Provisional Patent Cost
A provisional patent application costs $325 in USPTO filing fees if you’re a large entity, $130 if you qualify as a small entity, and $65 if you qualify for micro entity status. That’s the government’s cut. If you hire someone to write the application for you, expect to pay a good deal more on top of that, often somewhere between $1,500 and $5,000 depending on how complicated the invention is and who’s drafting it.
So the honest answer has two parts: what the USPTO charges, and what it actually costs once you factor in the work of putting a real application together. Let’s get into both.
The USPTO Filing Fee, Straight From the Source
According to the USPTO’s current fee schedule, the provisional application filing fee breaks down by entity size:
- Large entity (most companies and anyone who doesn’t qualify for a discount): $325
- Small entity (individuals, small businesses under 500 employees, most nonprofits): $130
- Micro entity (small entities that also meet income and filing history limits): $65
That’s it for the mandatory government charge. There’s no search fee and no examination fee for a provisional, since the USPTO doesn’t actually examine it. Compare that to a nonprovisional application, where filing, search, and examination fees together run close to $2,000 for a large entity, and the gap makes sense once you know a provisional never gets reviewed by an examiner in the first place.
Which Entity Category Do You Fall Into?
Most solo inventors and small startups qualify as either small or micro entity, which cuts the fee substantially. Small entity status generally applies to individuals, businesses with fewer than 500 employees, and most nonprofits, as long as you haven’t licensed the invention to a larger company. Micro entity status goes a step further and requires you to also meet income limits and have filed only a handful of previous applications. The USPTO’s micro entity status page walks through the exact qualifications, since getting this wrong and claiming a discount you’re not entitled to can create real problems down the line.
What Actually Drives the Total Cost Up
The filing fee rarely tells the whole story. What usually determines your real cost is who writes the application and how much work goes into describing the invention properly.
Filing It Yourself
If you write the description and drawings on your own, your only mandatory cost is the USPTO fee itself. This works fine for straightforward inventions where you’re comfortable writing in enough technical detail to actually support a later patent claim. The risk isn’t financial here, it’s that a thin or vague description can leave gaps that come back to bite you when you file the full nonprovisional application later.
Hiring a Patent Attorney or Agent
Bringing in a professional to draft the application adds cost, but it also reduces the chance of that thin-description problem. Attorney fees for a provisional application vary quite a bit based on how complex the invention is, ranging from roughly $1,500 for something simple up to $5,000 or more for inventions involving software, chemistry, or multiple interacting components. Firms that specialize in more technical fields, like biotech or semiconductors, tend to sit at the higher end of that range.
Extra Costs Worth Planning For
A few other expenses show up depending on your situation:
- Professional patent drawings, if your sketches aren’t detailed enough on their own
- A preliminary prior art search, which isn’t required but can save money later by catching conflicts early
- The provisional application size fee, which only applies if your specification and drawings together exceed 100 sheets
- The cost of the nonprovisional application you’ll eventually need to file within 12 months to keep your priority date alive
Provisional Patent Cost Breakdown by Filing Approach
| Filing Approach | USPTO Fee | Typical Additional Cost | Best Fit For |
|---|---|---|---|
| DIY, large entity | $325 | $0 to a few hundred dollars for drawings | Simple, well-understood inventions |
| DIY, small entity | $130 | $0 to a few hundred dollars for drawings | Solo inventors comfortable writing technical detail |
| DIY, micro entity | $65 | $0 to a few hundred dollars for drawings | Individual inventors who qualify for the discount |
| Attorney-drafted, large entity | $325 | Roughly $1,500 to $5,000+ in attorney fees | Complex inventions or higher-stakes filings |
This article is meant to give general information about US patent filing costs and isn’t legal or financial advice. Actual costs depend heavily on your invention and who you work with, so it’s worth getting a quote from a registered patent attorney or agent before committing to a filing strategy.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is a provisional patent cheaper than a nonprovisional patent?
Yes, considerably. The USPTO filing fee alone is $325 for a provisional versus roughly $2,000 combined for a nonprovisional’s filing, search, and examination fees at the large entity rate, and that gap doesn’t even count the extra attorney work a nonprovisional’s formal claims usually require.
Do I have to pay a search fee or examination fee for a provisional application?
No. Provisional applications aren’t examined, so there’s no search fee or examination fee attached to them, only the base filing fee.
Can I lower my provisional patent cost by filing it myself?
Yes, filing it yourself means your only required cost is the USPTO fee. Just weigh that savings against the risk of writing a description that’s too thin to properly support your invention later.
Does the cost change based on how long my application is?
It can. The USPTO charges an additional size fee once your specification and drawings combined exceed 100 sheets, so unusually long or detailed filings can cost more than the base fee alone.
What happens cost-wise if I miss my 12-month deadline?
You lose the priority date the provisional gave you, and there’s no cheap way to get it back. A limited petition process exists for unintentional delays, but it comes with its own added fee and isn’t guaranteed to succeed.
The government fee for a provisional application is genuinely low, low enough that cost usually isn’t the reason people skip filing one. The real budgeting question is whether you write the description yourself or pay someone to do it properly, and that choice matters more for your protection than it does for your wallet.