5G Air Interface Patent Landscape 2026
Samsung Electronics dominates a highly concentrated field, holding the largest single position among the top hundred filers in 5G air interface patents. The field peaked in 2018 and has eased from that high, with the multi-year corpus now spanning 10,350 patent families and the competitive structure firmly consolidated around a small number of mobile-chipset and device vendors.
Samsung leads a tightly consolidated field with a commanding share among the top hundred filers
Samsung Electronics holds the leading position in the 5G air interface ranking, followed at a significant distance by Qualcomm and Apple. The top five filers together account for 73% of the combined total of the hundred largest filers, signalling a structurally concentrated landscape.
The tier gap between the leader and challengers is pronounced: Samsung’s count is more than three times that of Qualcomm at rank two, and Qualcomm is itself nearly twice the size of Apple at rank three. Below the top three, Intel, AT&T Intellectual Property, and InterDigital form a secondary cluster, while the remaining top-twenty applicants are spread at smaller scales.
| # | Applicant | Patent families | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. | 4,593 | |
| 2 | Qualcomm Incorporated | 1,504 | |
| 3 | Apple Inc. | 860 | |
| 4 | Intel Corporation | 416 | |
| 5 | AT&T INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY I L P | 354 | |
| 6 | InterDigital Patent Holdings, Inc. | 314 | |
| 7 | Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson (publ) | 276 | |
| 8 | Nokia Technologies Oy | 218 | |
| 9 | Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. | 193 | |
| 10 | LG Electronics Inc. | 163 |
| # | Applicant | Patent families | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 11 | Sharp Corporation | 138 | |
| 12 | The Massengill Family Trust | 114 | |
| 13 | David E. Newman | 93 | |
| 14 | KT Corporation | 86 | |
| 15 | FG Innovation Co., Ltd. | 75 | |
| 16 | Intel IP Corporation | 75 | |
| 17 | T-Mobile US, Inc. | 56 | |
| 18 | Guangdong OPPO Mobile Telecommunications Corp., Ltd. | 52 | |
| 19 | VERIZON PATENT & LICENSING INC | 52 | |
| 20 | IDAC Holdings, Inc. | 50 |
The leaders’ positions reflect deep investment in standardised physical-layer and scheduling protocols — the areas where patent control translates directly into standards-essential patent (SEP) leverage and cross-licensing power. New entrants face a dense prior-art environment in core channels and must either find adjacent claim space or negotiate access to existing portfolios.
Data for the most recent 18–24 months is subject to publication lag and will understate actual filing activity; apparent low counts in 2024–2026 should not be read as a structural decline beyond the trend already established through 2023.
Filing activity peaked in 2018 and the technology mix is dominated by digital transmission and wireless network protocols
The annual trend chart shows when inventive activity surged and where it now sits relative to that peak. The technology composition chart reveals which IPC branches carry the bulk of the corpus and which remain comparatively sparse.
Annual filing trend
Filings surged to a peak of 1,747 in 2018, roughly doubling the 2017 baseline of 926. After a partial rebound in 2020 and 2022, annual volume has eased below the 2018 high. Counts for 2024 onward are suppressed by publication lag and should not be interpreted as a further structural drop.
↗ Hover for values · click a bar to ask EurekaTechnology composition
H04L (digital information transmission) and H04W (wireless communication networks) together account for the overwhelming majority of classified records, confirming that channel coding, scheduling, and network-layer signalling are the dominant technical domains. H04B (transmission, general) forms a secondary layer. All other IPC branches individually represent very small fractions of the corpus, including H04J (multiplex communication) at a low share — the one branch flagged as under-served relative to the field’s scale.
↗ Hover for values · click a bar to ask EurekaHighly cited patent families surfaced by the query
Citation-heavy patent families returned by the query. Use this section as citation context, not as a curated list of the most topic-specific patents.
Systems and methods for supporting urllc service i…
A 5G new radio (NR) Base Station (gNB) is described. The gNB includes a processor and memory in electronic communication with the processor. Instructions stored in the memory are executable to receive one or more indications for data availability generated by an ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC)-based logical channel group (LCG) in a 5G NR… (excerpt from the patent abstract)
| # | Patent | Citations |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Radio Download Control Channel | 380 |
| 2 | Reference signal and control information processin… | 359 |
| 3 | Upload Control Signaling For New Radio | 326 |
| 4 | Method and device for transmitting or receiving gr… | 315 |
| 5 | Resource management for 5g ev2x | 311 |
| 6 | Apparatus and method to support ultra-wide bandwid… | 283 |
| 7 | Distributed control in wireless systems | 236 |
| 8 | User equipment and methods for PDCP duplication in… | 225 |
Ranked by total forward citations. Citation counts favour older and broadly cited patent families, and broad or adjacent patents may appear when they match the search scope. Treat this section as citation context, not as a curated list of the most topic-specific patents. Some patent titles may be shown in their original, non-English language where an accurate translation could not be guaranteed.
What the competitive structure means for R&D investment decisions
Four structural observations — maturity, concentration, ecosystem collaboration, and geography — shape where newcomers and established players should direct resources in 5G air interface.
Post-peak, maturing field with easing annual volume
The lifecycle evidence classifies this field as declining, with annual filings easing back from the 2018 peak. Core physical-layer inventions are well-staked, meaning incremental improvements in established channels face a dense prior-art environment. R&D investment is better directed toward adjacent or application-layer branches where density is lower.
Lifecycle: DeclineTop five hold nearly three-quarters of the leading-hundred filers’ combined output
The top five filers account for 73% of the combined total of the hundred largest filers — a level of concentration that limits the realistic patent-staking opportunities for late entrants in the dominant H04L and H04W classes. Challengers below rank five are largely separated by order-of-magnitude gaps from the leader, making competitive repositioning through organic filing alone a slow strategy.
High concentrationCo-filing is primarily intra-corporate, with AT&T entities as the most active pair
The most active co-filing pair is AT&T Intellectual Property and AT&T Mobility II (21 joint filings), reflecting internal IP coordination within the AT&T group. Intel and Intel IP Corp account for 8 joint filings. Samsung Electronics and Beijing Samsung Telecom R&D Center co-filed 7 times, while Nokia Technologies and Nokia USA Inc accounted for 6. Samsung Electronics and Yonsei University also collaborated with 4 joint filings, representing one of the few cross-sector academic pairings visible in the data.
Intra-corporate dominantUnited States and EPO lead filing destinations; Asia-Pacific coverage is selective
The United States is the lead filing jurisdiction, followed by Europe (EPO) and WIPO PCT routes. India ranks fourth among national offices, ahead of China, which may reflect the filing strategies of US-headquartered applicants seeking enforcement coverage in emerging markets. Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan show relatively low filing counts, suggesting applicants are not universally pursuing full Asia-Pacific protection.
US-led geographyGo beyond the landscape: Eureka’s TRIZ Solution agent breaks down an R&D problem and returns patented concept solutions, each with a technical approach and cited patent & literature evidence.
| Applicant | Collaborator | Co-filings |
|---|---|---|
| AT&T知识产权一部有限合伙公司 | AT&T移动第二有限责任公司 | 21 |
| Intel Corporation | Intel IP Corporation | 8 |
| Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. | Beijing Samsung Telecom R&D Center | 7 |
| Nokia Technologies Oy | Nokia USA Inc. | 6 |
| Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. | 延世大学校产学协力团 | 4 |
| AT&T知识产权一部有限合伙公司 | AT&T TECHNICAL SERVICES CO INC | 4 |
| Nokia Technologies Oy | Nokia Solutions and Networks (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. | 2 |
| Nokia Technologies Oy | Nokia Solutions and Networks Oy | 2 |
| Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson (publ) | Ericsson Telecomunicacoes S.A. | 1 |
| Nokia Technologies Oy | Nokia Technologies (Beijing) Co., Ltd. | 1 |
Co-filing pairs, ranked by the number of jointly-filed patent families.
Samsung and Qualcomm anchor the field; momentum diverges sharply between them
The two largest filers define the competitive ceiling but show opposite recent trajectories. Both concentrate their portfolios in the same dominant IPC classes, making head-to-head claim density high.
Samsung Electronics
Samsung Electronics holds the leading position with 4,593 patent families, more than three times the next-ranked applicant. Its technology focus is concentrated in H04L 5 (digital information transmission), H04W 72 (wireless communication networks), and H04L 1, covering both channel coding and scheduling. Recent filing momentum is strongly positive at +74% versus the prior comparable period, setting Samsung apart from every other major applicant in this field, all of whom show declining recent activity.
families: 4,593Qualcomm
Qualcomm ranks second with 1,504 patent families, focusing on the same H04L 5 and H04W 72 domains. However, its recent filing trend is –73% versus the prior period, indicating a significant pullback in new filings. This divergence from Samsung’s trajectory suggests Qualcomm may be consolidating its existing portfolio rather than extending it, which could create relative claim-density gaps in newer sub-areas over time.
families: 1,504| Applicant | Recent (3 yrs) | Trend |
|---|---|---|
| Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. | 2,151 | ▲ +74% |
| Qualcomm Incorporated | 179 | ▼ -73% |
| Apple Inc. | 144 | ▼ -58% |
| Intel Corporation | 155 | ▼ -32% |
| AT&T知识产权一部有限合伙公司 | 52 | ▼ -76% |
| Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson (publ) | 49 | ▼ -67% |
| Nokia Technologies Oy | 36 | ▼ -23% |
| Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. | 42 | ▼ -31% |
Under-served branches adjacent to the dominant core
One IPC branch stands out as comparatively sparse relative to the scale of the overall corpus. A handful of single-record branches signal exploratory filings that have not yet attracted sustained activity.
H04J · Multiplex communication
H04J accounts for approximately 2% of the classified records in a corpus dominated by H04L and H04W, placing it as the most notable adjacent branch with non-trivial volume but low relative density. Multiplex communication techniques — including frequency-division, time-division, and code-division multiplexing — are technically adjacent to 5G NR waveform design and multi-carrier scheduling. An entrant with differentiated claims in multi-carrier or NOMA (non-orthogonal multiple access) framing could find comparatively lower prior-art density here than in the core H04L/H04W space, though the modest absolute count means the window is not uncontested.
Search this in Eureka →G01S · Radar, sonar and positioning
G01S appears at a very low count relative to the corpus, representing an observation of sparsity rather than a validated opportunity. Integrated sensing and communication (ISAC) is an actively discussed 5G-Advanced and 6G concept that would naturally bridge air-interface signalling with radar-like positioning functions. The small number of records here suggests this intersection has not yet attracted broad filing activity, making it worth monitoring as standardisation discussions in ISAC mature — though any claim strategy would need to account for telecommunications-sector prior art outside this specific IPC class.
Search this in Eureka →How leading applicants differ across technology sub-routes
Route coverage across the main technology branches in the current evidence set.
| Player | H04L 5 · Digital information transmission | H04W 72 · Wireless communication networks | H04W 28 · Wireless communication networks | H04L 1 · Digital information transmission | H04B 7 · Transmission (general) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. | Strong · 3,586 | Strong · 2,755 | Moderate · 933 | Moderate · 947 | Moderate · 894 |
| Qualcomm Incorporated | Strong · 1,344 | Strong · 768 | Emerging · 186 | Moderate · 364 | Emerging · 163 |
| Apple Inc. | Strong · 512 | Strong · 300 | Emerging · 81 | Moderate · 131 | Emerging · 77 |
| Intel Corporation | Strong · 327 | Strong · 252 | Moderate · 85 | Moderate · 117 | Moderate · 67 |
| AT&T Intellectual Property I, L.P. | Strong · 227 | Strong · 150 | Strong · 129 | Moderate · 75 | Moderate · 84 |
| Intel IP Corporation | Strong · 201 | Moderate · 91 | Absent | Moderate · 67 | Emerging · 39 |
| Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson (publ) | Strong · 191 | Moderate · 86 | Moderate · 82 | Absent | Emerging · 25 |
Frequently asked questions
The corpus covers 10,350 patent families. This is the base count used for trend and technology-composition analysis throughout the landscape report.
Samsung Electronics is the leading filer with 4,593 patent families, more than three times the count of second-ranked Qualcomm at 1,504 patent families.
Annual filings peaked in 2018 at 1,747. Volume declined from that high and has subsequently eased further, with recent years also affected by the standard 18–24 month publication lag that suppresses the most recent counts.
The United States leads as the primary filing destination, followed by Europe via the EPO and WIPO PCT routes. India ranks fourth among national offices, ahead of China, Japan, and South Korea.
H04L (digital information transmission) and H04W (wireless communication networks) account for the vast majority of classified records. H04B (transmission, general) forms a secondary layer. H04J (multiplex communication) is the most notable adjacent branch with a comparatively low share at approximately 2% of classified records.
Samsung’s recent filing trend is +74% versus the prior comparable period, making it the only top applicant showing growth. By contrast, Qualcomm is at -73%, Apple at -58%, Intel at -32%, AT&T Intellectual Property at -76%, and Ericsson at -67%, suggesting Samsung is actively extending its portfolio while most peers are consolidating.
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Disclaimer. This page is generated from PatSnap Eureka data drawn from a limited snapshot of global patent and scientific-literature records, and is provided for general information and reference only.
Patent data carries inherent limitations: recent filings (typically the most recent 18–24 months) are under-counted due to standard publication lag; counts may be reported at either a patent-family or a patent-record basis and are not always directly comparable; classification, applicant-name, and citation data may contain errors, duplicates, or omissions; and the underlying search query defines and constrains the scope shown. As a result, the analysis may be incomplete or inaccurate and may not reflect the full technology landscape.
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