The Government Accountability Office on Thursday said the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s effort to reduce its patent application backlog could keep examiner attrition high and weaken examination quality.
The GAO reported the backlog rose to about 838,000 unexamined applications in January 2025. The USPTO announced in September 2025 a goal to bring the backlog below 599,000 applications but did not set a time frame, according to the report. As of August 2026, the backlog stood at about 756,000, and the average time applicants wait for a final patentability decision rose 11 percent from January 2025, the GAO said.
To cut the backlog, the agency is requiring examiners to handle more applications, has cut back on examiner training, and has broadened the use of artificial intelligence search tools, the GAO wrote. The watchdog’s analysis concluded that, even if examiners increase output, the office is unlikely to bring the backlog below 599,000 before 2031 without lowering attrition.
Examiner attrition rose from 2.9 percent in fiscal 2020 to 7.6 percent in fiscal 2025, according to the GAO. By August 2026, the 12-month examiner attrition rate was 7.6 percent. The agency is seeking to hire more examiners, but if attrition stays high, it will hamper the USPTO’s ability to shrink the backlog, the report said.
Stakeholders told the GAO that the USPTO’s approach may not be sustainable. According to those interviewed, including the patent examiners’ union and former agency officials, mandating higher application counts and removing time set aside for subject-matter training creates risks to examination quality. While the agency has expanded use of AI tools, stakeholders said the tools are not effective yet, since they do not consistently return useful results in patent searches, the GAO wrote.
The GAO also noted that the USPTO paused a survey that collected stakeholder opinions on how responsive the agency is and on overall examination quality. Evaluating and tackling risks to retention and quality could better position the agency to balance its efforts to reduce the backlog, according to the report.
The GAO recommended that the Director of the USPTO evaluate and mitigate how its backlog-reduction steps could affect keeping examiners and the quality of reviews. The recommendation is open. The USPTO did not provide comments on the recommendation and did not provide the GAO with requested information, the report said.
The GAO said it analyzed USPTO patent application and examiner data from fiscal years 2020 to 2025 and federal workforce data on recent examiner attrition. It also spoke with the patent examiners’ union, former USPTO officials, patent attorneys, trade groups, and researchers.
