It takes a long time to apply for an invention patent. It will take more than two years at the earliest. There is implementation review in invention patent application, which takes a long time. In the substantive examination stage, within 3 years from the date of application, the patent administration department of the State Council shall make a substantive examination of the application according to the request made by the applicant at any time. Therefore, the applicant can request substantive examination at the same time as submitting the application. In addition, whether the various application documents submitted by the applicant meet the requirements of the Patent Law, whether it needs to be revised or corrected back and forth during the examination process, and the workload of the examiners of the patent administration department in the State Council will directly affect the examination and approval time. Generally speaking, it takes about 3 years to apply for a patent for an invention.
Invention patents will generally be published after 18 months from the date of application. If a real test is put forward after publicity, it will generally be authorized after the second pass, that is, more than two years. In short, it depends on the specific case and the examiner. The law does not limit the examination time, but only the applicant's defense time (four months for one pass, two months for the second pass, and two months later). You can also make it public in advance and make a real trial at the time of application, which will be faster, but it will not be authorized before 18 months at the earliest. According to practical experience, it usually takes about 2-3 years to apply for an invention patent under smooth circumstances; According to the different patent application technology and application documents, if it is necessary to make many corrections or state opinions, the examination time will be extended accordingly, and the longest time will even take 7-8 years.
I hope the above answers will help you!