USPTO Public Patent Search Tool and Google Patents

By Quinne Uchida and Edward Stern

For topics involving intellectual property or patent disputes, there is a high probability that you will need to find the word usage in a specific patent in dispute or the current status of a patent. In searching for patents online, Google Patents and Public Patent Search are two main databases that are essential for both personal research and for anybody who is interested in intellectual property. Both are free to use and provide the official source document filed at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Neither Google Patents nor Public Patent Search require an account so therefore no searched information is saved under the user’s browser history. 

Google Patents and Public Patent Search each have their own strengths and weaknesses in the ease of access for users to navigate and the way in which the patent information is presented.

Google Patents

Google Patents is the more useful tool for beginner users to patent law. The search tool is more forgiving in that you can search for a patent name from the Google main page. Patents are rarely registered under their brand name or the colloquial term for the object. Google recognizes brand names of objects more readily which makes finding patents much easier. In our presentation, we used the example of a “Bop It”- an early 2000s kids toy. “Bop it” was registered under “Hand-held voice game,” which would likely be hard to find for unaccustomed users.

Google Patents also has a number of tools that will likely help those who are doing patent research. Google Patents has a litigation tool that shows all legal events relating to a patent including when the patent was registered or assigned, when it expires, and if there is any sort of issue with the patent. International patents are also more represented on Google Patents whereas the Public Patent Search only lists domestic patents. Google also provides data visualizations of search results. For example, in searching for “Hand-held voice game” the patent for “Bop it” will appear along with other similar patents. Google then graphs the similar patents by assignee, inventor, and patent type. These tools will likely be useful in determining which companies have similar products and are likely to be in a patent dispute. 

USPTO

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office runs its Public Patent Search Tool (USPTO) from information taken from three separate databases: the Pre-Grant Publication (PGPub), U.S. Patents (USPAT), and USOCR which consists of scanned copies of patents from the 1830s to 1970s. USPTO is limited in its initial basic search functionality because it only allows for three boolean search operators to be used. USPTO basic search also only allows for two words to be used at a time on two separate text boxes. The advanced search function is more effective. 

The Public Patent Search Tool Advanced Search allows users to implement search terms for specific data fields in addition to other common search features like standard boolean operators and limited regular expressions. Compared to Westlaw and Lexis search methods, USPTO’s advanced search does not have a root expander (“!”). However, USPTO utilizes the universal character symbol (“*”) to match any number of characters. USPTO’s Advanced Search also allows for searches on string literals enclosed in quotation marks to search for an exact phrase in any section of any document. The default behavior of the USPTO’s Advanced Search is to iteratively search all text sections of the entire document. One of the most useful features of the Advanced Search is the ability to query a specific data field within the search text bar. For example, one could query the patent number of a “Bop it” directly by entering (“6210278”).pn. directly into the search field. A query of the specific data field bypasses additional actions of navigating the cumbersome search result settings.  

Conclusion

The main pro of using the Public Patent Search Tool is that it is run by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Anything on Public Patent Search can be trusted to be up-to-date and accurate as to its information. Google Patents takes the same information as Public Patent Search but is not updated as frequently. Therefore, information on Google Patents can be outdated. Google Patents on the other hand has several extra research aids including the data visualization tool, legal events tab, and more international patent filings of the same patent. Our recommendation is to use Google Patents as a main workhorse but to make sure to check USPTO for the accuracy of the information and to use USPTO for a patent citation.

Table1.1: Helpful Links Quick Reference: 

USPTO Public Patent Search Tool https://ppubs.uspto.gov/pubwebapp/

Google Patents https://patents.google.com