USPTO Patent Monitor API | JSON + Webhook

Protect your company's intellectual property and stay ahead of industry developments by setting up an automated USPTO patent watchlist. Designed to continuously monitor the official USPTO database, this tracker completely eliminates the need to manually browse complicated government websites. Corporate compliance teams, legal departments, and enterprise risk managers rely on this tool to track new US patent filings, official rulings, and agency actions automatically. By configuring targeted keywords, your team can filter out irrelevant noise and focus strictly on the innovations and legal movements that directly impact your corporate strategy.

The true power of this monitor is unlocked through its robust scheduling and instant alerting capabilities. Schedule the scraper to run on a daily or weekly basis to ensure your legal dashboards remain perfectly up to date. To guarantee rapid response times, the actor supports native webhook alerts. The moment a new filing triggers your keyword watchlist, it can instantly ping your team's communication channels. As it processes the search results, it extracts vital structured details from every match. Expect clean JSON datasets containing the official agency name, publication date, precise docket number, document type, and a direct URL to the source web pages. This ensures your legal team always has the exact details required to take immediate action on new patent filings.

Store Quickstart

• Start with store-input.example.json. It uses demoMode=true so the first Store run is safe and small.
• If the output fits, switch to store-input.templates.json and pick one of:
• Demo Quickstart for a trial run
• Production Search for richer dataset collection
• Webhook Alert for automation pipelines

Key Features

• 🏛️ Government-sourced — Pulls directly from official agency feeds — no third-party aggregators
• ⏱️ Timely digests — Daily/weekly rollups of new filings, rulings, or actions
• 🔍 Keyword watchlists — Flag items matching your compliance/legal watch terms
• 📊 Structured metadata — Agency, date, docket, document type, link — all dataset-ready
• 📡 Webhook alerts — Push to legal/compliance teams the moment new items match watchlist

Use Cases

Who	Why
Developers	Automate recurring data fetches without building custom scrapers
Data teams	Pipe structured output into analytics warehouses
Ops teams	Monitor changes via webhook alerts
Product managers	Track competitor/market signals without engineering time

Input

Field	Type	Default	Description
apiKey	string	—	Optional. If set, PatentsView API is used first. Get one at: https://patentsview.org/apis/keyrequest
query	string	prefilled	Patent search query (title, abstract, claims). Example: 'artificial intelligence machine learning'
assignee	string	—	Filter by assignee/company name. Example: 'Google'
dateFrom	string	—	Start date (YYYY-MM-DD). Patents granted on or after this date.
dateTo	string	—	End date (YYYY-MM-DD). Patents granted on or before this date.
maxResults	integer	10	Maximum number of results to return.
delivery	string	"dataset"	How to deliver results. 'dataset' saves to Apify Dataset, 'webhook' sends to a URL. In demoMode, delivery is always data
webhookUrl	string	—	Webhook URL to send results to (only used when delivery is 'webhook'). Works with Slack, Discord, or any HTTP endpoint.

Input Example

{
  "query": "artificial intelligence",
  "maxResults": 10,
  "delivery": "dataset",
  "dryRun": false,
  "demoMode": false
}

Output

Field	Type	Description
meta	object
results	array
results[].patentNumber	string
results[].title	string
results[].abstract	string
results[].date	string
results[].assignees	array
results[].source	string
results[].status	string
results[].url	string (url)
results[].detailsMasked	boolean

Output Example

{
  "meta": {
    "generatedAt": "2026-02-22T17:50:20.781Z",
    "totals": {
      "total": 3,
      "query": "artificial intelligence"
    },
    "demoApplied": true,
    "limits": {
      "maxResults": 3,
      "maskedFields": true,
      "webhookEnabled": false
    },
    "upgradeHint": "Demo mode limits output to 3 results and masks detailed fields. Set demoMode=false to unlock full patent rows and webhook delivery."
  },
  "results": [
    {
      "patentNumber": "US11074495B2",
      "title": "&hellip;  and method for extremely efficient image and pattern recognition and <b>artificial</b> &hellip;",
      "abstract": " Specification covers new algorithms, methods, and systems for: <b>Artificial Intelligence</b>; the first application of General-AI (versus Specific, Vertical, ",
      "date": "2018-03-12",
      "assignees": [
        "Z Advanced Computing, Inc. (Zac)"
      ],
      "source": "google_patents",
      "status": "ok",
      "url": "https://patents.google.com/patent/US11074495B2",
      "detailsMasked": true
    },
    {
      "patentNumber": "KR102367831B1",
      "title": " An <b>artificial intelligence</b> apparatus for the self-diagnosis using log data and &hellip;",
      "abstract": " Fault diagnosis method using driving log and <b>artificial intelligence</b> model. 12. The method of claim 11, The step of performing the control is determinin",
      "date": "2019-07-23",
      "assignees": [
        "엘지전자 주식회사"
      ],
      "source": "google_patents",
      "status": "ok",
      "url": "https://patents.google.com/patent/USKR102367831B1",

API Usage

Run this actor programmatically using the Apify API. Replace YOUR_API_TOKEN with your token from Apify Console → Settings → Integrations.

cURL

curl -X POST "https://api.apify.com/v2/acts/taroyamada~uspto-patent-scraper/run-sync-get-dataset-items?token=YOUR_API_TOKEN" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{ "query": "artificial intelligence", "maxResults": 10, "delivery": "dataset", "dryRun": false, "demoMode": false }'

Python

from apify_client import ApifyClient

client = ApifyClient("YOUR_API_TOKEN")
run = client.actor("taroyamada/uspto-patent-scraper").call(run_input={
  "query": "artificial intelligence",
  "maxResults": 10,
  "delivery": "dataset",
  "dryRun": false,
  "demoMode": false
})

for item in client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items():
    print(item)

JavaScript / Node.js

import { ApifyClient } from 'apify-client';

const client = new ApifyClient({ token: 'YOUR_API_TOKEN' });
const run = await client.actor('taroyamada/uspto-patent-scraper').call({
  "query": "artificial intelligence",
  "maxResults": 10,
  "delivery": "dataset",
  "dryRun": false,
  "demoMode": false
});

const { items } = await client.dataset(run.defaultDatasetId).listItems();
console.log(items);

Tips & Limitations

• Run daily for active watchlists; weekly for passive monitoring.
• Webhook delivery works well for compliance team Slack channels — include docket URL for 1-click access.
• Use watchKeywords generously — false positives are cheap to triage, false negatives miss filings.
• Pair with regulatory-change-monitor for cross-agency coverage.
• Archive Dataset rows weekly for long-term compliance evidence retention.

FAQ

How far back does history go?

This actor monitors forward-only — new items since first run. For historical data, use the agency's own search tool.

What timezones are used?

All timestamps are UTC. Use your downstream pipeline to convert to agency-local time if needed.

Does it translate non-English content?

No — original language is preserved. Use downstream translation services if needed.

Is the data official?

Yes — sourced directly from official government websites and feeds. Not a third-party aggregator.

Can I use this for legal research?

For alerting and monitoring, yes. For litigation research, cross-verify with primary sources (agency websites) — this actor is a monitoring tool, not a legal database.

Related Actors

Government & Regulatory cluster — explore related Apify tools:

• EPA Enforcement Digest | ECHO Compliance Risk Monitor — Monitor EPA ECHO all-media facility search, corporate compliance screener, and enforcement case feeds with one summary-first digest row per watched company, facility, or case feed.
• FDA Warning Letters Digest | Summary-First Feed — Monitor public FDA warning letters with one summary-first digest row per configured feed.
• Federal Register Digest | Agency Rule & Notice Monitor — Monitor Federal Register documents — rules, proposed rules, and notices — per configured agency feed.
• Government Contract Award Monitor | Award & Competitor Watch — Monitor public-sector contract award notices for new wins, notable awardees, incumbent recompetes, and competitor signals — one digest row per configured feed without brittle broad crawling.
• Grants.gov Funding Digest | Opportunity Watch & Signal Digest — Monitor Grants.
• NHTSA Vehicle Recall Digest | Recalls + Complaints Watch — Monitor official NHTSA vehicle recall and complaint endpoints for watched model-family, VIN, and manufacturer feeds.
• Product Safety Recall Digest | CPSC + openFDA Alerts — Monitor CPSC saferproducts.
• Regulatory Change Monitor API — Monitor official regulator update feeds, government bulletin pages, and public compliance notices with one action-oriented digest row per monitored source.
• OFAC Sanctions Change Digest | SDN List Monitor — Monitor the OFAC SDN (Specially Designated Nationals) sanctions list for additions and removals.
• Tariff Trade Change Digest | Federal Register + HTS Monitor — Monitor U.
• Treasury Fiscal Data Digest | Debt, Rates & Budget Monitor — Monitor the U.
• Campaign Finance & Lobbying Digest | FEC + LDA Watch — Monitor official FEC OpenFEC committee reports and LDA.

Cost

Pay Per Event:

• actor-start: $0.01 (flat fee per run)
• dataset-item: $0.003 per output item

Example: 1,000 items = $0.01 + (1,000 × $0.003) = $3.01

No subscription required — you only pay for what you use.

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