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The Lex Machina 2026 Patent Litigation Report shows a split-screen story: By the end of 2025, district court filings had just reached their highest level in a decade, while activity before the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB) had begun a sharp descent.
Plaintiffs filed 4,547 patent cases in federal district courts in 2025, a nearly 20% increase from 2024. Yet in the first half of 2026, claimants filed approximately 1,900 new district court lawsuits, putting the year on pace to finish comfortably below the 2025 peak. PTAB activity shifted even more dramatically, with only about 200 petitions filed during the first half of 2026, fewer than in any other half-year period in at least a decade.
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Key takeaways
Filings rose from 3,111 cases in 2023 to 3,803 in 2024 and 4,547 in 2025. The 2025 total surpassed the previous high of 4,507 cases filed in 2016 and finished approximately 17% above the ten-year average. That said, from January 1 through June 30, 2026, claimants filed approximately 1,900 new patent lawsuits in federal district courts, putting the year on pace to finish comfortably below the 2025 peak.
Importantly, the increase in 2025 was not limited to litigation campaigns by high-volume plaintiffs (HVPs), meaning entities that filed at least 10 patent lawsuits within a 365-day period, excluding Abbreviated New Drug Application (ANDA) cases. When HVP cases are excluded, filings still rose 15.6%, from 2,386 in 2024 to 2,759 in 2025. Non-HVP cases represented more than 60% of all patent filings in 2025.
Design patent litigation remained at a high level in 2025. Plaintiffs filed 494 design patent cases, six more than in 2024 and over 46% more than the 339 cases filed in 2023. Many of these matters involve “Schedule A” defendants, including online vendors that may be identified initially by marketplace account names.
Patent litigation continues to be shaped by a relatively small group of venues. From 2023 through 2025, the Eastern District of Texas received 2,941 cases, accounting for 25.7% of all patent lawsuits filed during that period.
The Western District of Texas and the District of Delaware followed, with 531 and 530 cases respectively in 2025. Together with the Northern District of Illinois, the four most active districts accounted for more than half of recent patent lawsuits.
Concentration was even more pronounced at the judge level. The Honorable James Rodney Gilstrap was assigned 2,276 patent-related cases from 2023 through 2025, which was more than four times the total assigned to the next most active judge.
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Patent litigation remains a high-exposure practice area. District courts awarded $2.353 billion in patent damages in 2025, excluding costs, attorney’s fees, and interest. Although that total was below the levels recorded in 2023 and 2024, it marked the fourth consecutive year in which damage awards exceeded $2 billion.
Jury verdicts continued to drive the largest recoveries. From 2023 through 2025, reasonable royalty awards totaled $8.156 billion across 156 cases, with $8.066 billion awarded through verdicts. Lost-profit awards totaled $582 million, while enhanced damages reached $622 million.
Effective analysis therefore needs to address more than the “average case.” Legal teams need to identify which comparable matters terminated early, which progressed to later milestones, what characteristics are shared between cases with large damage awards.
PTAB filings began declining in 2025 and then fell sharply during the first half of 2026. Inter partes review petitions decreased from 1,314 in 2024 to 1,208 in 2025, a decline of approximately 8%. Post-grant review petitions moved in the other direction, rising from 40 to 75, their highest level since 2021. By the first half of 2026, however, total PTAB petition volume had fallen to just 201.
The recent decline appears to be tied primarily to the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s revived and expanded use of discretionary denial. Under the interim workload-management process introduced in March 2025, the institution process for inter partes and post-grant reviews was bifurcated so that discretionary denial could be considered before the merits. See U.S. Patent & Trademark Office, Interim Processes for PTAB Workload Management (Mar. 26, 2025) (memorandum from Coke Morgan Stewart, Acting Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Acting Director of the USPTO, to all PTAB judges).
In practical terms, many accused infringers appear to be reassessing whether the timing and cost of PTAB review remain worthwhile. Some may reserve petitions for their strongest candidates. Petition strength, institution prospects, discretionary-denial exposure, district court timing, settlement posture, and appellate history must be evaluated together. See Proskauer, Back to District Court? PTAB Strategic Recalibration in Patent Litigation (Feb. 18, 2026).
Comprehensive analytics connect market-level patent litigation trends with the specific decisions legal professionals make every day. Rather than relying on raw filing counts or isolated decisions, users can analyze courts, judges, parties, counsel, timing, case resolutions, findings, damages, and appeals through a consistent dataset.
For litigators, patent analytics can strengthen strategy throughout the lifecycle of a matter. Attorneys can assess a judge’s history with claim construction, subject-matter eligibility, summary judgment, damage awards, and trials. They can compare the experience and behavior of opposing parties and counsel, evaluate venue-specific timing, and understand arguments that have historically resonated with their assigned judge. The value is not to replace legal judgment, but rather to give that judgment a more complete factual foundation.
For law firm leaders, pricing professionals, marketing teams, and business development groups, patent litigation analytics make market activity measurable. Teams can identify companies facing new patent disputes, evaluate competitors’ legal representation, and determine where the firm’s experience aligns with emerging needs. In pitches and RFP responses, firms can demonstrate relevant experience and success using hard numbers, rather than relying only on generalized credentials. The same intelligence can inform matter pricing, staffing models, practice-group investment, lateral recruiting, and geographic expansion.
For general counsel, corporate legal, and risk professionals, analytics empower claim valuation and outside-counsel selection, often before the record is fully developed. Patent litigation analytics can help business professionals establish realistic timing and budget expectations, assess potential damages, set reserves, and compare settlement and trial outcomes in similar disputes. In-house teams can evaluate whether an outside firm or attorney has handled comparable technologies, claims, opponents, judges, venues, and procedural stages in patent litigation. They can compare experience using relevant case volume and outcomes instead of relying solely on reputation or existing relationships.
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The latest data shows why IP litigation strategy cannot depend on last year’s assumptions. Filing levels, venue concentrations, PTAB practices, case timing, damages, and party behavior can change quickly. Legal professionals need reliable benchmarks as well as the ability to examine the courts, judges, parties, counsel, and case types most relevant to the matter at hand.
Request a copy of the Lex Machina 2026 Patent Litigation Report to explore the data behind these trends and see how comprehensive litigation analytics can support your legal and business strategy.
What are the most important patent litigation trends for 2026?
The most significant trends include the 2025 district court filing peak, a broad increase in cases outside high-volume plaintiff campaigns, continued record-level design patent litigation, persistent concentration in the Eastern District of Texas, high damage awards, and a substantial slowdown in district court and PTAB activity during the first half of 2026.
Why is PTAB activity slowing?
The drop appears to be tied primarily to the USPTO’s revived and expanded use of discretionary denial. As institution prospects, cost, and timing become less predictable, some accused infringers appear to be reserving PTAB petitions for stronger candidates and considering district court defenses, settlement, licensing, or ex parte reexamination instead.