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I saw on https://patentlyo.com/patent/2007/12/rising-claim-co.html:

enter image description here

Why has the number of claims risen over the past few decades?


Data:

The chart shows the average number of total claims and independent claims for each year of issuance. The sample is drawn from 28,000 randomly selected patents that issued from 1977 and 2005. (For those who want data, the following table shows the average claim numbers by filing date.)

Year Avg Total Claims Avg Ind Claims n
1975 10.6 2.2 358
1976 10.1 2.0 616
1977 10.2 2.1 620
1978 10.7 2.0 615
1979 11.7 2.1 619
1980 11.3 2.0 608
1981 12.4 2.2 585
1982 11.6 2.1 593
1983 11.7 2.2 593
1984 11.4 2.1 614
1985 11.0 2.1 674
1986 11.8 2.3 689
1987 11.9 2.2 718
1988 12.6 2.3 824
1989 13.2 2.3 912
1990 12.9 2.5 912
1991 12.5 2.4 918
1992 13.0 2.5 932
1993 14.8 2.7 1005
1994 14.6 2.7 1173
1995 16.1 2.9 1344
1996 17.2 3.0 1329
1997 17.1 2.9 1645
1998 16.7 2.9 1562
1999 17.9 3.0 1666
2000 18.4 3.0 1717
2001 18.9 3.1 1615

1 Answer 1

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I do not know, but I speculate that every time in a notable case a judge misconstrues a claim, practitioners are more motivated to include claims that use alternative wording to try to define the same invention.

Note that these averages are not from normal distributions. From PatentlyO in 2014 see this chart - enter image description here

By far the most popular number of claims is the 20 you get for no extra fees. Note these are applications not issued patents. Some of the popular 20 will get canceled in prosecution.

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