The steps are simple to list and easy to get wrong. What follows is what actually happens, which choices cannot be undone once you file, and where applications really come apart.
Trademark law does not protect names it thinks everyone needs. A name that is the common term for the product — "Bicycle" for bicycles — can never be registered, however much you spend. A name that merely describes what you sell — "Cold & Creamy" for ice cream — is refused unless you can show years of use have made buyers treat it as a brand rather than a description.
This trips up more founders than conflicts do, because descriptive names feel like good marketing. The counterintuitive rule: a name that means nothing gives you more protection than a name that explains everything. There is a longer version of this in the distinctiveness guide.
Look for identical names, and for names that sound or mean the same in related goods — that is where refusals come from. Do it before you print anything, buy the domain, or tell your customers. A $2 knockout search rules out the obvious failures cheaply.
The application describes your goods and services in the USPTO's own vocabulary, and you can narrow that description later but never broaden it. Claim too little and your registration protects less than your business does; claim too much and you pay for classes you cannot support, and invite refusals you did not need.
If you are already selling under the name, you file on use in commerce and must show it. If you are not yet, you file on intent to use, which holds your place — but the registration only issues once you begin selling and prove it, with further fees and deadlines. The choice changes what you owe and when.
A specimen is proof the name is used as a brand, not as decoration or as a description. A logo on a mock-up is not it. A product page where the name identifies the source of the goods is. Bad specimens are one of the most common reasons an otherwise sound application stalls.
An examining attorney is assigned some months after filing. If they see a problem they issue an office action — a written refusal or objection you have a limited window to answer. Most of them are answerable. Ignoring one abandons the application, and the fee is not refunded.
If it clears examination the mark is published, and anyone who believes it would harm them has a window to oppose. Most marks pass unopposed. If nobody objects — and you have shown use — the registration issues.
Registration is not the end. There are maintenance filings between the fifth and sixth years, again at ten, and every ten years after. Miss one and the registration is cancelled — not suspended, cancelled — and you start again behind anyone who filed in the meantime. The deadlines guide lists them.
Two different things get called "the cost", and conflating them is how people end up surprised.
| What | Paid to | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Government filing fee | USPTO | Charged per class of goods or services. Non-refundable — including if the application is refused. |
| Attorney fee | The firm | For the work: clearance, drafting the description, choosing the basis, answering refusals. |
| Later filings | Both | Statements of use, extensions, and the maintenance filings above each carry their own fee. |
Watch for a "$0 filing" offer. The government fee is never zero, so it is being collected somewhere. Read what the service actually does for its fee — most of the cheap ones expressly do not advise you on what to file, which is the part that decides whether the registration is worth having.
If you are domiciled in the United States you are allowed to file for yourself. If you are domiciled abroad, USPTO rules require a licensed U.S. attorney — a rule brought in because so many foreign-filed applications were being prepared by people not entitled to practise, and the office has sanctioned filings made that way.
Permission is not really the question. Every step above contains a decision that cannot be corrected afterwards: the description you cannot broaden, the basis that sets what you must prove, the specimen that either shows trademark use or does not. A lawyer is who is answerable for those decisions — and a service that is not a law firm cannot make them for you, which is why its terms say so.
Expect the better part of a year to eighteen months from filing to registration when nothing goes wrong, and longer if an office action or an opposition arrives. Nothing makes examination itself fast; what shortens the total is filing something that does not draw an objection.
Possibly, but carefully. Rights in the U.S. can arise from use alone, so an unregistered user may still have rights that predate yours in their area or field. A federal register search will not surface them, which is exactly why a clean search is not the same as a clear name.
The word usually protects more, because it covers the name however it is styled. A logo registration protects that design. Businesses that can afford both often file the word first, since a rebrand of the artwork does not then cost them their registration.
A refusal is not the end — most are office actions with a response deadline, and many are answerable with argument or an amendment. What is fatal is missing the deadline. The grounds an examiner can cite are listed in the refusal guide.
No. Forming a company with the state registers a business entity; buying a domain rents an address. Neither gives you trademark rights, and both are routinely mistaken for it. Trademark rights come from use as a brand, and federal registration is what makes them enforceable nationwide.
Everything above assumes the name survives the first step. That one takes two minutes.
This page is general information, not legal advice. Outcomes depend on facts this page knows nothing about.