to search for a patent/ conducive patent searching.  


Let's take the example of USPTO 


To find patent based on invention type:

a. Search by keyword, 
b. Apply mix strategies and 
c. Classification code in specific field, 
d. Put inventor name
e. Other information to run the additional searches 
f. Find a patent through if you know the patent number 
g. If you know the inventor, owner or assignee then search by name



If you know the date of patent issued 

It is the fastest way to retrieve the data and go directly to the USPTO,  click patent public search and use the date searching option below which will provide the full text of US patent.

Publication date 

The formats to follow search by publication (issue) date YYYY with year, mm with month number, and DD with the number of day 

Exact publication date: @pd=YYYYMMDD
Publication year: @py=YYYY


Filling dates

The format to search by application, replace YYYY with the year, mm with month number, and DD with number of Day.

Exact filling date @ad=YYYYMMDD
Filing year: @ay=YYYY


Citation search: Use citation search to find patent for particular patent, which can help identify related technologies.


Boolean Operators : use operators like "AND", "OR" and "NOT" to search.

Analyze the results of patent search 

Prior art: if any similar inventions or concepts already exist related with your specific field.
Patentability: Perform assessment the the novelty and non-obviousness of your invention. An extended step of prior art
Infringement: Identify patent that could be infringed upon in your related field.

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