Filed application for patent filed in the United States may claim the benefit of, or priority to, a prior application filed in the United States. What is a patent priority date?Priority date refers to the earliest filing date in a family of patent applications. The priority date determines whether another patent filing or publicly available document qualifies as prior art against one's patent application. In Espacenet you can find the priority date in the Bibliographic data section right after the Priority number(s) in the format yyyymmdd. An application for patent filed in the United States may be entitled to the benefit of the filing date of a prior application filed in a foreign country. A priority claim is made to an earlierfiled patent application. For example, an Applicant can claim priority in a later-filed patent application. • Priority Development Area (PDA) Planning Program Cycle Five Application for Funding (Alameda. County's PDA Planning Grant Application).