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Type | PatentSCOPE | FreePatentsOnline | Google Patents | USPTO | Espacenet |
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Free |
Free Sponsored by the WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization) |
Free Registration
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Free Google search engine accessing |
Free Sponsored by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office |
Free Sponsored by the European Patent Office |
U.S. Coverage |
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Foreign Coverage See also Directory of Intellectual Property Offices by Country | Coverage varies for 36 patent offices Check for latest coverage |
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None | None |
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Search Interface |
Excellent
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Excellent
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Excellent
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Awkward
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Good
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PDFs |
Yes Includes PDFs of applications and other select documents |
Yes Registration required |
Yes Clicking the “Download PDF” button on the patent’s About page |
No Requires TIFF viewer for images |
Yes |
Applications | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes, in separate database | Yes |
RSS/email alerts | Yes | No | No | ||
Other |
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Registration required for advanced features such as saving searches, email alerts, viewing PDFs, etc. |
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