A UAE trademark is one of the cheapest pieces of protection a business here can buy, and the rules changed more than most owners realise: the governing law was replaced in 2022, and the old newspaper-publication step is gone. Here is how registration actually works now.
The governing law
Registration runs under Federal Decree-Law No. 36 of 2021 on Trademarks, issued 20 September 2021 and in force from 2 January 2022. It abrogated the previous Federal Law No. 37 of 1992, and it is supplemented by an Executive Regulation issued as Cabinet Decision No. 57 of 2022.
The law was written partly to accommodate the UAE’s accession to the Madrid Protocol — its own preamble cites the accession decree. The UAE deposited its instrument on 28 September 2021, with the Protocol entering into force for the country on 28 December 2021, making it the 109th member of the Madrid System. In practice that means a UAE filing can serve as the basis for an international registration covering many countries through a single application.
One naming point: the law refers to the “Ministry of Economy”, which now operates as the Ministry of Economy and Tourism.
What you can register
The definition is unusually broad. A mark can be names, words, signatures, letters, symbols, numbers, addresses, seals, drawings, pictures, engravings, packaging, graphic elements, forms, a colour or colours, and signs — and expressly includes three-dimensional marks and hologram marks. The law also provides that “a distinctive sound or smell may be considered as a Trademark.”
A single application may cover a group of identical marks differing only in ways that do not affect their character — different colourways, for instance — provided the goods and services sit in the same category.
The process the statute sets out
| Stage | Time limit |
|---|---|
| Ministry decides on the application | Within 90 days of filing |
| Respond to a Ministry restriction or amendment request | 30 days, or you are deemed to have waived |
| Publication in the Ministry’s Bulletin after acceptance | Within 30 days of notification of acceptance |
| Opposition window after publication | 30 days |
| Applicant’s reply to an opposition | 30 days, or treated as abandoning the application |
| Acceptance becomes final where no objection is filed | 30 days after publication |
The published announcement must carry the application number and date, the applicant’s name, address and nationality, a copy and description of the mark, the agent’s details, the goods or services and their class, any conditions, and the priority details.
The newspapers step is gone. Under the old 1992 regime, marks were advertised in two local newspapers as well as the official bulletin. That requirement appears nowhere in the 2021 law or the 2022 regulation, and the Trademark Office ended local newspaper publication from 27 February 2022. If a service provider quotes you for newspaper advertising, ask what it is for.
Classes — what the law says, and what happens in practice
The UAE applies the Nice Classification of goods and services. The Executive Regulation states that an “application shall be submitted for one or several classes”, with “registration fees shall be several for the application on several classes.”
So the law permits multi-class filing. In practice, filings are still generally made class by class, and we could not verify current Trademark Office practice against an official page — so treat multi-class filing as something to confirm with the Ministry before you plan around it.
Two useful principles from the law itself: goods and services are not similar merely because they share a class, and not different merely because they sit in different classes. Class numbers are an administrative convenience, not the test for conflict.
Applications from free zone entities are treated the same as those from persons domiciled in the country — relevant if you hold a licence in a Dubai free zone or one of the Sharjah free zones.
Priority
If you have already filed in a Paris Convention member state or under a relevant treaty, you may claim priority from that earlier filing — but you must attach a copy and acknowledgment showing the date, number and country within six months of the UAE filing. Miss it and the claim is forfeited.
The ten-year term, and the detail that catches people
Protection lasts ten years from the date of filing the application — not from the date of registration. Since examination can take up to 90 days and publication and opposition add further weeks, your first term is effectively shorter than ten years of registered protection. Diary it from the filing date.
Renewal is for successive ten-year periods, indefinitely, and is granted without further examination. The application must be filed “within the last year of the protection period and for 6 months” — the final year of the term plus a six-month window after expiry. The Ministry’s own summary additionally mentions a possible three-month extension on justified request, though we could not locate that in the regulation’s text.
Miss it entirely and the consequence is unforgiving: where the limit lapses without a renewal application, the mark “shall be considered cancelled from the Register as of the date of expiry of the protection period.”
If you are refused, and if someone opposes
A refusal must be notified in writing with reasons. You may file a grievance with the Trademarks Grievances Committee within 30 days, and appeal to the Federal Court of Appeal within a further 30 days. Note a procedural trap: an action to cancel a Ministry decision is inadmissible unless a grievance was filed first. The Committee is chaired by a specialised judge nominated by the Minister of Justice, with two specialist members.
Use it or lose it
Registration is not permanent squatting. Any interested party may ask the Ministry to cancel a mark not used for five consecutive years, absent emergency circumstances. Separately, the owner of a well-known mark whose reputation extends beyond the country may seek cancellation of a similar registered mark within five years of its registration — unless bad faith is proven, in which case that time limit does not protect the registrant.
On cost
We are not publishing fee figures. No official Ministry fee schedule was retrievable, and the amounts circulating on agent websites are bundled with their own charges. Ask the Ministry, or get an itemised quote that separates the government fee from the agent’s fee.
A trademark belongs alongside the rest of your setup paperwork — see our guides to UAE trade licence types, to the Dubai Instant Licence and to corporate tax Small Business Relief. If a dispute over a mark escalates, our guide to arbitration in the UAE covers the alternative to court.
This article is general information, not legal advice. Primary sources: Federal Decree-Law No. 36 of 2021 on Trademarks (PDF), the Executive Regulation, Cabinet Decision No. 57 of 2022 (PDF), the Ministry of Economy and Tourism IP legislation hub and WIPO on the UAE’s Madrid Protocol accession.
