What are the advantages of a provisional patent application?
One advantage of a provisional patent application is that you may display “U.S. Patent Pending” on your invention after the PTO provides you an official filing receipt. A provisional patent application establishes your priority with a “date of invention” and is much faster and easier to file that a non-provisional patent application. A non-provisional patent application can take months to prepare, and it can cost several thousand dollars or more. Furthermore, you can tell people about your idea, seek funding to develop your invention, even begin selling your invention, with confidence that the conception date of your invention has been documented at the PTO. This way, you can assess your invention ‘s complete potential before spending significant sums of money on a non-provisional patent.
