PATENT COUNTRY SELECTION

Each country is scored from 0 to 100 on seven factors: filing activity in your field of technology, foreign PCT demand, affordability, market size, population, specialisation and sector strength. The scores are combined using the weightings in section 2, which you can change. The data comes from WIPO patent statistics (2020 to 2024) and the World Bank.

Filing activity is the estimated number of patent applications filed each year in your field of technology at that country's patent office (WIPO, 2020 to 2024). It shows where companies in your field, including your competitors, actually seek protection, which makes it the most direct sign of a market's value for your technology. It has the highest default weighting, 30%, because it is the strongest evidence of where patents in your field are wanted.

Foreign PCT demand is the number of PCT applications that enter the national phase in that country each year (WIPO). It shows where other international applicants choose to protect their inventions, which is the same decision you are making. It has the second-highest weighting, 20%, because it reflects real filing decisions by foreign applicants, but it covers all fields of technology rather than only yours.

Affordability is based on the lifetime cost: the estimated cost to grant plus all renewal fees for the full term, including official and attorney fees. Every filing budget is limited, and a lower cost means more protection for the money. It is weighted 15% so that cost influences the ranking without outweighing the value of the market. Increase it if your budget is tight.

Market size is the size of the country's economy (GDP, World Bank). A larger economy generally means more sales, more licensing income and more potential infringers, so a patent there is usually worth more. It is weighted 10% because large economies already score well on filing activity and foreign PCT demand, and a higher weighting would count the size of the economy twice.

Population is the number of people the patent covers (World Bank). It matters most for consumer products and medicines, and it gives credit to large markets whose economies are still growing. It is weighted 10% because it adds a view of future demand that the size of the economy does not show, while partly overlapping with it.

Specialisation compares your field's share of patent filings in that country with its share worldwide (WIPO). A high score means your technology is relatively important there, even if the country files fewer patents overall. It is weighted 10% because it helps to find smaller markets with a strong focus on your field, but the figures for smaller patent offices are less reliable.

Sector strength measures how large the market for your field is relative to the country's economy, for example health spending as a share of GDP for pharmaceuticals, or internet users per person for computer technology (World Bank). It shows whether the industry that buys or uses your technology is well developed there. It has the lowest weighting, 5%, because each field is matched to the closest available sector measure, which is an approximation.

The value map plots each country's score against its estimated lifetime cost (the cost to grant plus the lifetime renewal cost), with cost on a logarithmic scale. Countries towards the top left give the highest score for the lowest cost.

Growth in your field of technology shows, for the top 20 countries, how the number of patent applications in your field has changed each year at that office, as an average percentage a year from 2020 to 2024 (WIPO). The dashed line is the growth across all offices: a country above it is gaining ground in your field. WIPO's figures by technology lag behind the totals, so years with incomplete figures are left out, and a country is only shown with at least four complete years, including 2023 or 2024, and at least 50 applications a year in your field. Otherwise it says “not enough recent data”, “too few filings” or “data too irregular”.

Estimated costs by year shows when you would pay the estimated costs of the countries ticked in the Country selection table, year by year from national phase entry, with each country in its own colour. It uses each country's estimated cost to grant and lifetime renewal cost from the table, placed on a standard timeline: national phase entry at 30 or 31 months from the priority date, the office action response about 18 months later and grant about 3 years after entry, with the renewal fees spread over each country's renewal payments, rising over the term. South Africa, Nigeria and SANi are paid in full at national phase entry (filing, acceptance and the renewal to term). Actual timing varies by office. The total for the ticked countries is shown under the chart.

Tick the countries you are considering. The costs by year chart shows the ticked countries, and the same countries are ticked for you when you click Select Law Firms (where firms are available). No countries are ticked to begin with. SANi is South Africa and Nigeria together, so ticking SANi unticks South Africa and Nigeria, and ticking either of them unticks SANi; SANi has its own firms in Select Law Firms. In a customised report, the costs by year cover the countries in its tables (the number of countries you choose), whatever is ticked on the page.

Cost against coverage adds the top 20 countries one by one, in ranking order. Each point shows the lifetime cost of the countries so far and the share of the world's GDP and population they cover, so you can see where adding more countries adds cost but little coverage. Europe counts as the 18 Unitary Patent states, as its lifetime cost assumes Unitary Patent renewals and no national validations. SANi (the yellow dot) stands in for South Africa and Nigeria. A country that is already covered adds its cost but no coverage.

It splits each country's lifetime cost (the cost to grant plus the lifetime renewal cost) into official fees and attorney fees, both to grant and for renewals. It shows where most of the money goes: in some countries official renewal fees dominate, in others attorney fees to grant, where a lower-cost local firm matters most. GlobalIPCo’s prices (South Africa, Nigeria, SANi, the German utility model and the Luxembourg patent) are split using the official fees they include; SANi stands in for South Africa and Nigeria. Translation and validation costs are not included.

The estimated cost to grant is the official fees plus local attorney fees from filing to grant, including one office action response, at company rates. Official fees were checked against the patent offices' current fee schedules in October 2026. The South African, Nigerian and SANi costs are GlobalIPCo's published prices for law firms. Drafting, translation and validation costs are not included. All amounts are in US$ at current exchange rates.

All official renewal (annuity) fees for the full term of the patent, plus a professional fee for each payment. For Europe, it covers the European application renewal fees for years 3 and 4, followed by Unitary Patent renewal fees for years 5 to 20.

An ARIPO patent covers only the member states you designate, and two of its official fees are paid for each designated state: the designation fee (US$100 per state, paid on entry) and the annual maintenance fees (from US$50 per state in the first year, rising to US$530 in the nineteenth - US$4,670 per state over the life of the patent). The other official fees - filing, search, examination, publication and grant (US$3,032 in all) - are paid once. These are ARIPO's fees from 1 March 2025 (Harare Protocol Regulations, Schedule I).

To begin with, ARIPO is priced for the four largest economies among the 21 Harare Protocol states: Kenya, Ghana, Tanzania and Uganda. Tick ARIPO in the country table to choose the states yourself: its costs, and the GDP, population and market size used in the ranking, are then worked out for the states you tick, and its rank changes accordingly.

Designating many states makes ARIPO expensive over the life of the patent: for all 21 states, the maintenance fees alone come to about US$98,000.

No, translation costs are not included in the patent cost to grant.

GlobalIPCo offers law firms discounted pricing. The system shows both discounted pricing for law firms and standard pricing for non-law firms. For South Africa and Nigeria, S&Z also offers a “traditional” filing option (where instructions are sent by email only) and provides its pricing for this traditional option.

The deadline is the earlier of the earliest priority date and the PCT filing date, plus the country's national phase period (usually 30 or 31 months). Some countries allow an extension, and once the standard deadline has passed we show the extended deadline instead: South Africa permits the 31 month deadline to be extended to 34 months (without cost on GlobalIPCo); Singapore permits the 30 month deadline to be extended to 48 months (at a cost); and China permits the 30 month deadline to be extended to 32 months (at a cost). Countries shown in maroon are past their deadline.

A South African patent is granted without substantive examination, so the patent certificate is usually issued within 9 months. It lasts 20 years from the filing date, and renewal fees can be prepaid to term. The PCT national phase deadline is 31 months, which can be extended to 34 months (without cost on GlobalIPCo).

A Nigerian patent is granted without substantive examination, so the patent certificate is usually issued within 3 months. It lasts 20 years from the filing date, and renewal fees can be prepaid to term. The PCT national phase deadline is 30 months.

SANi is GlobalIPCo's combination patent, combining South African and Nigerian patents in one instruction. The two countries combine well: neither has substantive examination, both issue patent certificates within 9 months, and both allow renewals to be prepaid to term.

A German utility model is registered by the German Patent and Trade Mark Office without substantive examination, so it is quick and inexpensive to obtain, and it can be enforced like a patent. It protects products and devices, but not processes or methods, for up to 10 years. It can be entered from a PCT application within 31 months.

A Luxembourg patent is granted by the Luxembourg Intellectual Property Office without substantive examination, so it is quick and inexpensive to obtain. It lasts up to 20 years. The PCT national phase deadline is 20 months, earlier than most countries.

Some countries can only be reached through a regional patent, such as OAPI member states. Countries that are not members of the PCT, such as Taiwan, Province of China, and Argentina, are not listed.

When you enter a PCT or WO number, we look up the patent's International Patent Classification (IPC) in the European Patent Office's database and use the first classification to rank the countries. Any other classifications are shown as options you can click. You can also enter a classification yourself.

The app looks up PCT and WO numbers in the European Patent Office's database. A PCT application is usually published about 18 months after its earliest priority date, so a newer application may not be available yet. Please also check the number. You can still enter the patent classification yourself.

Law firms can customise the report and download the report under their own name to send to clients. The custom settings can be saved and used for other PCT patents. Click Customise Report and enter your firm's name and, if you like, your logo. You can add US$ surcharges to each stage of the estimated cost to grant (filing, search, examination request, office action response and grant), each added only for countries that have that stage, and to the estimated lifetime renewal cost, set the weightings for your reports, choose how many countries to show in the tables, remove countries you don't want to show, and choose which sections to include. The surcharges are included in the costs used for the ranking. The report shows your firm's name and logo instead of Sibanda & Zantwijk's, and leaves out the GlobalIPCo options. It uses the patent, claims, pages and applicant size entered in section 1.

Each surcharge on the cost to grant is added per country, and only to the stages that apply in that country. Where a stage costs $0 in a country, no surcharge is added for that stage. For example, South Africa has no search, examination request or office action response stage, so only the filing and grant surcharges are added there. The renewal surcharge is added once to each country's lifetime renewal cost.

Click Add Law Firm. Enter your firm's details (we can read your name and logo from your website), then choose a country and enter your professional fees. Use Add Another Country for each further country, and Show All to add optional fees, your profile (up to 50 words) and the technology fields you work in. Save with your email address. Adding your firm is free, and we do not publish your fee schedule. A new page, and any country you add later, needs our approval: we review it before it is shown to applicants and let you know when it is approved. You can add more than one firm under the same email address, each with its own firm name.

The highlighted fees: the steps every application goes through to grant (filing, examination, publication and grant). All other fees, including the per-claim, per-page and per-priority fees, are optional. The two totals are your professional fees only (no official fees) for the standard case: your fees to file, and your minimum fees to prosecute to grant without office action responses.

The case your totals are worked out for: 10 claims (1 independent), 30 pages and one priority. The totals do not include office action responses. Section C shows how many extra claims, pages or priorities it includes for each country.

Yes. Drop your tariff (PDF or Word, up to 10 MB) on the fee sheet. Software, not AI, reads it, chooses the country and fills in the fees it can match; the file is not stored. Filled fees are shown in blue for you to check. Tariffs covering several countries can fill a sheet for each, and a tariff for another country than the sheet you dropped it on fills (or adds) the sheet for the tariff’s country. Fees in scanned pages or pictures cannot be read.

Click Edit Law Firm and enter the email address you saved with. To keep your page safe, we email a passcode to that address: enter it to open your page (if you have more than one firm under it, choose the one to edit). You can edit your page once we have approved it. Make any changes and click Save/Confirm Data. Changes to the countries we have already approved are shown straight away and need only the passcode; a country you add needs our approval before it is shown. Firms must confirm their details every year to keep receiving instructions; we email you a reminder 11 months after you last saved or confirmed.

After you save your page, Get your LinkedIn URL appears at the top of it, with a preview of a page about your firm and your countries: why clients should consider them, the technology fields in which they lead their region, and what filing there costs with you. Once we have approved your page, click COPY URL next to the link for all your countries or for one country, and paste it into a LinkedIn post (Edit Law Firm shows the links too). LinkedIn shows an image made for your firm with the link.

Once your page is approved, you can mark firms in other countries as Preferred on your Add Law Firm page; they are listed first when you select law firms for a patent. Endorse a firm to recommend it: the firm is told, and your endorsement is shown to applicants. Use Invite Firm to ask a firm that is not yet listed to add its pricing.

Enter a PCT or WO number, then click Select Law Firms and tick the countries you want. Under each country you see the law firms that can file there and work in your field of technology, with their estimated filing fee and cost to grant for your patent. The countries ticked in the Country selection table are ticked for you. Click REQUEST QUOTE CONFIRMATION, enter your name and email address, choose the applicant’s status where that country’s fees depend on it, add a note for the firm if you like (up to 50 words), and enter the passcode we email you, and we send your details and the patent's details to that firm once we have checked the request. The status you choose there is used for that country’s estimates and is passed on to the firm. The firm then contacts you directly.

Firms that we have approved, that have pricing for the country, work in your field of technology, and have confirmed their details in the past year. “Verified” means S&Z has used the firm before and enjoyed the experience. A firm’s listing on our system does not mean that S&Z endorses the firm. For South Africa, Nigeria, SANi, the German utility model and the Luxembourg patent, only GlobalIPCo and (for South Africa, Nigeria and SANi) Sibanda & Zantwijk can be selected.

Section 4 shows a flag for every country with a national phase route, and for the European (EPO), ARIPO and OAPI regional systems, in alphabetical order. Click a flag or a country name to open that country's page in a new tab.

Each page shows the country's population, economy and PCT national phase entries a year; the fields of technology in which it leads its region and the world; its fastest-growing fields; its strongest economic sectors; and charts of its patent publications by field, its share of its region's publications and their growth.

Where the country is one of the world's leading exporters of particular goods - among the 3 largest exporters, or with at least 15% of world exports - or where goods make up at least 25% of its own exports (of at least US$500m a year), the page lists them and charts the top 6. For Europe, ARIPO and OAPI only exports to countries outside the system count. Hong Kong, Singapore and the United Arab Emirates are left out of these export comparisons, as much of their trade is re-exported.

The pages for Europe, ARIPO and OAPI compare each system with the rest of the world rather than with its own region. Where patents for a country are mostly or often obtained through a regional system (for example, a European patent validated in Portugal, or an ARIPO patent designating Kenya), the country's page says so, as its own figures count only applications filed directly with its national patent office.

No. The ranking is a guide based on published statistics and typical patent costs.