Global AI Patent Grants Top 100,000 for First Time as Agentic AI Filings Accelerate

Source: IFI Claims report

On Tuesday, IFI CLAIMS Patent Services released its annual report on artificial intelligence patenting, IFI Insights: Inventing AI. According to the report, worldwide AI patent grants reached 107,279 in 2025, marking the first time the total has surpassed 100,000 in a single year. The figure also represents an 83% increase over the past three years. Globally, AI patent applications reached 209,518 in 2025, of which 23% related to generative AI and 9% related to agentic AI, which is up from 5% in IFI’s previous study.

The U.S. figures diverged by category, with overall AI patent grants falling approximately 7% from 2023 even as generative AI patents rose 11% year over year, and agentic AI patents outpacing both categories with U.S. grants up 14% from the previous year and 70% since 2021. Worldwide, agentic AI applications increased 59% over the past year and 137% over the past two years, growing to represent 15% of total AI patent activity, up from 7% in IFI’s prior report. However, generative AI, by comparison, accounts for 16% of the total AI patent domain.

Over the past decade, global AI patent grants have risen at a compound annual rate of 35%, while applications have grown by 29%, according to the report. IFI senior marketing manager Lily Iacurci said the growth reflects a shift in focus, noting that “even as the overall category of U.S. AI patents is slowing a bit, generative AI patents continue to grow and the frenzy around agentic AI is now in the patent spotlight.”

Samsung filed the most AI patent applications worldwide in 2025 with 2,162, followed by Huawei with 1,822 and Google with 1,672. Among U.S. filings, Samsung also led with 682 applications, followed by Google with 671 and Microsoft with 585. Within the generative AI category, Google ranked first in both domestic and global patent applications. Microsoft and Nvidia followed in the U.S. rankings. In the agentic AI category, Nvidia led patent applications in both domestic and global markets with 128 U.S. filings and 225 worldwide, while Microsoft and Google ranked second and third in the U.S. with 112 and 91 applications.

Source: IFI Claims report

The report also compared patent filing activity among leading AI developers. OpenAI filed 27 U.S. patent applications in 2025, and 35 worldwide, compared with seven U.S. and eight worldwide from Anthropic, and four from Alibaba. Meanwhile, DeepSeek and xAI held no patents or patent applications in either the United States or worldwide.

Iacurci attributed part of this disparity to some companies choosing trade secrets over patents to protect their AI inventions. ““While we’ve seen an overall increase in patent activity for GenAI and Agentic AI, given the nature of AI’s rapid evolution, some companies’ approach to protecting their AI inventions varies from a robust patent portfolio to a few defensive patents to leaning more heavily on trade secrets,” Iacurci said.

AI-related inventions also remain subject to patent eligibility challenges in the United States under 35 U.S.C. Section 101.