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Part of Intellectual Property

Patent Law

Rights in inventions, from application to enforcement.

Find schools with programsAll areas of law

What this area covers

Patent lawyers help inventors obtain patents and help companies assert or defend against them. Representing applicants before the patent office requires separate registration, which is open to people with qualifying scientific or technical training.

Also called: Patent Litigation, Patent Prosecution, Patents.

Typical legal work

  • Drafting and prosecuting patent applications
  • Assessing patentability and freedom to operate
  • Litigating patent infringement and validity

Where lawyers work

  • Law firms of every size
  • In-house legal departments
  • Patent offices
  • University technology-transfer offices

A setting is where you work; an area is what the work is about. The same area is practised in very different settings.

Schools with verified programs

A school is listed here only when its own website names a concentration, certificate, clinic, center or field placement in Patent Law. Schools are in alphabetical order. The list is not a ranking, and a school that is absent may still teach the subject.

5 schools · 5 clinics

Filter these schools in the directory

Program types counted as evidence: clinics, certificates, concentrations and specializations, centers and institutes, externships and field placements. Joint degrees and advanced degrees are described under Degrees & program types.

Sources

These references informed what the area covers. The description above is PreLaw Advisor’s own and does not reproduce their text.

  1. 1.American Bar Association. Section of Intellectual Property Law (opens in a new tab) Retrieved Sep 2026.
  2. 2.United States Patent and Trademark Office. Becoming a patent practitioner (opens in a new tab) Retrieved Sep 2026.

Description reviewed Sep 2026. Each school program links to the page it was verified against.