What Changes Under the New EUIPO Guidelines?

What Changes Under the New EUIPO Guidelines?

The intellectual property landscape in Europe is dynamic and requires constant adaptation. The European Union Intellectual Property Office (hereinafter, the “EUIPO”) keeps its rules and examination practices up to date in response to rapid developments in the market, technology and case law. These updates are not merely bureaucratic formalities: they establish how companies, from large multinational groups to small businesses and startups, should protect some of their most valuable assets, including trademarks, designs and other elements of their corporate identity.

What are the EUIPO Guidelines and what role do they play in trademark registration?

The main purpose of the EUIPO Guidelines is to ensure that all procedures relating to the registration of European Union trademarks and Community designs are handled transparently, consistently and predictably.

This manual provides applicants, lawyers, representatives and examiners with a clear basis for understanding the criteria applied when assessing an application. By explaining how the relevant rules are interpreted in practice, it helps reduce uncertainty and limits arbitrariness in the Office’s decisions.

They also seek to ensure that similar cases are examined in the same way, thereby maintaining a consistent and harmonised approach across the 27 Member States of the European Union. This is particularly useful for companies operating in more than one European market.

Finally, the Guidelines connect legislation, which can sometimes be abstract or highly technical, with practical reality. They are updated annually to incorporate the latest judgments of the Court of Justice of the European Union, developments in the Office’s practice and new market trends that may affect the protection of intellectual property rights. This allows applicants and practitioners to anticipate more clearly how the Office is likely to assess each application.

Main changes introduced by the latest update of the Guidelines

The 2026 edition of the EUIPO Guidelines, which entered into force on 1 July 2026, introduces significant technical changes aimed at digitalization, procedural simplification and the updating of examination criteria in line with recent case law and current market practices.

• Electronic-only filing for designs: communications concerning Community design proceedings may now only be submitted electronically. From 1 July 2026, documents sent by post or courier will not be considered received.
• Similarity criteria for word marks: upper-case and lower-case letters no longer affect the assessment of similarity. Marks differing only in capitalization will therefore be regarded as identical for registration purposes.
• Distinctive character of single letters: a single letter will be considered weakly distinctive unless it is sufficiently stylized.
• Simplification of extension requests: although requests must still be properly justified, parties are no longer required to provide supporting evidence for a second or subsequent extension request.

Impact of the changes on trademark and design registration for technology startups

For startups, whose main digital assets are often intangible, such as software, applications or corporate brands, these updates may significantly affect their legal protection strategy. Taking the new criteria into account from the outset may help avoid weaknesses in future applications.

• More advanced and realistic protection for interfaces: explicit criteria have been introduced for animated and dynamic design representations, directly benefiting software and mobile application developers.
• Protection of names against imitations: technology companies often use “CamelCase” formats, such as “TechApp” or “techAPP”. Since capitalization no longer affects similarity, competitors cannot avoid a conflict simply by changing upper-case and lower-case letters, as the Office will treat such versions as identical.
• The challenge of minimalist logos: companies frequently use logos based on a single initial. Under the updated criteria, the letter will need strong stylization to improve its prospects of acceptance by the Office.