Mineral Sunscreen Filters Patents: Top Companies & Trends 2026
Mineral Sunscreen Filters: Patents Behind Zinc Oxide and Titanium Dioxide UV Blockers
37.6% of all 426 records sit with just five assignees, while a long tail of single- and few-filing entrants fills out the rest of the ranked field. Filings ran from 9 in 2017 to a peak of 54 in 2018, then eased; the 2021-to-2024 window alone fell 46%, from 37 to 20. 2025 and 2026 are shown but are not comparable yet — publication lags filing by roughly 18 months, so the newest years will fill in as more records publish.
- 1LOREAL SA80
- 2THE BOOTS CO PLC32
- 3JOHNSON & JOHNSON CONSUMER INC20
- 4LCS ADVANCED SOLUTIONS LLC14
- 5RENMATIX INC14
See the full mineral sunscreen filters analysis in Eureka
- The complete ranking, not just the top five
- Every IPC branch with its share of the corpus
- The most-cited records, and where claim space is still thin
Common questions about mineral sunscreen filter patents
Who holds the most patents on mineral sunscreen filters?
The assignee ranking in this dataset of 426 records is led by a single filer holding 80 records, well ahead of a fifth-place filer at 14 and a tenth-place filer at 10. The top 5 assignees together hold 37.6% of all records and the top 10 hold 51.4%, meaning close to half the field sits outside the leading group. This is a concentrated but not closed category — a large share of records belong to single- or few-filing entrants outside the ranked leaders.
Why do mineral sunscreens cause white cast, and is it still being patented around?
White cast comes from the light-scattering behaviour of zinc oxide and titanium dioxide particles at the sizes needed for broad-spectrum UV protection. It remains an active claim target: the most recent representative filing in this dataset, a 2026 L’Oreal application, addresses it through emulsifier pairing and a hydrophobically-modified thickener rather than particle size reduction alone. The comparatively thin C09C share (9.9% of 426 records) suggests coating-based solutions to white cast are less densely claimed than formulation-based ones.
Has patent filing for mineral sunscreen technology slowed down?
Filing peaked in 2018 at 54 records and fell across the following years, with the 2021-to-2024 window showing a 46% decline from 37 to 20 filings. That is the last three-year span the data can treat as complete. 2025 and 2026 figures should not be read as confirming further decline, since publication lags filing by roughly 18 months and those years will still fill in.
Disclaimer. This analysis is based on Patsnap Eureka data drawn from a limited snapshot of global patent records and is provided for general information and reference only. Patent data carries inherent limitations — recent filings are under-counted because of publication lag, counts may be on a record or family basis, classification and applicant-name data may contain errors or duplicates, and the underlying search query defines the scope shown — so the analysis may be incomplete or inaccurate and may not reflect the full technology landscape.
Nothing here is an exhaustive prior-art, novelty, freedom-to-operate or validity search, nor does it constitute legal, financial or professional advice, and it should not be relied upon as such. Verify independently and review with qualified patent and legal professionals before acting on it.
Method: Filing trend and technology composition. Derived from a Patsnap search on Mineral Sunscreen Filters covering 2015–2026, data cut-off 2026-07-31. Counts reflect published records only and shift as new filings publish. Every share divides by all records in scope. Data: Patsnap Eureka. See the full landscape report.