Index  | Search 

Publication number

The publication number is the number assigned to a patent application on publication. The publication number is made up of a country code (two letters) and a serial number (variable, one to ten digits) (eg US4325348).
Sometimes the number is followed by a kind code corresponding to a specific stage in the procedure.
Note: Do not enter blanks between the country code and the number.

To retrieve all the documents having a particular country code in combination with other search criteria (dates, etc.), all you have to do is enter the country code in the publication number field in combination with a date in the publication date field.

You may enter a maximum of four search terms per field and a total of 21 search terms per mask. For the publication number and application number fields, if more than one term is entered, the default operator is OR. This means that you can enter your search terms without having to type the default operator .

When searching for non-patent literature (XP) documents, you must enter the accession number in the publication number field.

For more information on patent searching, see the following pages:

Default operator
Boolean operators
Limitations
FAQ searching
Country codes
Number formats
Click here to see the oldest and the most recent documents available for each country .