Can You Patent Your App Idea?

“There’s an app for that.”

Over the years we’ve seen many apps come and go. Meanwhile, apps like Uber, Twitter, and TikTok have completely changed human behavior.

If you have an app idea, you are probably in the process of pitching your idea and raising money. At the same time, you might be thinking about intellectual property.  “What if someone steals my idea?” You might ask.  “How do I protect it?”

Traditionally, patents have been the go-to method of protecting genius ideas and inventions.  Patents give inventors the right to exclude others from making, selling, or using their invention without the permission of the patent holder.  This can become a powerful tool for inventors.  Having a patent gives entrepreneurs and investors greater reassurance that their venture is worth pursuing.  It also gives founders a greater peace of mind when pitching their idea.

When it comes to mobile apps, most developers have the same question.  “Can you patent an app?” The answer is it depends. 

Most app ideas are not patentable.  Patents don’t protect ideas; they protect new technology.  This means that for an app to be patentable it must be novel, non-obvious, and solve a technical problem. Most app ideas are completely new or novel.  At the same time, most app ideas are fairly obvious and rarely solve a technical problem.

Is It New?

If someone else thought of your app idea before you, it isn’t novel.  You might as well stop reading the rest of this article.  Bye. (Just kidding, skip to the last section on “Other Types of Protection”)

Is It Obvious?

Your app idea is obvious if it’s a straightforward combination of existing ideas.  When founders pitch their idea as “like Uber for sneaker drops” or “like AirBnb for camera rentals,” they are communicating that they have an obvious idea.  On some level, all inventions are a combination of existing ideas because they draw upon the pool of human knowledge and subject matter expertise.  However, true inventions draw upon existing knowledge in ways that persons of ordinary skill cannot imagine or predict.  In the context of mobile apps, a solution is non-obvious when there is no comparison to any app out there.

Does it Solve a Technical Problem?

The vast majority of apps are created to solve an everyday problem.  If you look at the “top paid apps” on the App Store, you’ll see a variety of scheduling apps, sleep tracking apps, recipe apps, etc.  After all, the most successful apps are those that have the widest appeal.  The whole point of apps is that they use software to make our lives easier. 

But when it comes to patents, the patent office will not grant a patent for the general idea of solving an everyday problem using software.  They will only grant patents for the technical implementation of that software.  This is why most app ideas are not patentable, but the software methods behind features of an app are often patentable.  In other words, app ideas are typically not patentable inventions, but the technical execution of an app idea may well be patentable.

As one example, many apps these days purport to be powered by “artificial intelligence.”  If you are leveraging AI in a truly novel and non-obvious way, then the execution of those AI features may be patentable.  Additionally, if you are creating a new type of neural network or training an existing neural network in a very unconventional way, then your process for training, building, and testing the model may be patentable.

Should You File a Patent?

Most app developers are not ready to file a patent for their app. If you have yet to build a minimum viable product, you are unlikely to have developed any patentable inventions.  This is because, in the mobile app space, patentable inventions most commonly arise during the prototyping and evaluation phases of development.

The other issue is resources.  Software patents are a long-term investment and are difficult to navigate.  Even a simple software invention will take a lot of mental power to draft.  In fact, a patent for a simple software invention is harder to draft because the invention faces the risk of being seen as obvious or too abstract to be patentable.

Therefore, you should only consider patent protection if you are ready to exploit your invention commercially. With that being said, every company that considers themselves a “technology company” should periodically evaluate whether a provisional patent application is needed. Provisional applications are cheap and easy ways to obtain protect your intellectual property. (More on this below)

How to File a Patent

Timing is everything.  The patent office operates on a first-to-file basis, meaning the date that you file a patent application is the date you get priority over others trying to claim the same invention.  Filing a provisional patent application gives you early priority.

A provisional patent application is not a patent but is a placeholder that give you another year to develop your invention fully.  This means another year of research and development, another year of learning what works and what works best.  The idea is that the company will grow, and you will have more fully formed inventions after 6-9 months of research, development, and testing.  The placeholder also buys time to attract investment or establish revenue streams that can bankroll the patent process.

For provisional patent applications, the filing fee is $60 for most first-time filers.  To file, go to the United States Patent Office (USPTO) website.  You can file a provisional patent application through the site’s patent center. From there, you want to click on “new submission” and look for “Utility Provisional.” Here is the link to patent center:

https://patentcenter.uspto.gov/

Fill-out the application data sheet and upload the files for your application.  Your files should include a document that describes your invention and variations you expect to explore in the future.  You likely want to find a patent attorney or patent agent to help you prepare your documents for you, but they will charge you between $1000-$3000 to prepare them according to professional standards. 

If you don’t feel like paying for professional help, a picture is worth 1000 words.  Leverage the use of visual materials to describe how your invention works.  For your app, that could mean user flow diagrams, functional block diagrams, and screenshots of the graphical user interface (GUI).  Drawings of the GUI can also be used to obtain design patent protection, which protects the visual appearance of the interface.

Other Types of Protection

Patents are not the only type of IP protection available.  Even if your app idea is not patentable, your app contains other types of intellectual property, such as computer code, text, images, and video.  The authors of these elements are automatically afforded copyright protection.  If any of these elements are farmed out to an independent contractor, authorship and ownership should be worked out ahead of time, and of course, spelled out in an agreement.

Lastly, most apps have a fanciful name that helps with brand recognition.  They also have a unique app logo.  Trademarks can protect your app’s name and logo and are a powerful tool.  Unlike patents, which have time-limited protection, a registered trademark can last forever, so long as you keep the name and logo in use.

These are the many ways to protect your app and its unique and distinguishable features.  Intellectual property is only one aspect of your business and is unlikely to make or break your company at its earliest stages.  The most important part will be developing an app that people want to use.

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