160 million reasons to search Espacenet

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160 million reasons to search Espacenet

22.04.2025

As the volume of patent documents grows worldwide, Espacenet continues to deliver open and reliable access

In early April 2025, the EPO’s Espacenet database reached a significant milestone: 160 million patent documents. Around half of these documents corresponded to granted patents, meaning they represent inventions that have been officially recognised as novel and inventive. This underscores the efforts of millions of inventors working to solve technical challenges and advance technology. Crucially, this entire body of knowledge remains freely accessible.

Just over a year ago, we celebrated reaching 150 million documents, highlighting the extraordinary speed at which innovation is being documented and protected around the world. Espacenet keeps pace with this rapid rise in data and is updated daily with information delivered to the EPO by national and regional offices.

Rapid rise in patent documents

The growth in patent publications has been far from linear. While approximately 45 million patent documents were published between 1782 and 2000, about 70 million documents have been added in the last ten years alone. As shown in Fig. 1 below on granted patents at the IP5 offices, P.R. China, via the China National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA), has emerged as the leading contributor during this period.

Fig.1. IP5 granted patents – Source: https://www.fiveipoffices.org/statistics/statisticsreports

While no single technical field truly dominates (see Fig. 2), the three fields below currently lead the way:

Industrial processes, manufacturing techniques, machinery and transportation technologies (International Patent Classification (IPC) section B) account for 21% of all patents in the EPO’s collection.
Applied physics technologies, including measurement instruments, computing, optics, telecommunications and information technology systems (IPC section G), follow closely with 19%.
In third place, electricity-related innovations (IPC section H) represent 17%, highlighting the crucial role of energy and communication technologies in shaping our future.

Fig.2. Distribution of patent documents across IPC sections in Espacenet, from 1782 onwards

Although not always in this precise order, the B-G-H trio consistently ranks in top across all IP5 offices and has done so for the past decade, reflecting global technological and economic priorities.

Beyond data

The 160 million documents in the EPO database are far more than just data. They constitute a living record of human creativity and serve as a rich resource to inspire new discoveries that will shape the technologies and solutions of the future. Moreover, the ever-growing volume of patents underscores the increasing strategic importance of intellectual property for companies, researchers and inventors worldwide.

Keywords: Espacenet, search, worldwide, 160 million, patent documents