In November 2025, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) issued revised guidance stating that artificial intelligence (AI) systems cannot be named as inventors under current U.S. patent law, as only “natural persons” may qualify for inventorship. The new enforced guidance reinforces a human-driven inventorship standard that continues to define the boundaries of patent protection.

The USPTO’s position aligns with the most notable federal court precedent, Thaler v. Vidal, 43 F.4th 1207 (Fed. Cir. 2022). For patent practitioners, the guidance highlights the importance of human contribution and the necessity of careful documentation when AI is used in the inventive process for new technologies.

Key Takeaways for Patent Practitioners

• Only natural persons may be named as inventors under the current U.S. patent law.

• AI systems are considered tools that assist the inventive process and cannot qualify for inventorship.

• Traditional inventorship standards apply to AI-assisted and non-AI inventions.

• “Conception” remains the “touchstone of inventorship,” which requires a significant human contribution.

• Operating or owning an AI system is insufficient to establish inventorship.

• Practitioners should carefully document human science contributions to ensure the patent’s validity.

Thaler v. Vidal Precedent

Moreover, the dispute originated in patent applications filed by computer scientist Stephen Thaler, who listed his AI system, the Device for Autonomous Bootstrapping of Unified Sentience (DABUS), as the sole inventor of two inventions he claimed were autonomously generated. The USPTO rejected the applications, explaining that the Patent Act (35 U.S.C) requires inventors to be “natural persons.”

In August 2022, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld the USPTO’s determination that the Patent Act refers to inventors as “individuals,” a term the Supreme Court has interpreted to indicate human beings. In addition, the court stated that “the Patent Act requires that inventors must be natural persons; that is, human beings.” The Supreme Court subsequently declined review, allowing the Federal Circuit’s ruling to stand as the binding precedent.

Withdrawal of the Prior Guidance

Following the Thaler v. Vidal decision, the USPTO issued guidance in February 2024 under former USPTO Director Kathi Vidal, addressing inventorship in AI-assisted inventions. That guidance applied the joint-inventorship framework from Pannu v. Iolab Corp., 155 F.3d 1344, 1351 (Fed. Cir. 1998). which requires that an inventor: “(1) contribute in some significant

manner to the conception of the invention; (2) make a contribution to the claimed invention that is not insignificant in quality when measured against the dimension of the full invention; and (3) do more than merely explain well-known concepts or the current state of the art.”

The Pannu factors are traditionally used to evaluate contributions among multiple human inventors in multidisciplinary technologies, but applying them to AI-assisted inventions prompted criticism because the test was not designed to measure the role of a human working with a non-human tool.

In November 2025, USPTO Director John Squires rescinded the 2024 “Inventorship Guidance for AI-assisted Inventions”, explaining in the revised guidance that the Pannu factors “only apply when determining whether multiple natural persons qualify as joint inventors.” Since AI systems are not persons, the USPTO concluded that no joint inventorship analysis arises when a single human uses AI assistance.

According to the USPTO, the revised guidance establishes that “the same legal standard for determining inventorship applies to all inventions, regardless of whether AI systems were used. There is no separate or modified standard for AI-assisted inventions.”

‘Conception’ Remains the ‘Touchstone of Inventorship’

The guidance reiterates that conception is “the touchstone of inventorship,” defining it as the “formation in the mind of the inventor, of a definite and permanent idea of the complete and operative invention.” To qualify as an inventor, a natural person must make a significant contribution to this mental act.

Under the revised guidance, the use of an AI system does not disqualify a person from inventorship, provided the individual supplied the intellectual contribution necessary to form the invention. The USPTO has emphasized that AI systems should be viewed in the same manner as other tools used in research and development that are capable of assisting the inventive process but incapable of conception.

Merely using AI to run simulations, generate designs, or produce outputs does not, standing alone, confer inventorship because it requires human contribution to the inventive concept itself.

Best Practices for Patent Practitioners

Inventorship directly affects patent validity and ownership by making accurate inventorship determinations essential to enforceable patent rights. The guidance conveys practical implications for patent practitioners and applicants developing technologies with AI assistance. Each claimed invention must reflect a significant human contribution, and practitioners should carefully identify and document those contributions during the disclosure process.

Patent practitioners should adopt an approach to invention disclosure by ensuring that human contributions are clearly documented on how AI tools were used for the subject matter.

Maintaining documentation of human contributions may be critical for demonstrating inventorship, including prompts, inputs, and subsequent modifications.

Ultimately, the failure to properly name a human inventor or to substantiate a qualifying contribution could undermine a patent’s validity. The USPTO also has resources for patent practitioners addressing AI-related issues, including access to the revised inventorship guidance, links to inventor analysis materials, relevant sections of the Manual of Patent Examining Procedure, FAQs on AI inventorship, and other guidance documents and training materials related to AI and patent law.