List of operators
|
Operator |
Example |
Short notation |
Example |
|
AND |
cleaning AND shaver |
& (ampersand) |
cleaning & shaver |
|
OR |
cleaning OR shaver |
| (pipe) |
cleaning | shaver |
|
NOT |
cleaning NOT shaver |
- or ! (hyphen or exclamation mark) No space between – or ! and word |
cleaning –shaver cleaning !shaver |
|
NEAR/N |
cleaning NEAR/5 shaver |
none |
none |
|
SENTENCE |
cleaning SENTENCE shaver |
none |
none |
|
PARAGRAPH |
cleaning PARAGRAPH shaver |
none |
none |
Remarks:
- There always is implicit AND operator -> cleaning shaver means cleaning AND shaver
- NEAR is a generalized proximity operator allowing N-1 maximum words between. See Search with proximity for usage.
- OR operator precedence is higher than AND
- The SENTENCE and PARAGRAPH operators only accept keywords, phrases and operators of the same type as arguments.
Start simple
Search for the words cleaning and shaver but not automatic in title and abstract
Remark: Search isn’t case sensitive. A search for shaver is the same as a search for Shaver
Search with an exact word
Word stemming is used in our search engine. Word stemming is a language related tool, which determines the root of a word first, and then retrieves all possible variants.
|
Search term |
Word stemming |
Matching results would have the word(s) |
|
compose |
On (searches for variants of compose) |
compose, composes, composed, composing, composable, composition etc |
|
=composition |
Off (searches for exact word) |
composition |
|
composition |
On (searches for variants of the root word "compose") |
composition, Compositions, Compose, composes, composed, composing, composable etc |
|
=metallic |
Off (searches for exact word) |
Metallic |
|
metallic |
On (searches for variants of the root word "metal") |
Metallic, Metal, Metals etc. |
Search with an exact phrase
Put quotation marks around words "[any word]" to search for an exact phrase in an exact order. Keep in mind that searching with quotes might exclude relevant results. For instance, a search for "Alexander Bell" will miss patents that refer to Alexander G Bell.
Search with proximity
This means that there must be less than 4 words between cleaning and shaver.
|
Text in title abstract |
Found? |
|
Cleaning device for dry shaver |
Yes (only 3 words between) |
|
Cleaning device for a dry shaver |
No (4 words between) |
|
Shaver with cleaning device |
Yes (only 1 word between, order doesn’t matter) |
Tip: If you want to search for an inventor, you can use this proximity syntax.
With this filter you will find all patents of Thomas Edison or Edison Thomas
Advanced proximity search can be done with the operator NEAR
This means there can be maximum 3 words between cleaning or electric and shaver or razor
|
Text in title abstract |
Found? |
|
Cleaning device for dry shaver |
Yes (only 3 words between) |
|
Electric device for a dry razor |
No (4 words between) |
|
Shaver with cleaning device |
Yes (only 1 word between, order doesn’t matter) |
Search with quorum
Quorum matching operator introduces a kind of fuzzy matching. It will only match those patents that pass a given threshold of given words. The example above ("cleaning electric device dry shaver razor"/3) will match all patents that have at least 3 of the 6 specified words. Operator is limited to 255 keywords and does not work with wildcards.
Grouped queries
With brackets you can make more advanced filter queries.
‘Nested’ queries are also allowed.
Wildcard must be at the end of a word
Special characters must be between quotes
e.g. for chemical elements
List of allowed special characters:
, . - ( ) ' [ ] _ + ; :