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This (random) patent on Google says it was cited by 67 other patents:

https://patents.google.com/patent/US8954418B2/en?oq=%228%2c954%2c418%22#citedBy

...Same patent on USPTO says it was cited by just 49.

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=8,954,418.PN.&OS=PN/8,954,418&RS=PN/8,954,418

I know that "Cited by Examiner" patents appear in both.

...So what's the difference? Why would Google show more citations than the Patent Office itself?

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    After a quick look it seems that the USPTO only identifies granted patents, whereas Google Patents identifies both granted patents and published patent applications.
    – the Europeist
    Commented Feb 24, 2020 at 15:57

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The @the Europeist comment is correct - Google is showing references from patent publications. Technically they are not really citations until they appear printed in a patent. It looks like Google is going into PAIR or the Global Dossier to the file wrapper and getting information from the IDS forms filed in the applications.

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Google patent capture all the patents i.e., US and Non US ( WO,EP,AU ETC.,) Where as USPTO capture only the US data the difference is due to the fact there are other Non US parents present in the Google patent.

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  • This is not correct. In the example given in the question there are all US patents and applications except for one PCT application. Separately, if a foreign reference is cited by an examiner in the USPTO it will certainly show up on the face of the patent as a cited document.
    – George White ♦
    Commented Feb 28, 2020 at 1:33

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