One EU trade mark, or a few national ones?

An EU trade mark (EUTM) covers all member states with a single application to the EUIPO. For most businesses selling across Europe it is good value. It also has a property that cuts both ways: it stands or falls as one. An earlier right in a single member state can block the whole application, including in the countries where you actually trade.

The deciding question

Are you likely to meet an earlier conflicting right somewhere in the EU? With 27 national registers, plus the EU register and national unregistered rights, the chance is higher for common words. If clearance across all of them looks good, file an EUTM. If there is a known conflict in a country you do not care about, national filings in the countries you do care about may be the safer route.

What the EUTM gives you

One application, one register, one fee for the whole Union, examined by the EUIPO in Alicante. You can file online in any official EU language and pick a second language from the EUIPO's five working languages.
Ten years of protection from the filing date, renewable indefinitely in ten-year periods.
Use in one member state can be enough. To keep the mark alive against a non-use challenge, you need genuine use in the Union. That does not have to mean use in every country, though the use must be real and sufficient in scale for the market.
A cost structure that favours one or two classes. The basic fee for an electronic filing covers one class. A second class costs a small extra fee, and each class from the third onward costs more.

EUIPO fees for an individual EU trade mark filed electronically, as set in Annex I to the EU Trade Mark Regulation. Check the EUIPO fee page before filing.
Item	Fee
Basic fee, one class	EUR 850
Second class	EUR 50
Each class from the third	EUR 150
Opposition (if you oppose someone else's EUTM)	EUR 320

The unitary character, from both sides

Article 1 of the EU Trade Mark Regulation says the EUTM has a unitary character: it has equal effect throughout the Union and can only be registered, transferred, surrendered, revoked or declared invalid for the whole Union. That is the source of its value, and of its main risk.

The risk. The owner of an earlier national mark in one member state, say Portugal, can oppose your EUTM application. If the opposition succeeds, the application is refused for the whole EU, including Germany, France and every other country where nobody objected. The same applies to absolute grounds. A word that is descriptive in any official EU language can be refused for the whole Union, because the test is applied wherever the word is understood.

The strength. Once registered, you can enforce one right across all member states, and EU trade mark courts can issue injunctions that reach across the Union. A national portfolio covering the same countries would cost more and would have to be enforced country by country.

Conversion: the safety net

If an EUTM application is refused, withdrawn or lapses, all is not necessarily lost. Under Articles 139 to 141 of the Regulation, you can ask to convert it into national applications in the member states where the obstacle does not apply. Each national application keeps the EUTM's filing or priority date. There are firm deadlines, generally three months from the relevant event or communication. Conversion is not available in a member state where the ground for refusal applies, and national filing fees are payable again for each country you convert into.

Conversion turns the all-or-nothing risk into something more manageable, at the cost of time and the national fees you would have paid anyway.

Seniority: folding national marks into an EUTM

If you already own national registrations for the same mark and goods, you can claim their seniority in your EUTM. You can then let the national registrations lapse without losing their earlier date in those countries. For a business that registered at home first and later expanded, this can reduce renewal costs without giving up priority.

When national filings make more sense

A known conflict elsewhere in the EU. If clearance finds an earlier mark in a country that does not matter to you, filing nationally where you trade avoids handing that owner a veto over the whole application.
A word that is descriptive in another EU language. A name that is a dictionary word in, for example, Polish or Italian may be refused EU-wide. It may still be fine in countries where that language is not understood.
You trade in one or two countries and will stay there. A single national filing is usually cheaper than an EUTM. For a business with no real plans to expand, the EU-wide right may not be worth the extra cost and exposure.
Outside the EU. The United Kingdom, Switzerland and Norway are not covered by an EUTM. Since 1 January 2021 the UK needs its own filing. EUTMs registered before that date were cloned into comparable UK rights.

Questions

Does an EUTM cover the United Kingdom?

No, not since the end of the Brexit transition period on 31 December 2020. EUTMs registered by then were automatically cloned into comparable UK marks. Anything filed later needs a separate UK application to the UK IPO, or a UK designation under the Madrid Protocol.

Can I search the EU and national registers at once?

TMview, run by the EUIPO with national offices, searches the EU register and the participating national registers together. It is the right starting point, but it is a starting point. Read the actual records, and remember that unregistered national rights will not appear in it. How to search so the result means something.

How long does an EUTM take?

An application with no objections and no oppositions can register within a few months. The three-month opposition period after publication is fixed, so nothing registers faster than that. An opposition can add a year or more.

Published 2026-10-18 and checked against Regulation (EU) 2017/1001 and EUIPO guidance. Fees are set in Annex I to the Regulation and can change. Confirm at the EUIPO before filing. General guidance, not legal advice on any filing strategy.