Portfolio · 28 April 2026 · 7 min
Comparable UK rights: what still exists, and what needs a new filing
EU trade marks and designs did not vanish in Britain. The ones that were alive on 31 December 2020 became something else. Everything filed later did not.
We still open files for clients who believe an EU trade mark filed in 2023 covers shops in Croydon. It does not. The cut-off is mechanical and unforgiving, which is why it is still being missed six years on.
The comparable right
Every EU trade mark and registered Community design that was registered or pending at 23:00 GMT on 31 December 2020 produced a comparable UK right. The UKIPO created those rights automatically. They have their own UK numbers, their own renewal dates, and they must be dealt with as UK rights from that moment.
An EU mark filed on 2 January 2021 or later has no UK counterpart. If you want protection here, you file here, or you designate the UK in a Madrid application.
What goes wrong in practice
- Renewal instructions sent only to EUIPO, so the comparable UK mark lapses while the EU mark lives on.
- Assignments recorded in Alicante and never recorded in Newport, so the UK owner of record is a company that no longer exists.
- Watching set up only on the EU register, so a later UK application is never seen.
- A buyer completing diligence on 'the EU portfolio' and discovering, late, that the British shops sit on a lapsed comparable mark.
The audit we run
We list every EU filing by date, match it to a comparable UK number where one exists, and flag every gap. Gaps are either a new UK filing, a decision to leave the UK uncovered, or a confirmation that the business does not trade here. All three are legitimate. Silence is not.
This note is general information about UK intellectual property practice. It is not advice on a particular set of facts. For that, write to [email protected].