Patent Application Search: all of them take place at the USPTO

Every patent application search is conducted at the USPTO website. This is because this is where everyone can gain access to the governmental data base that is storing all current patents which have been issued by the US government.

There are services that help with this arduous task. The difficulty of conducting this search can be noticed by the possible options for the search engines to locate the desired patents. One service has 37 different field names as the variable for this to be done.

If you have decided to do it yourself, be ready for two data bases at the USPTO to go through. The reason there are two is the way the electronic files have been created. All patents from 1790 until 1975 are available but only in image form. This is done so you can view them, but the search criteria are severely limited. They are only searchable by issue date, patent number, and current US classification.

For the part of the database that is from 1976 to the current date, there are 37 possibilities. This makes it easier to search a more specific way. You can use abstract, the name of the patent holder, related US patent applications data, to just name a few. This is not an easy process to review with any like item because you have to be specific when calling up a patent in order to view it.

For this reason, many hire a patent application search specialist to do this. It may be time consuming and expensive, but at least you will not be filing for a patent that has already been issued to another party.