Using the Public Search Facility

You may use our computer workstations to search patents issued from 1790 to the current week. Full document text may be searched on U.S. patents issued since 1971 and OCR text from 1920 to 1970.

U.S. patent images from 1790 to the present may be retrieved for viewing or printing.

We provide access to the following patent examining automated search systems:

• Public Patent Search system (PPUBS)
• Patent Center
• Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB)
• Patent Classifications
• Patent Assignments Search
• Patents Official Gazette

A complete trademark registration collection is available online. Online searching of pending, registered, and dead trademarks is available using the following trademark examining automated search systems:

• Trademark Search
• Trademark Status and Document Retrieval (TSDR)
• Trademark Reporting and Monitoring System (TRAM)
• Trademark Trial and Appeal Board VUE (TTABVUE)
• Trademark Assignments Search
• Trademarks Official Gazette

You can search patent and trademark data without coming to USPTO headquarters, either through the internet or from other USPTO locations.

Internet access

Patent and trademark data is searchable on the internet. You can access the Patent Center and the Patent Examination Data System (PEDS) online. You can also use Trademark search to access the same text and image database as the examining attorneys at the USPTO.

Patent and Trademark Resource Centers

The nationwide network of Patent and Trademark Resource Centers (PTRCs) offer access to patent and trademark reference materials and search tools. Trained staff are available to assist public users.

To locate a PTRC near you, visit the PTRC Program page at the USPTO website or call 800-786-9199. 

USPTO Regional Offices

The Regional Offices of Detroit, Denver, San Jose and Dallas provide access to the same research system available in the Public Search Facility. For locations and other information about the Regional Offices, visit our USPTO office locations page.

Please be aware that you will not be able to connect a removable media device—such as a thumb drive or your personal phone—to our computers for the purpose of downloading your search results. Please see the USPTO removable media policy for more information. Also, search results cannot be emailed from the search system, but results can be printed out without charge.

Patent Indices

Early in our history, these books published the issuing of patents. They also listed the patents by inventor name, and today are useful for locating patents for early inventors. 

Official Gazette for Patents

The Official Gazette for Patents is a weekly publication that lists patents and patent-related decisions issued in a particular week. We have most issues of the gazette, dating back to 1872 and up to 2002, when the USPTO moved to an electronic version of the publication. The older issues are helpful when searching patent and USPTO decisions prior to 2002. Many of these decisions continue to impact patent policy today. 

Plant Patents Collection

Plant Patents, which the USPTO issues for asexually reproduced flowering plants, fruit trees, and other hybrid plants, are the last collection of patents that are still available for researching in classified paper format. The Plant Patent Act of 1930, which first allowed horticulturalists to protect their creations as IP, was spurred by the work of Luther Burbank and his development of over 800 plant varieties in his career. Over 33,000 plant patents have been issued since then.

Color, an important feature of plants, can only be viewed in the paper copies in the PSF. 

X-Patents

A collection of X-Patents is available in microfilm format. The patents known as X-Patents were issued by the U.S. Patent Office from July 1790 to July 1836. In December of 1836, the records of the nearly 10,000 patents issued to that date were burned in a fire. An index of these patents was prepared from sources like inventors' copies, newspaper and magazine articles, libraries, and universities. While many of the patents were lost, those that were recovered were assigned an X-number to distinguish them from the numbered patents issued after 1836.

U.S. Alien Property Custodian Collection

The Trading with the Enemy Act of October 6, 1917 delegated the president's right to seize enemy property to the Office of Alien Property Custodian. During World War II, mechanical, electrical, and chemical patents held by Germany and Japan were seized under this authority. The USPTO's collection of these patents is one of few of its kind in the world.

Other searchable patent-related collections

Other patent-related searchable collections available in print format include:

• Bound volumes of design patents
• The Annual Report of the Commissioner of Patents
• Annual Indexes of Inventors (dating from 1839 to 1997)
• Historical collections of the U.S. Manual of Classification and its subject matter index
• Early issues of the U.S. Patents Quarterly (USPQ) 
• Reclassification orders (copies of orders issued for changes in classification)

The following records are available in microfilm format:

• Assignment information
• Design and Reissue Patents
• Statutory Invention Registrations (previously known as Defensive Publications) 

Patent assignment records of transactions affecting the ownership of patents and microfilmed deeds are also available.

You may search trademark-related information using the following physical collections: 

The Trademark Bound Volumes Register

This is a collection of all trademark registrations in numerical order, from 1870 to July 2018, bound into volumes. Status information for each trademark is included and continues to be added to the Trademark Bound Volumes. The collection begins with the first registration issued, to Averill Chemical Paint Company on October 25, 1870. The official records from 2018 to date are now also available on the USPTO website.

Trademark Official Gazette

The Trademark Official Gazette is a weekly publication that lists each week's new trademarks, published applications, and registrations, as well as affidavits and renewals. It facilitates searching of trademarks by classification, then serial number. Print issues of this gazette available in the Public Search Facility date from 1881 to 2013, when the publication became available electronically.

Trademark ledgers 

These ledgers were a method of recording each application as it was submitted to the Trademark Office from 1890 to 1956. From August 1890 to December 1955, each transition of an application as it was approved, issued or rejected as a trademark was recorded by handwriting the information on these ledgers. For each application, the ledgers contain the name of the applicant and of the mark, a description of the design, goods and services related to the mark, and often the registration number and renewal or cancellation information.

Other searchable collections of trademark information

Other searchable printed collections include:

• Trademark Indexes (1881-1997)
• A collection of Paris Convention marks (incomplete, dating from 1890 to 2005)
• Trademark Manuals of Examination Procedures
• Trademark assignment records, including full documents recording changes in ownership
• A record of Trademark Trial & Appeals Board (TTAB) Proceedings
• A card catalog that can be searched by registrant or applicant name (from approximately 1960 to 1990)

Additionally, trademarks-related records available in microfilm format include the following:

• Microfilmed deeds
• Assignment documents (from 1955 to 2002)
• Abandoned and pending applications (small collection, drawing page only)
• Cancelled and expired registrations from the decades of 1970, 1980, and 1990
• Registered words and designs in alphabetical and classification order (as of May 1, 2007)

The Universal Workstation System is no longer available. Remaining funds in UPWS accounts can be refunded. To request this, complete the UPWS Account Refund Request form and submit it to the fax number or mailing address on the form. No email submissions of the refund request form will be accepted. Users have a two-year period to request a UPWS account balance refund, from May 19, 2022, until May 18, 2024.

For assistance with filling the UPWS refund request form or related questions, contact the psf@uspto.gov.

Fax the completed form to 571-273-6500 (Attn: Refund Branch) or mail it to the following address:

Mail Stop 16
Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office
P.O. Box 1450
Alexandria, VA 22313-1450