A provisional patent application is a legal device adopted by Congress in 1995 that allows inventors to submit an invention using a very informal procedure to the United States Patent Office (USPTO) for a reduced filing fee.

The reduced filing fee is currently $80 for small entities, which are defined as companies having less than 500 employees, according to the USPTO.

In comparison, the filing fee for a traditional patent application, formally known as a utility patent application, begins at $385 for small entities as you can see on how to patent a product with InventHelp article.

How to File a Provisional Patent Application

To file a provisional patent application, submit at least the following to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office:

• A description (aka specification): This is any writing that sufficiently describes the invention
• Some kind of drawing.
• $80 check
• An appropriate cover letter to the United States Patent office

The patent office will receive the application, check it for filing clerical errors (i.e. paper some unusual size for example), date it and file it.

That’s it.

IMPORTANT: The provisional patent application is dated, filed but NOT examined by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

The Next Step

After one year one of two things happens:

Either the inventor follows up with a proper utility patent application (the $5000 version), in which case the patent process proceeds

OR the inventor does nothing in which case the provisional patent application is abandoned and the technology usually (but not always) fall into the public domain.

The one year deadline is set by statute and is a hard deadline that cannot be changed by the USPTO or anyone else. For more information please read how do you patent an idea with InventHelp post.