Guide
Written for a company with no place of business in China. Every deadline below is the one the statute actually imposes, with the article number, not a number someone remembered.
Two things foreign applicants get wrong here, in opposite directions. Most assume appointing an agency is optional — it is not. A few assume it catches every foreign company — it does not.
An applicant may handle a trademark registration application or other trademark matters on its own or through a lawfully established trademark agency. A foreigner or foreign enterprise applying for trademark registration or handling other trademark matters in China shall entrust a lawfully established trademark agency to handle the matter.
— Trademark Law, Article 18 · 《商标法》第十八条 — in force through 31 December 2026
From 2027-01-01 this becomes Trademark Law (2026 Revision), Article 11(2) of the 2026 Revision, which writes the limitation into the statute itself and adds "other foreign organisation". The obligation is unchanged.
And “foreign enterprise” is defined more narrowly than people expect — this is the part that decides whether the obligation catches you at all:
The term "foreigner or foreign enterprise" in Article 18 of the Trademark Law means a foreigner or foreign enterprise that has no habitual residence or place of business in China.
— Implementing Regulations, Article 5 · 《商标法实施条例》第五条 — in force through 31 December 2026
So it is not about your nationality on paper — it is about whether you have a habitual residence or a place of business in China. A US corporation selling through a Chinese distributor has neither. Nor does a German manufacturer whose goods are made here under contract. Both must file through an agency.
The regulation also requires that a foreign applicant's power of attorney state the nationality of the principal — a small detail that causes a surprising number of formality objections.
Here is what the law requires. Not what usually happens — what the statute says. The fourth column matters: the Trademark Law was revised on 26 June 2026 and the new article numbers take effect on 1 January 2027.
| Stage | Statutory limit (now) | Authority | From 1 Jan 2027 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Substantive examination自收到申请文件之日起九个月内审查完毕 | 9 months from receipt of the application documents | Article 28 第二十八条 | Article 329 months — unchanged |
| Opposition period after preliminary publication初步审定公告之日起三个月内提出异议 | 3 months from the date of preliminary publication | Article 33 第三十三条 | Article 36 — reduced to 2 months |
| Review of refusal驳回后十五日内申请复审；复审九个月内决定 | Applicant has 15 days to request review; decision within 9 months | Article 34 第三十四条 | Article 3715 days — unchanged |
| Opposition decision异议十二个月内决定，经批准可延长六个月 | 12 months, extendable by 6 months with approval | Article 35 第三十五条 | — |
Sources: Trademark Law of the People's Republic of China (2019 Amendment) (in force through 31 Dec 2026) · Trademark Law of the People's Republic of China (2026 Revision) (NPC text, effective 2027-01-01). Last checked 2026-07-16.
The nine-month examination period survives the revision unchanged (it becomes Article 32). So does the fifteen-day window to appeal a refusal (Article 37). But the opposition window narrows from three months to two on 1 January 2027 — new Article 36. The date your exclusive rights start running moves with it, being calculated from the expiry of the two-month period rather than the three.
If you are running trademark watch services on a Chinese portfolio, that is a third of your reaction time gone, and it happens on a date rather than gradually. Most English-language guidance has not caught up: the revision is three weeks old as we write this.
One more thing worth knowing before you rely on any English-language source written after January 2027. The revision drops both “the Trademark Office” and “the Trademark Review and Adjudication Board” — TRAB — replacing them throughout with “the trademark administration department under the State Council”. TRAB is an acronym that appears in essentially every English guide to Chinese trademark practice. From 1 January 2027 it names a body the statute no longer contains.
We cannot tell you how the revision treats applications that are already pending on 1 January 2027. The only transitional provision in the whole statute is Article 87(2): “trademarks registered before this Law takes effect remain valid”. It says nothing about applications in flight. That will presumably be dealt with by the implementing regulations or a judicial interpretation, neither of which has been published. Anyone telling you the answer today is speculating.
Nine months of examination, then three months of publication during which anyone may oppose. A clean application that nobody opposes therefore cannot reach registration in much under twelve months, and CNIPA is not entitled to take longer than nine months over the examination.
You will see ranges like “8–12 months” and “12–18 months” quoted confidently across the English-language internet, frequently in the same search results, contradicting each other. Those are recollections of practice. They are not useless — practice is what you will actually experience — but nobody seems to mention that there is a statute with a number in it. There is, and it is nine months.
We are not going to publish our own “typical timeline” figure. We could — every firm has one, drawn from its own docket — but it would be our experience presented as if it were a fact about China, and you already have plenty of those to choose from. What we can tell you is the statutory ceiling, which is checkable, and what we are seeing on live matters, which we will tell you directly when you ask about your case.
The official fee is ¥270 per class when filed online, covering up to ten items of goods or services in that class, with ¥27 for each item beyond ten. Filing on paper costs ¥300 and ¥30 respectively, and there is no reason to do it.
Our own service fee is quoted per matter, in writing — set out beside these official fees when we send you a quote. See how we charge, and the full official-fee schedule in our fees guide.
No. You need a Chinese agency, which is not the same thing. Article 18 of the Trademark Law requires a foreign applicant to file through a lawfully established Chinese trademark agency, and the agency's address becomes the address of record. You do not need a subsidiary, a WFOE, a distributor or a Chinese address of your own.
The statute gives CNIPA nine months from receipt of the application to complete examination (Article 28), followed by a three-month opposition window after preliminary publication (Article 33). So a clean, unopposed application cannot complete in much under twelve months, and CNIPA is not permitted to spend longer than nine months on the examination itself. Most English-language sources quote a range like 8–12 or 12–18 months without saying where it comes from; those are recollections of practice, not the deadlines the law actually imposes.
No, and this is worth correcting because the figure circulates widely. The current Trademark Law does not set a separate statutory period for formal examination. Four months is a practitioner's rule of thumb. If a guide presents it as a legal deadline, that guide is not reading the statute.
You have fifteen days from receipt of the refusal to request a review (Article 34). That window is statutory, it is short, and it is counted from receipt — which, for a foreign applicant, means receipt by your agency. This is the single strongest practical argument for appointing an agency that watches the docket rather than one that files and forgets.
Yes, and you should. China is a first-to-file jurisdiction: rights follow the register, not the market. If you are manufacturing here, negotiating with a distributor here, or even exhibiting here, your brand is already visible to people who register brands for a living.
Yes, within six months of your first filing in a Paris Convention country. CNIPA does not charge a separate official fee for a trademark priority claim, though the priority document itself has to be in order.
Subclasses: the thing that breaks foreign filings →
The single most common way a foreign trademark registration in China ends up worth less than its owner thinks.
What CNIPA actually charges →
The full official fee schedule, with document numbers.
