Does claiming priority to a previous application affect your patent term?

Claiming priority to a previous application can indeed affect the patent term, particularly in the context of nonprovisional applications. When a nonprovisional application claims priority to a prior application, it can take advantage of the filing date of that earlier application, which can be crucial for determining the patent's term.

In the United States, the term of a utility patent is generally 20 years from the earliest filing date of the nonprovisional application from which it claims priority, in accordance with 35 U.S.C. § 154. Therefore, if a nonprovisional application claims priority to a provisional application or to another nonprovisional application that was filed earlier, the effective filing date for determining patent term is that of the earlier application.

This ability to relate back to an earlier filing date is a significant benefit, as it extends the time before the patent expires based on the time elapsed since the first filing. It is important to note that this principle primarily applies to nonprovisional applications which are intended to lead to issuance of an actual patent, whereas provisional applications are not examined and thus do not directly result in patent rights; they simply assign an early filing date.

For foreign applications, while international treaties like the Paris Convention allow similar priority claims