Espacenet is ready for the Unitary Patent.
A new marker - C0 - indicates European patents with registered unitary effect. You can search for Unitary Patents using this marker, such as in the following query: pn=EPC0.
For Unitary Patents, in addition to the EPA and EPB publications there will be an additional record (EPC0).
A blue icon (
) also indicates European patents with registered unitary effect.
The following new features have been added for Unitary Patents:
A new Unitary Patent link featuring the blue icon will lead you to the Unitary Patent Register section UP About this file. It will appear on the Bibliographic data, Description, Claims and INPADOC family views.
Within the EPC0 record, the link to Global Dossier will lead you to the Unitary Patent Register section UP All documents. It appears in the Bibliographic data, Description, Claims and INPADOC family views.
Within the EPC0 record, Bibliographic data, Description, Claims and Drawings will display the data of the corresponding EPB document. The abstract will be from the EPA or EP/PCT.
In downloads of the latest legal events, the Unitary Patent and Global Dossier links will appear in two adjacent columns.
The blue icon will also appear to the right of EP publication numbers on printed Bibliographic data, Description, Claims, INPADOC family and Latest legal events views.
For more on Unitary Patent data in Espacenet, see the Unitary Patent information in patent knowledge page.
Inventor names are now displayed in the Simple family and INPADOC family tables. They are also visible in the downloaded and printed versions of these tables.
If there are network connection issues and the document details are not displayed, an error message will now appear as well as a button to reload the page.
There were loading and stability issues with My patents. For example, some users saw a loading icon instead of stored documents. This issue has been fixed.
Access to the page "Notice of changes" from the Classification search area has been restored.
The Family/Publication filter toggle has been set by default to Family instead of Publication.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
The chart/graph overview (available when you enable Filters) now comes with a hyperlink, meaning you can share the statistical overview of your search results with others.
The Notice of changes to CPC hyperlink is working again.
Once you've viewed a document in My patents, selecting My patents in the breadcrumbs closes the document pane.
You can now sort on the More events column in the Patent family – Latest legal events table.
The reset icon is greyed out and inactive after you reset the layout.
It is now possible to focus on the Smart search magnifying glass (Search button) using your keyboard.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
Straight after opening Espacenet, when you entered a query in Smart search and opened Advanced search before running the query, the query in Smart search disappeared. This has been fixed.
The limit for the Countries filter category has been raised to 150 and for the Applicants – country and Inventors – country filter categories to 300.
It sometimes took up to 15 seconds to load Bibliographic data views. They are now displayed much faster.
When users select Global Dossier in the Bibliographic data, Description or Claims view, the Global Dossier page is now displayed in the same EPO official language (DE, EN, FR) as the one selected for the Espacenet interface.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
The result list could not be expanded anymore when Advanced search or the Filters were open. This has been fixed.
When publications do not have any available abstract in the database, the available abstract of another publication sharing the same application number is displayed on the bibliographic data view. In these situations, a message now indicates the publication number to which the displayed abstract corresponds to.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
The language code for Montenegro has been changed to CNR.
The left and right axis titles of the Publication date filter have been changed to "Publications per year" and "Publications cumulative" when filtering on publication level.
When the Help area was open in a new tab or window, other areas in the main navigation bar could sometimes not be selected anymore. This has been fixed.
Help pages can now be printed and the menus can be both opened and closed upon selection of a drop-down arrow.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
Queries are no longer limited to a maximum of 20 search terms. They are now restricted to a maximum of 500 search terms and by the maximum URL length supported by your browser or email provider.
To help with longer queries, it is now possible to expand the width of the Advanced search view.
For easier query viewing and editing use the Smart search editor. This can be accessed using the rectangle icon displayed in the Smart search bar.
Publication numbers with trailing letters, e.g. SG10201907080YA, are now searchable and recognised as patent numbers when you search with the kind code.
The publication date in the Citing documents view was not correct. This has been fixed.
The left and right axis titles of the Publication date filter have been changed to "Publications per year" and "Publications cumulative" when filtering on publication level.
New help content has been added to Espacenet with an expandable/collapsible tree of topics. Adjust the width of the panels by using the double-headed arrow which appears when you hover over the panel separator. Select and hold or right-click a help topic to open a new tab or window. Use the new keyword search feature to find topics of interest.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
You can now access the Advanced search from the homepage when you zoom in on your desktop, laptop or tablet using the magnifying glass icon and from the drop-down menu on your smartphone.
You must now enter a value to use the Smart search.
Axis titles were missing from date graphs. This has been fixed.
It is now always possible to sort by column in the Citations and Patent family views.
A new column in the Citations view indicates the type of NPL citation (e.g. internet citation, journal article, conference proceedings article).
Some Korean descriptions were only partially being downloaded. This has been fixed.
Some publication numbers were being incorrectly displayed in the Citations view. This has been fixed.
Users encountered problems using My patents when the number of stored documents exceeded 100. This has been fixed.
Families which have been transferred from the Citations view into the result list can now be added to My patents.
Under My Settings, deleting results marked as read will now also include items in My patents.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
Visit this Espacenet discussion forum for a list of known issues and workarounds.
The names of downloaded xlsx and csv files have been changed to reflect their content types.
Some information in the xlsx files was hidden. This has been fixed.
The print layout of result lists has been made more user‑friendly.
The query ct=XP sometimes caused the duplication and grey highlighting of XP numbers in the Citations view. This has been fixed.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
Visit this Espacenet discussion forum for a list of known issues and workarounds.
The links to Global Dossier were sometimes missing in the Latest legal events pane of Patent family. This has been fixed.
Descriptions and claims were missing for some EP documents. This has been fixed.
For NPL citations, the three-dot menu at the top right of the Bibliographic data pane wrongly proposed a Share this patent option. Because cited NPL documents are not patent documents and because they cannot be specifically searched and shared, this option has been removed for NPL citations.
The publication date of NPL citations was displayed in the wrong column in the Cited documents pane. This has been fixed.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
Visit this Espacenet discussion forum for a list of known issues and workarounds
When searching specifically for patent publication, application or priority numbers, the numbers were not highlighted correctly in the Bibliographic data and Patent family panes. This is now working properly.
At certain zoom levels, Espacenet failed to correctly display the result list, advanced search and filter sections. This issue has been fixed.
The link to the ARABPAT French interface is now working.
The bibliographic data printouts are now showing the correct application number.
The entries in the Help glossary are now displayed in alphabetical order in the French and German language interfaces.
With Smart search, you can search all patent documents with
a specific kind code using one of the following types of query (CC= country
code, KC=kind code):
pn=CCKC, e.g. pn=EPB1
pn=CC AND pn=KC, e.g. pn=EP AND pn=B1.
In Advanced search mode, you need to use the Publication
number search field.
You can also use wildcard operators to broaden the scope of
your search, e.g. pn=EPB* to find EPB1, EPB2, EPB3, EPB8 and EPB9.
This new release eliminates any need to truncate the kind
code, so pn=EPB now gives the same results as pn=EPB*.
When you activate a filter, updated queries in Smart or Advanced search modes are now also processed.
Some results disappeared when scrolling down the result list and then shifting the focus to another view such as My patents, Classification search and Help. This has been fixed.
In the Citations view, the publication date corresponded to the earliest publication date of the citation's application lifecycle instead of the publication date of the displayed citation. Espacenet now displays the correct publication date.
When using keyboard navigation, some elements were highlighted in grey or framed in black instead of being framed with a blue border when the keyboard focus was on them. These elements are now correctly framed with a blue border.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
Visit this Espacenet discussion forum for a list of known issues and workarounds.
If you select individual results in the Result list, the number of items selected is indicated to the right of the main check box (x patents selected) at the top of the list. Clearing this check box now cancels all selections made. The bug whereby it was only possible to cancel the first 100 selections in one go and all others one by one has been fixed.
The document title in the result list is designed to change from red to grey when clicked/tapped to indicate that the document has been consulted. In this release, it is now also the case in the following scenarios:
The bug whereby titles and/or abstracts in a language other than English in citations or INPADOC family data transferred to the Result list were not displayed has been fixed.
When using your keyboard to navigate, the Espacenet element your keyboard focus is on at any given time is visually highlighted. Google Chrome, for instance, uses a blue border for this. This is now also true for Help section links to support materials and forms, for example the Pocket guide, the Changes in Espacenet guide, the Espacenet forum and our Contact form.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
Visit this Espacenet discussion forum for a list of known issues and workarounds.
When selecting the Text and thumbnails list view, for some documents, a spinner was displayed instead of a thumbnail. This bug has been fixed.
Previously, Espacenet crashed when the user tried to print a result list with 0 results. This is no longer the case.
Espacenet only allows the first 100 results in the result list to be selected at once. When a list with more than 100 results was viewed, e.g. 120, an incorrect message used to be displayed at the top of the result list, i.e. Select the first 120 results. This message has now been remedied. Please note that additional documents can be selected manually. When doing so, the limitations for the download features should be taken into consideration: max. 100 results in .pdf format and max. 500 results in .xlsx and .csv formats.
When the result list was in collapsed/hidden mode, the hit number erroneously overlapped other text elements. This has been fixed.
In some instances, data such as the applicant name and the earliest publication date was missing after the transfer of the INPADOC family to the result list. This issue has been fixed.
The query link in a downloaded Excel file for filtered data is now working.
See also this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
The Internet Explorer browser is not supported anymore by Espacenet. A popup now appears on this browser to remind the users that some features may not work and tables many not render properly. The use of another browser is highly recommended (supported browsers).
Patent documents with large abstracts (over 1 MB) in Korean can now be handled by Espacenet, which now remains stable when these documents are specifically searched for or when a result list that contains these documents is sorted, e.g. by descending publication date.
The display of drawings has been optimised. In default viewing modes, images are not truncated anymore and the need for slider use is minimised.
In some cases, highlighting was not displayed correctly. This has been fixed.
When the user printed the classification search area in Firefox (right click / print), the first and last pages appeared as blank pages. This bug has been fixed.
Espacenet does not crash anymore when a filter for applicants or inventors that contain a semicolon, for example “RSR TECHN INC ;”, is applied.
In some instances, Patent Translate proposed incorrect list of languages, for example English for English descriptions or claims. This has been fixed now.
The Espacenet database contains searchable machine translations in English for description and claims that are not available in this language. The Patent Translate button was, however, erroneously made available for these machine translations. Now Patent Translate is not displayed anymore on the machine translated text view, but is still available for the original language text if you want to obtain a version with the latest translation technology. As a reminder, all EPO member states’ languages can be translated into English, German or French, while the Asian languages and Russian can only be translated into English.
Downloaded descriptions and claims in Arabic font are now rendering properly.
Erroneous characters, wording and/or tags were sometimes displayed in exported result lists. This issue has been fixed.
See also this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
In the Bibliographic data view, there were layout issues and Espacenet was delivering oversized drawings. These were particularly common on smaller screens such as laptops, and it made the application difficult to use at times. Espacenet now calculates the size of the drawing displayed in the Bibliographic data, Description and Claims views, so you do not need to use the scroll bars. You can now adjust the width of the result list and collapse it, a feature that is particularly useful in the case of tablet-sized devices. In the collapsed view, you can still use the keyboard navigation: use the up and down arrow or "n" and "p" keys (i.e. next and previous) to navigate between results. You can also adjust the drawing width to allow you to focus on other parts.
If necessary, you can reset the screen layout in My Espacenet (My settings) if you find it difficult to operate the system with the default layout adjustments rendered by the application.
Stability and scrolling on mobile devices has been improved: the interaction is now smoother (e.g. headers no longer disappear or bounce up and down).
Sometimes xml tags appeared in the Bibliographic data view. This has been fixed.
In addition to claims as originally filed, Espacenet displays a tree showing the interdependency between the claims. A bug meant that it was only possible to render the claims tree in English. Now this also works in French and German, as originally intended.
In the Description view, paragraphs and claims were being misrepresented and this has now been improved. Much of the historical text in Espacenet is derived from OCR and it is sometimes difficult to determine the quality of the claim and paragraph numbering. These numbers are now often only displayed when they are likely to be reliable. Please remember that the OCRed text in the Description and Claims views is there to help you to find relevant data, but you should check the Original document view (document in pdf format) e.g. when making citations as it is the only truly reliable source of information.
Browsing the Citations table was cumbersome especially on small devices, owing to the large white spaces and very high rows. This was aggravated by the fact that non‑patent literature citations do not have a publication number. So, the sorting order of the columns has been changed (showing the Citation origin first) and rows with many entries are collapsed by default (you can expand them if necessary).
In the past, the Filters function failed when there was only one document in the result list. This has been resolved.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
See this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
When you select Drawings only in the result list, Espacenet now sorts the drawings by the number of the page they appear on. Previously they were in a random order. Espacenet now also shows the publication number and page number when you enlarge a drawing by hovering over it in the result list.
Titles in Asian characters were not shown correctly in downloaded result lists in csv format. This has been fixed.
Espacenet allows you to print or download the first 500 results in xlsx and csv format and now any 100 front pages in pdf format from these 500 results. Previously, errors were sometimes encountered when printing or downloading, depending on the data range requested. This has been fixed, as has a related error leading to a duplication of hits in the result list.
In classification searches, sometimes fragments of the search query appeared in the Bibliographic data view. This has been fixed.
Where available, the default language for abstracts, descriptions and claims is now always the selected interface language. An improved algorithm is now used to identify which language the user expects to see.
Previously Espacenet missorted some tabs and did not show all that were available. Now it shows additional tabs if those subsections are available in the metadata (e.g. DNA Sequence). The selection of a subsection (e.g. Claims) is sticky, which means that the subsection remains selected when you switch to other hits in the result list, even if the order of the tabs changes. Espacenet defaults to Bibliographic data when the subsection selected does not exist.
Previously, when the Classification search was reopened, preferences were lost (e.g. view the CPC hierarchy as a tree structure or only highlight CPC symbols). Now they are stored for future use.
Performance has been optimised in various parts of Espacenet.
This release also includes other improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
See this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
When you navigated between different publications in the same family, the selected language was not always indicated. This has been fixed.
Highlighting is now also shown in the description and claims of the WO publication that takes the place of an EP publication (Article 153(3) EPC). This did not work before.
In some cases, the bulk machine translated description was not shown. Now more English bulk translations are shown than before.
In some cases when you selected the backward citations (cited documents) of all family members, only the ones of the selected document were shown. This has been fixed.
Searching for “XP” in Smart search is correctly interpreted as a search for the term “XP” in all text or name fields. However, Advanced search used to put “XP” in the All numbers field because it interpreted it as a number search for non-patent literature documents starting with “XP”. This has been fixed.
Please note that in new Espacenet you can get the bibliographic data on XP documents by searching for “CT= XP…”: searching e.g. for CT=XP03* will retrieve all patents citing NPL documents that start with “XP03”. Navigating to the cited documents in the citations pane and moving them to the result list will allow you to retrieve the bibliographic data of those XP documents.
The breadcrumb trail now indicates the journey for XP documents in the same way as it does for patent documents.
Printing the tree view to show the dependencies of CPC codes is now possible in supported browsers. To do this e.g. in Chrome, you will need to select Background graphics under More settings in the Print dialog.
Espacenet shows you the search statement and the filter criteria when you print or download a result list or the front pages of the documents found. In the past, however, the reference to excluded filter items was not shown correctly. This has been fixed and certain typographic conventions applied in the layout of the download have been harmonised with the layout you see on screen. Also in the past, when you searched with several search items separated by spaces, the link to the query displayed in the download did not work properly. This too has been fixed.
The title, query and filters were not fully visible in the downloads for complex searches. Now lines are wrapped so that no information is lost.
When you downloaded result lists in xlsx format, the content of the results was sometimes split between consecutive pages but that is no longer the case.
Keyboard navigation in Espacenet (e.g. with the tab key) allows you to use Espacenet without a mouse. This can be helpful for visually impaired persons. Now the user focus in certain parts of the application is clearer, e.g. when you select the RSS feed for the INPADOC patent family.
See also this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
Espacenet did not work properly when you selected a specific language for the abstract and then moved on to a different result in the result list that did not comprise the selected language. This has been fixed.
Descriptions of documents with certain kind codes (e.g. USH47H) were not displayed correctly. This has been fixed.
Like Euro-PCT Notices (A0 documents), US X6 documents (e.g. certificates of corrections) are now also displayed in the Original document pane. They appear under the Additional tab and can be downloaded.
The Legal events tab now displays the most recent publication of an application. In addition, whenever there is an AO publication in a family, events relating to later publications in the family are now shown. This did not work before.
The print function has also been enabled for non-patent documents (XP documents) and their citing documents.
The data transfer volume has been reduced by tailoring the response more precisely to the user request (e.g. download of front pages). This makes the application faster.
This release comprises other improvements that are not visible to the user and are not mentioned here.
See this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
The download and print file now shows which criterion was used for sorting the downloaded result list (relevance, priority or publication date).
The dropdown patent translate appears only in case that the content of the selected document pane can be translated. Inconsistencies when displaying the patent translate button when navigating between panes with and without content have been fixed.
Sometimes the language of the applicant and inventor heading did not change when changing the language interface. This has been fixed.
The number of filter items retrieved per filter category has been increased considerably. This should make it easier e.g. to find applicants or inventors with specific countries of residence or to select various spelling variants of the same applicant.
The truncation of large numbers in the date graph in the filter has been fixed. Also, the numbers in these graphs are expressed in thousands or millions as deemed appropriate for better readability.
This release comprises other improvements that are not visible to the user and are not mentioned here.
See this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
The selected document was sometimes omitted from the breadcrumb trail. The breadcrumb trail now shows the selected document number irrespective of whether or not the result list is shown.
In classic Espacenet, when copying the page bookmark comprising the title and patent number to a Word or Excel file, the copied data includes the hyperlink to Espacenet. This handy feature is now also available in the new interface. Tip: this feature works best if you select the items you want to copy backwards, i.e. starting with the last character of the title (omitting the space) and copy them to the clipboard.
CPC combination sets (C-sets) that are invention-related are displayed in bold in the bibliographic data pane. C-sets relating to additional information are now displayed in non-bold.
Occasional omission of information identifying the description text as a machine translation. This information has now been added.
The unwanted truncation of the description of some long documents has now been fixed.
The field operators (all, any, etc.) were interpreted as text when capitalised. Capitalisation no longer interferes with the search behaviour.
Deep linking to specific classification codes in the classification browser has been restored.
The cross (X), which instantly removes all search terms in the smart search query, has been restored on mobile devices.
This release comprises other improvements that are not visible to the user and are not mentioned here.
See this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
A patent application can claim more than one priority. Espacenet's bibliographic data pane shows all of the claimed priorities (number and date). However, only the earliest priority date is taken into account in the filter function, the result list download and the citation table. The wording has been changed from "Priority date" to "Earliest priority date" to make this clearer to the user.
In the bibliographic data pane, WO documents were sometimes incorrectly sorted according to the priority document's country code.
Now all publications are sorted alphabetically according to their publication number.
Missing highlighting of XP documents in the citation tab has been restored.
Filter tokens that appear at the top of the result list disappeared when opening the search via the breadcrumb trail. Now filtering remains intact and the filter tokens are visible.
Sometimes messages indicating the non-availability of patent information details, e.g. "description not found", were displayed until the system had loaded the available data. Now the error message is only shown if it is clear that no data is available.
Users reported an instability issue during a new interface release. This issue is now fixed and a warning message has been added for users using older versions.
This release also includes a number of necessary improvements that are not visible to the user. These improvements are not mentioned here.
See this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
Since release 1.10.0, searching for a document publication with a specific kind code displays the document with the relevant kind code instead of the earliest available publication of the application. This, however, is only the case when you search for individual documents. In the new release, the kind codes in the result list correspond fully to your search criteria. If you search for multiple documents (e.g. pn= EPB*), the Espacenet result list will display all publications matching the kind code specified.
Similar to the display format in classic Espacenet, the patent number is now shown with the selected application's other publication kind codes in brackets, e.g. EP0881463A2 (A3,B1,B8). This helps the user to quickly see which document stages have been published, e.g. to check whether an application has been granted or amended. Please note that the kind codes in brackets indicate the existence of a document, but in some jurisdictions (e.g. Japan), the publication numbers associated with the various kind codes may differ. You will find full information in the Published as section on the document pane. In the case of divisional applications, the result list only shows the publication of the selected application. The publication kind code of other divisional applications may be found in the Published as section on the Bibliographic data tab.
When you download and print a result list, Espacenet now includes all publications associated with an application (e.g. A1, B1, etc.) in the Publication number column - not just the earliest available publication.
Applicant names are standardised to a certain degree in Espacenet, combining the different spelling variants of the same applicant name. Espacenet now shows the non-standardised or original name if the standardised applicant name is missing.
In the Text and thumbnails view, the front-page drawings are now shown instead of a systematic display of the document's first drawings. This is to ensure the best representation of the invention as proposed by the applicant.
Analysis of large families with multiple citations is now more stable and responsive.
The list of patents in the Citations tab can be moved to the result list for further exploration. Non-patent literature citations cannot be explored any further. In the new release, the button for moving citations to the result list is masked out if only non-patent literature documents are cited.
Minor bug fixes and improvements not visible to the user are not described here.
See this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
You can now copy your My patents list from classic Espacenet to new Espacenet. In new Espacenet, simply select the double-arrow symbol in My Espacenet -> My settings -> Saved lists -> My patents to see the items in your My patents list in classic Espacenet. When you select Copy all to My patents, the tool will tick each copied item and change its background colour from grey to blue. Any item that is not copied will be displayed with a cross and a red background. If that happens, we recommend that you repeat the above procedure after a few days. If you update your My patents list in classic Espacenet, you can again repeat the above procedure to copy any additional patents in classic to new Espacenet. The grey circle beside the double-arrow symbol indicates the number of items in classic Espacenet that have not yet been copied to My patents in new Espacenet.
This feature will work if you are using both versions in the same browser on the same computer.
Please remember the general principle that adding another publication of a family that is already in My patents will not increase the number of families listed. However, the star icon is filled in for both documents because both are in My patents. The same principle applies when copying patents from classic Espacenet.
Where only one document is found, you will now see the document pane only. Previously there were circumstances where this did not work. If, however, you want to see the result-list entry of that one document, simply open it from the breadcrumb trail.
Minor bug fixes and improvements not visible to the user are not described here.
See this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
Minor bug fixes and improvements not visible to the user are not described here.
See this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
Release 1.8.1 of Espacenet includes the following new features and bug fixes:
Minor bug fixes and improvements not visible to the user are not described here.
See this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
Release 1.7.3 of Espacenet includes the following new features and bug fixes:
Minor bug fixes and improvements not visible to the user are not described here.
See this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
This release 1.7.0 of Espacenet includes the following updates and bug fixes:
Minor bug fixes and improvements not visible to the user are not described here.
Espacenet is an EPO database containing over 110 million patent documents - full technical descriptions and drawings of inventions - from over 100 countries.
New Espacenet is a complete overhaul of classic Espacenet, offering you
These release notes provide an overview of the features and changes compared to classic Espacenet.
Landing page
Smart search
Result list
Detail view
Advanced search
Filters
My Espacenet area for
Download
Help
Responsive design
For optimal user experience, new Espacenet adapts the layout to different
devices (large screens, laptops, tables and smartphones).
See this forum entry for a list of known issues and workarounds.
We will continue to collect your feedback via a standardised questionnaire. Simply follow the link in the main navigation bar.
We will not be able to comment on your feedback. Should you have any questions requiring a direct response from us, please post them on the forum.
Reporting data errors
Please report data errors relating to the document displayed in the detail view from the link in the main navigation bar.
|
Field identifier in Smart search |
Description /
Equivalent |
Example |
|
|---|---|---|---|
|
in new Espacenet |
in classic Espacenet |
||
|
nftxt |
- |
All text fields or names |
nftxt="extreme uv lithography" |
|
ntxt |
txt |
Title, abstract or names |
ntxt=microscope lens |
|
ti |
ti |
Title |
ti="mouse trap" |
|
ab |
ab |
Abstract |
ab="mouse trap" |
|
desc |
desc |
Description |
desc=lens |
|
claims |
claims |
Claims |
claims=laser |
|
ta |
ta |
Title or abstract |
ta="laser printer" |
|
ctxt |
- |
Title, abstract or claims |
ctxt=milking ctxt=robots |
|
ftxt |
extftxt |
All text fields (title, abstract, description or claims) |
ftxt=nanoparticles |
|
in |
in |
Inventors |
in=smith |
|
pa |
pa |
Applicants |
pa=siemens |
|
ia |
ia |
Inventors or applicants |
ia=apple OR ia="ries klaus" |
|
pd1 |
pd |
Publication date |
pd=20180107 |
|
pr |
pr |
Priority number |
pr=ep20050104792 |
|
pn |
pn |
Publication number |
pn=ep1000000 pn=EPB12 |
|
ap |
ap |
Application number |
ap=jp19890234567 |
|
num |
num |
Numbers |
num=ep1000000 |
|
ipc |
ipc |
IPC |
ipc=A63B49/08 |
|
cpc |
cpc |
CPC |
cpc="A61K31/13" |
|
cpcc |
cpcc |
CPC C-sets |
cpcc="C08F297/02" |
|
cl |
cl |
IPC or CPC |
cl=C10J3 |
|
ct |
ct |
Cited documents |
ct=ep1000000 |
1 You can search by the publication date of the earliest publication (e.g. EPA1) of a patent document but not by the publication dates of subsequent publications (e.g. EPB1). This is because subsequent publication dates are not indexed for search purposes.
Following the launch of the CPC International project on 24/25 August 2019, Espacenet now displays CPCI data. This means that the authorities that have assigned CPC classification symbols are now displayed next to each classification symbol (see screenshot below).
CPC symbols will continue to be propagated at family level, which means that every member of the simple patent family will display the same CPCI symbols in the bibliographic data view.
Use of the field identifier "cpc" in Smart search or the search field "CPC" in Advanced search will still search all documents that have been assigned the CPC symbol in question, independently of the assigning authorities.
Espacenet, however, now offers the possibility of searching for documents where CPC symbols have been assigned by specific authorities. Here are some examples of queries you can use for this purpose:
cpc=(C08F220/26 prox/unit=sentence EP)
cpc=(C08F220/38 prox/unit=sentence
(US, EP))
cpc=(C08F220/26/low prox/unit=sentence
(US, KR, EP))
cpcc=(C07C37/08 prox/unit=sentence
(CN, EP, US))
cpcc=(C08F218/08 prox/unit=sentence
(C08F220/06, US, EP))
You may recall that when the "cpc" field identifier is used, "/low" can be added at the end of the classification symbol to include all children (i.e. sub-classification levels) in the search. /low is only needed at subgroup levels, e.g. C08F220/26/low. Up to the main group level, e.g. C08, C08F or C08F 220, the data is auto-posted, which means that all sub-levels are automatically searched at the same time. When searching for combination sets (the "cpcc" field identifier), use of "/low" is not supported.
You will find general information on the CPCI on the CPC website. For more details on the CPCI, please send an e-mail to cpc@epo.org.
There are two new features available in Espacenet.
The new extftxt field identifier lets you perform full-text searches for keywords anywhere in a patent document (title, abstract, description and claims). To perform a full-text search in Smart search, run a normal search (step 1). By default, the search is run in the bibliographic data collection. Click Refine search (step 2) to be able to select one of the three full-text searchable collections available and run your search again (step 3).
Step 1
Step 2
Step 3
Espacenet lets you search for partners residing in countries that could be of interest for your business or research field. In Advanced search, just enter a country code between square brackets, e.g. [CN], in the Inventor(s) or Applicant(s) field. In Smart search, use the following query: in=[CC] or pa=[CC], e.g. pa=[JP].
The Latest updates section on the Espacenet homepage has been renamed Data coverage and its content replaced by links to the Latest bibliographic coverage and Latest full-text coverage pages.
For some years now RSS feeds have been available for monitoring changes in EP files, in the "All documents" section of the European Patent Register.
With the latest release, Espacenet also offers access to the Global Dossier RSS feed for EP and Chinese dossiers, allowing you to receive alerts on dossier changes.
The family-based RSS feed is accessible in Espacenet from the INPADOC patent family view (Fig. 1).
To receive alerts on changes to the files of INPADOC family members of Global Dossier's participating patent offices, click on the RSS dossier icon and follow the instructions to subscribe to the RSS family dossier feed.
Currently, RSS feeds are available for EP and CN documents (see help files for coverage). In the future, the family-based RSS alerts will be extended to further participating offices.
Fig.
1 RSS feed - family dossiers
The CCD application, accessible via Espacenet in the Cited documents view (Fig. 2) and the IP5 website, now has an added download function. This new function allows you to export the prior art cited by family members of a single patent application in CSV or Excel format (Fig. 3). Some of the data attributes in Excel format will have active hyperlinks to Espacenet (Fig. 4). The CSV format allows you to import the data into your own patent management systems.
Fig.
2 Access to CCD
Fig.
3 Download function in CCD
Fig.
4 Exported data in Excel
The Global Dossier service has now been extended to encompass further authorities participating in the WIPO CASE initiative.
In addition to patent application dossiers ("file wrappers") from the world's five largest patent offices, it now also includes public dossiers from the Canadian Patent Office as well as PCT applications.
The register link will (where available and only then) remain in the navigation bar whereas the Global Dossier link, when available, will be displayed in the content area of the bibliographic view and in the INPADOC family view.
The Espacenet interface displays Global Dossier icons and links to registers for certain authorities providing access to the Global Dossier and to register information, respectively.
In order to avoid any ambiguity, access to Global Dossier and links to the European Patent Register and available national registers have been separated.
When you click on a Global Dossier icon, the behaviour is the same as in the European Patent Register. For links to a national register, the respective national (or EP) register window will open where links/pages are available. For authorities/documents where no link to a register is available, no link will be displayed.
When you click on a Global Dossier icon, the respective Global Dossier window opens where links/pages are available. The icon is not visible when the respective file wrappers are not available.
For those authorities where Global Dossier is available (currently CA, CN, EP, JP, KR, US and WO) you will find a corresponding icon after the application number. This will link to the file inspection service of the respective authority. The Global Dossier link, when available, is displayed in the content area of the bibliographic view and in the INPADOC family view.When you click on the Global Dossier icon next to the EP application number, the "All documents" view of the corresponding application in the EP Register opens.
With the extension of Global Dossier, the new authorities show a corresponding link to the existing information in the INPADOC patent family view below the publication information in the "Publication info" column.
It is now also possible to sort your lists by publication date.
Provided there are fewer than 500 documents in the result list, it can be sorted in ascending or descending order by Publication Date (result list only), Priority Date, Inventor, Applicant or CPC.
The layout of the automated daily update of the coverage provided by the EPO's full-text and bibliographic database has changed. Coverage tables are accessible at the following links:
Coloured rows indicate that the data has changed compared to the previous day. The details of the changes are indicated in green. If a new row of data is created, all entries are in green. If gaps in coverage are filled without any change of the first/latest publication, only the total number of documents is in green.
Espacenet now supports full-text (FT) search in English, French and German.
To use full-text search, you must first select the collection you wish to search in, i.e.
These collections include the content of the former EP and WIPO full-text databases.
Make the appropriate choice from the drop-down menu in the field Select the collection you want to search in:
Then enter at least one keyword in that language in the Enter keywords field:
Enter keyword(s) and click Search as usual.
Then click Refine search as indicated below:
This takes you to the Smart search screen where you can choose a full-text collection from the drop-down menu and use the following field identifiers in connection with your search terms:
ftxt = to search full text in the description and claims
desc = to search full text in the description
claims = to search full text in the claims.
The default (field identifier = txt) is for searching in the title and abstract as well as in the applicant and inventor fields.
Combination sets ("C-sets", "Combi sets") are ordered lists of linked CPC symbols created by patent examiners. Combination sets classify technical features in context or "taken in combination". The scope of a combination set can vary across technical fields.
These classification combination sets are now searchable in Espacenet. Please note you can only search for combination sets in Smart search and to do so you must use the field identifier "cpcc".
You can enter up to ten classification symbols in the search field each separated by a space and the system will use a default Boolean AND operator.
Example:
This example retrieves patent documents that have been assigned combination sets that include C08F8/30 and C08F287/02.
You can also refine your search by using the Boolean operators AND or OR along with proximity operators.
Examples:
For further information on the use of Boolean and proximity operators, please refer to Help in Espacenet.
The combination sets are also visible in the Bibliographic data panel under C-sets.
These appear once you click more (if applicable) in the cooperative field:
A new link to the Common Citation Document (CCD) has been added to Espacenet.
You can now look up the list of documents in the CCD from the Cited documents section as well as from the INPADOC patent family section:
Secure access to Espacenet is now available. This means that you can search in Espacenet within a verified secure domain. Espacenet has an Extended Validation Certificate as indicated by a green address bar. It also verifies that all communications between your browser and the website are encrypted.
