How should ‘Large Tables’ be submitted in patent applications?

This page is an FAQ based on guidance from the Manual of Patent Examining Procedure. It is provided as guidance, with links to the ground truth sources. This is information only: it is not legal advice.

‘Large Tables’ can be submitted in two ways:

1. Via the USPTO patent electronic filing system as ASCII plain text files
2. On read-only optical discs in compliance with 37 CFR 1.52(e)

According to 37 CFR 1.58(d), these ASCII plain text files must:

• Maintain spatial relationships of table elements
• Be compatible with PC or Mac computers and various operating systems
• Contain only ASCII characters with specific line terminator requirements
• Be named with a .txt extension
• Be incorporated by reference in the specification

There’s a 25 MB size limit for files submitted via the USPTO patent electronic filing system, with no compression allowed.