How many U.S. patents did Thomas Edison receive?

Thomas Edison received 1,093 U.S. patents.

Edison’s extraordinary total covered a wide range of technologies, including telegraphy, electric lighting, sound recording, motion pictures, batteries, mining equipment, and electric power systems. His first U.S. patent, granted in 1869, was for an electrographic vote recorder, a device that allowed legislators to register “yes” or “no” votes electrically.

The total of 1,093 refers to U.S. patents, not all the patents Edison held worldwide. His international total was much larger, commonly reported as 2,332 patents. The U.S. figure includes 1,084 utility patents and nine design patents.

Edison’s reputation as an inventor sometimes leads people to assume that he personally created every part of the technologies associated with his name. In reality, many patents protected improvements, systems, or inventions developed collaboratively by employees and associates at his Menlo Park and West Orange laboratories. His importance also lies in helping establish industrial research and development as a systematic process.