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Charted: Countries Accumulating the Most AI Patents
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Key Takeaways
- According to the 2025 AI Index Report, China has accumulated 70% of global AI patents
- Evidence suggests that the majority of China’s AI patents are only applied for and protected within China
Artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to reshape industries globally, but which nations are leading its innovation?
One way to measure leadership is through patent filings, which legally protect novel ideas or inventions. In the case of AI, securing a patent typically involves demonstrating unique methodologies, machine learning algorithms, or applications capable of significantly advancing existing technologies.
This visualization is part of Visual Capitalist’s AI Week, sponsored by Terzo, and uses data from the 2025 AI Index Report to see which countries & regions have accumulated the most AI patents.
Data & Discussion
The data we used to create this graphic is listed below. Note that 2023 is the most recent year for which data was accessible. All figures were sourced from patent-level bibliographic records in PATSTAT Global, provided by the European Patent Office (EPO).
| Year | China | U.S. | Rest of Asia | Europe | Rest of World |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 13.4% | 40.0% | 37.2% | 8.6% | 0.8% |
| 2011 | 18.8% | 32.4% | 40.1% | 7.9% | 0.7% |
| 2012 | 21.2% | 34.6% | 35.9% | 7.8% | 0.5% |
| 2013 | 20.4% | 38.1% | 34.8% | 5.9% | 0.8% |
| 2014 | 18.1% | 42.1% | 32.7% | 6.4% | 0.7% |
| 2015 | 25.8% | 42.8% | 24.4% | 6.4% | 0.6% |
| 2016 | 31.3% | 39.2% | 22.5% | 6.3% | 0.8% |
| 2017 | 36.9% | 34.5% | 21.3% | 6.6% | 0.8% |
| 2018 | 43.8% | 28.7% | 20.8% | 6.1% | 0.6% |
| 2019 | 42.9% | 31.2% | 20.0% | 5.4% | 0.5% |
| 2020 | 50.2% | 26.5% | 18.8% | 4.1% | 0.4% |
| 2021 | 57.9% | 21.0% | 17.3% | 3.5% | 0.4% |
| 2022 | 64.9% | 17.5% | 14.3% | 3.0% | 0.3% |
| 2023 | 69.7% | 14.2% | 13.1% | 2.8% | 0.3% |
Rethinking China’s Lead in AI Patents
While China has filed more generative AI patents than any other country—over 38,000 between 2014 and 2023—experts caution that this volume may not equate to technological dominance.
For starters, a significant portion of its patents are filed only within China, with just 7.3% submitted internationally.
The quality of these patents is also under scrutiny, based on the patent grant ratio which is the ratio of patents granted against the number of applications.
China’s general patent grant ratio is 55% as of 2023, which trails that of other major economies like Japan (70%) and Canada (77%). Numbers released by the Ministry of Industry and Information of China in April 2024 suggest that the grant ratio of China’s AI patents is even lower, at 32%.
Quantifying U.S. Leadership
While falling behind China in terms of patents, the U.S. is undoubtedly leading the direction of global AI development.
In 2024, U.S. organizations produced 40 “notable AI models” compared to China’s 15. The AI Index Report defines notable AI models as those that make meaningful technological advancements.
According to WIPO’s Patent Landscape Report, American patents and publications also receive significantly more global citations, highlighting their outsized impact.
For example, OpenAI has published just 48 articles (ranked 325th), but its publications have received 11,816 citations (ranked 13th).
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