 In Canada, since October 1, 1989, generally speaking, patents are granted to the first inventor to file an application for an invention (that is, Canada has a "first-to-file" system), which may result in a "race to the patent office" by inventors of competing technologies

In some cases (referred to below under the heading Requesting an Earlier Filing Date), an application may effectively receive an earlier filing date, to improve the chances of an applicant winning the "race to the patent office".In Canada, inventors have one year after their first public disclosure of their invention in which to file a Canadian patent application (this is sometimes referred to as the "one year grace period").However, disclosing the invention to the public prior to filing a Canadian patent application will result in the loss of significant international patent rights.