Guide
A Chinese trademark registration protects you inside the similarity groups you actually claimed — not across the class. Most foreign applicants find this out afterwards.
The 13th edition, 2026 text, took effect on 2026-01-01. CNIPA published the notice on 2025-12-26, with the changes annexed as a PDF.
We say this plainly because it matters: search in English for how Chinese trademark classes work and the top result is likely to be a well-written article from 2019. It was accurate then. The Nice Classification is revised annually, and the Table moves with it. An article from 2019 is describing the tenth edition.
Source: 关于启用《类似商品和服务区分表》（尼斯分类第十三版2026文本）的通知 (CNIPA, 2025-12-26). Last checked 2026-07-16.
CNIPA's rule on which edition governs is stated in the Table's own official page: “申请人申请商标注册时，应当依照提交申请时施行的版本进行申报。” — an applicant classifies according to the version in force when the application is submitted.
Nice gives you 45 classes. So far, so international. What CNIPA then does — and this is the part that has no counterpart in most applicants' home systems — is described on its own page like this:
商标局将尼斯分类的商品和服务项目划分类似群，并结合我国实际增加常用项目名称，制定《类似商品和服务区分表》。45个类别项下含类别标题、【注释】、商品和服务项目名称。
— CNIPA — Classification of Similar Goods and Services · 商标局
So: the class tells you the neighbourhood, the subclass tells you the street. And in China the street is what you own.
Within the same class, goods in the same subclass are generally presumed similar; goods in different subclasses are generally presumed dissimilar. A registration confers practical exclusivity only within the subclasses it covers. Examiners apply the Classification Table mechanically rather than conducting a case-by-case substantive comparison.
Note the register we are writing in. The rules in the paragraph above are examination practice, drawn from how the Classification Table is applied. They are not a provision of the Trademark Law and you will not find an article number for them. This distinction is not pedantry — practice can shift, and a firm that tells you the subclass system is the law is telling you something it has not checked.
The practical consequence runs like this. You sell, say, LED lighting components. You file in the obvious class. Your competitor — or a squatter — files an identical mark in the same class but a different subclass. Under the Table, the examiner does not treat those goods as similar. Both marks register. You now share your brand in your own class, and the remedy is no longer a filing question, it is an opposition or invalidation question, which costs considerably more than getting the specification right would have.
The ¥270 official fee covers ten items in the class. Item eleven costs ¥27, and so does every one after it. Ten sounds generous until you are trying to cover four subclasses meaningfully, at which point you are choosing between paying more and leaving gaps.
This is the actual conversation to have before filing, and it is not a conversation about price. It is about which gaps you can live with. A filing that came in cheap because it claimed ten well-chosen items is a good filing. A filing that came in cheap because nobody thought about subclasses is a liability you will discover in about three years.
The Nice Classification, 13th Edition, 2026 text, in force since 2026-01-01. The rule CNIPA states is by filing date: an application filed on or after 1 January 2026 is classified under the 2026 text; one filed before that date stays under the previous edition. So an application you file this week is under the 13th edition, and any guide written against the 12th is describing a different document.
CNIPA takes each of the 45 Nice classes and divides it into similarity groups — 类似群 — then adds item names reflecting Chinese commercial practice. The result is the Classification of Similar Goods and Services. Nice tells you which class; the subclass tells you which corner of that class you actually occupy.
In practice, no — and this is the single most expensive misunderstanding a foreign applicant can bring to a Chinese filing. Examiners work from the Classification Table: goods in the same subclass are generally treated as similar, goods in different subclasses generally are not. Your registration bites where you claimed, not across the class. Be aware that this is examination practice derived from the Table, not a rule you will find written in the Trademark Law.
Ten are covered by the ¥270 official fee. Each item after that costs ¥27. Ten is not many once you are trying to cover several subclasses within a class, which is exactly the tension you have to resolve at filing — and it is the reason a cheap filing can turn out to protect very little.
Usually not, and translating it literally is worse than useless. A specification drafted for the USPTO or the EUIPO will not map onto the Chinese Table, and non-standard wording via the national route invites objections. The specification has to be rebuilt against the current Table, item by item, which is work — and it is most of what you are paying an agency for.
← How to register a trademark in China
The statutory process and deadlines.
