Innovators around the world filed 3.4 million patent applications in 2021, slightly higher than the  pre-COVID peak of 3.3 million filed in 2018 (figure 1.1). Patent applications worldwide grew by  3.6% in 2021 compared to 2020. This follows an increase of 1.5% in 2020 which came after a 3%  drop in 2019. A substantial rise in filings by China, which made 88,504 more applications than it  did in 2020, combined with robust contributions from the intellectual property (IP) office of the  Republic of Korea (11,239 additional applications) and the European Patent Office (EPO) (8,432),  was the main driver of growth in 2021. The IP offices of India (4,802) and South Africa (4,272) also  made notable contributions to overall growth.