A provisional patent application acts as a placeholder for a later filed non-provisional patent application.  It will never get examined nor will it issue as a patent.  What it will do for you is give you a year from the date you file it to file a utility patent application and reach back to the provisional patent application filing date as a priority date.  In other words, if you file a provisional patent today and someone comes up with your same invention tomorrow, you would hopefully be able to claim priority as long as your utility application is covered by the provisional.  The provisional application will only protect the elements that were covered in that application.

Advantages of a Provisional Patent Application

• Priority Date
  • If you aren’t quite ready to file for a utility patent, but have a good idea of what your invention entails, a provisional might allow you to beat out similar inventions filed after yours
• Cost
  • Provisional patent applications are less expensive than utility patent applications.
• Strategic Planning
  • A provisional patent application will allow you to explore whether or not you would like to proceed with the patent process.  You may market your product as “patent-pending” as soon as a provisional application is filed and see if there is any interest in your product.

Disadvantages of a Provisional Patent Application

• Must file non-provisional within one year
  • If you do not file a non-provisional application within a year of filing your provisional, you will lose the benefit of claiming the date of the provisional.
• No formal examination or issuance
  • A provisional patent application will not be examined by the USPTO to issue as a regular patent.
• Needs to be able to cover a later filed non-provisional
  • The disclosure of the invention in the provisional application should be as complete as possible.  In order get the benefits of a provisional application, the claimed subject matter in the later filed non-provisional application must have support in the provisional application.

Should I File a Provisional Patent Application? 

The answer to that question depends on your specific circumstances.  You need to define your budget and determine what your goals are in pursuing patent protection.  Do you plan on seeing the whole process through, or do you want to come up with something and try to sell off the idea?

Whatever the case may be, a provisional patent application might be the right first step in securing protection.