Guidelines for Examination 2023 enter into force
1 March 2023
The EPC and PCT-EPO
Guidelines 2023, published in preview mode a month ago, entered into force
today, superseding the editions of March 2022.
The new EPC and PCT-EPO Guidelines are published in the EPO's three official languages on the EPO website, where they can be downloaded free of charge in PDF format or accessed section-by-section in HTML format. The PDF version is available both as a "clean copy" and as a version showing all modifications. Within each section of the HTML version, what has changed in the new edition can be displayed by selecting the Show modifications box in the top right-hand corner. A full list of the sections which have been amended, together with corresponding hyperlinks, is published alongside the corresponding Guidelines.
Public consultation
A public user consultation on the 2023 edition of the Guidelines is already underway and will run until 4 April 2023. Users are encouraged to file their comments through the dedicated webform. The anonymised comments will be discussed within the SACEPO Working Party on Guidelines in May 2023. Your feedback will enable us to better identify what matters to our users and help us improve the 2024 editions of the EPC and PCT-EPO Guidelines.
Further information
- Notice from the European Patent Office dated 12 December 2022 concerning the updating of the Guidelines for Examination in the European Patent Office (OJ EPO 2023, A6)
- Notice from the European Patent Office dated 12 December 2022 concerning the updating of the Guidelines for Search and Examination at the European Patent Office as PCT Authority (PCT-EPO Guidelines) (OJ EPO 2023, A7)
- Guidelines for Examination in the European Patent Office
- Guidelines for Search and Examination at the EPO as PCT Authority
- Comment on the latest EPC or PCT-EPO Guidelines