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Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
2026-07-06 10:51:44 -04:00

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---
type: "LegalText"
title: "35 U.S.C. § 173"
description: "Term of design patent"
jurisdiction: "us"
corpus: "united_states_code"
kind: "code_section"
title_number: 35
title_name: "PATENTS"
chapter_number: "16"
chapter_name: "DESIGNS"
section: "173"
citation: "35 U.S.C. § 173"
status: "current"
release_point: "119-100"
release_date: "2026-06-26"
source: "official"
source_url: "https://uscode.house.gov/download/releasepoints/us/pl/119/100/xml_usc35@119-100.zip"
source_identifier: "/us/usc/t35/s173"
source_file: "data/legal/raw/us/code/title-35/usc35.xml"
source_hash: "6367213f53902083483c82b3692cd2c6e5e3b6631204571b7c1c53f3099d0764"
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text_hash: "3571af305e38e6f68ce2f6badf85994a87a8c294dbf95a172690276ac35fb29f"
retrieved_at: "2026-07-04"
confidence: "official"
tags: ["legal", "us-code"]
---
# 35 U.S.C. § 173 - Term of design patent
## Text
Patents for designs shall be granted for the term of 15 years from the date of grant.
(July 19, 1952, ch. 950, 66 Stat. 805; Pub. L. 97247, § 16, Aug. 27, 1982, 96 Stat. 321; Pub. L. 103465, title V, § 532(c)(3), Dec. 8, 1994, 108 Stat. 4987; Pub. L. 112211, title I, § 102(7), Dec. 18, 2012, 126 Stat. 1532.)
## Notes
Historical and Revision NotesBased on Title 35, U.S.C., 1946 ed., § 77 (R.S. 4931). Language is changed slightly.
Editorial Notes
Amendments2012—Pub. L. 112211 substituted “15 years” for “fourteen years”. 1994—Pub. L. 103465 inserted “from the date of grant” after “years”. 1982—Pub. L. 97247 substituted “Patents for designs shall be granted for the term of fourteen years” for “Patents for designs may be granted for the term of three years and six months, or for seven years, or for fourteen years, as the applicant, in his application, elects”.
Statutory Notes and Related Subsidiaries
Effective Date of 2012 AmendmentAmendment by Pub. L. 112211 effective on the later of the date that is 1 year after Dec. 18, 2012, or the date that the Geneva Act of the Hague Agreement Concerning the International Registration of Industrial Designs enters into force with respect to the United States (May 13, 2015), and applicable only to certain applications filed on and after that effective date and patents issuing thereon, see section 103 of Pub. L. 112211, set out as a note under section 100 of this title.
Effective Date of 1994 AmendmentAmendment by Pub. L. 103465 effective 6 months after Dec. 8, 1994, and applicable to all patent applications filed in the United States on or after that effective date, with provisions relating to earliest filed patent application, see section 534(b)(1), (3) of Pub. L. 103465, set out as a note under section 154 of this title.
Effective Date of 1982 AmendmentAmendment by Pub. L. 97247 effective Oct. 1, 1982, see section 17(a) of Pub. L. 97247, set out as a note under section 41 of this title.