China ranks third in European patent applications

Berlin, March 24th (Xinhua) - The European Patent Office released its 2025 Technology Dashboard Report (formerly known as the Patent Index Report) on March 24th, which showed that the agency received 22031 patent applications from China in 2025, a year-on-year increase of 9.7%; The number of patent applications from China has risen to third place for the first time, with the fastest growth rate among the top ten patent application countries.

Overall, the European Patent Office received a total of 201974 patent applications from around the world in 2025, a year-on-year increase of 1.4%, reaching a historic high. The top five countries in terms of the number of patent applications are the United States, Germany, China, Japan, and South Korea.

The report shows that patent applications from China account for 10.9% of the total number of applications received by the European Patent Office in 2025, with digital communication being the field with the highest number of patent applications in China. In addition, transportation and semiconductors are the fastest growing fields for patent applications in China, with year-on-year growth rates exceeding 30%.

From the ranking of enterprises, among all companies that submit patent applications to the European Patent Office in 2025, Huawei from China ranks second with a total of 4744 patent applications. CATL China ranks tenth with 1305 patent applications, marking the first time two Chinese companies have entered the top ten. Samsung from South Korea ranks first, while LG from South Korea and Qualcomm from the United States rank third and fourth respectively. In addition to Huawei and CATL, there are four other Chinese companies that have entered the top 50, namely Xiaomi, ZTE, OPPO, and Tencent.

From a technical perspective, the field with the highest number of patent applications received by the European Patent Office in 2025 is computer technology, with a total of 17844 applications, a year-on-year increase of 6.1%. The report believes that the rapid development of artificial intelligence is the main driving force behind the growth of patents in this field. The number of patent applications in the field of digital communication increased the most, with a year-on-year growth of 11.4%, reaching 17802.