Type the date on your registration certificate. This works out when the Section 8 declaration, Section 15 incontestability and Section 9 renewal windows open and close. No sign-up, nothing saved.
A sworn statement that you are still using the mark in commerce for the goods and services in the registration, filed with a specimen showing that use. The window opens on the fifth anniversary and closes on the sixth, with a six-month grace period afterwards for a surcharge. Miss it and the registration is cancelled: not suspended, cancelled.
Optional, and worth understanding rather than skipping. After five consecutive years of continuous use you can declare the registration incontestable, which removes most of the grounds on which someone could later attack it. It is normally filed at the same time as the Section 8 because the timing coincides.
The combined maintenance and renewal filing. The window runs from the ninth to the tenth anniversary, with the same six-month grace period, and it repeats every ten years for as long as the mark is in use. A registration can live indefinitely; it just cannot be left alone.
The deadlines guide covers what each filing has to contain and what happens when one is missed. Fees change, so this page does not quote them: the current figures are on the USPTO fee schedule.
If your mark is not registered yet and you filed on an intent-to-use basis, the clock that matters is the Notice of Allowance. You have six months to file a Statement of Use or request an extension, and up to five extensions after that, for a hard maximum of 36 months from the Notice. Put that date in the second field above and those dates appear too.
Check a name before you file A registrability screen against the live USPTO register. First search $2, then $5.Between the fifth and sixth anniversary of the registration date. It is a declaration that you are still using the mark in commerce, filed with a specimen. There is a six-month grace period after the sixth anniversary with a surcharge, and missing it cancels the registration.
The combined Section 8 and Section 9 filing is due between the ninth and tenth anniversary of registration, and then every ten years for as long as you keep using the mark. It also carries a six-month grace period with a surcharge.
It is optional. After five consecutive years of continuous use you can file to make the registration incontestable, which sharply narrows the grounds on which someone can later challenge it. It is normally filed together with the Section 8 because the timing lines up.
It sends courtesy email reminders to the correspondence address on file, but they are courtesy notices and the office is explicit that the responsibility for the deadline is yours. Registrations are cancelled every year for missed maintenance filings, which is the reason docketing exists as a service at all.
It does arithmetic on a date you type. It does not look your mark up, does not know whether the registration is still live, and will not remind you of anything: close this page and the dates go with it. Watching a registration on the register and emailing you before each window is the monitoring service, $6 a month. The honest summary is that the maths is free and being told in time is the product.
General information about U.S. trademark practice, not legal advice about your registration. LaunchTime IP is software, not a law firm.