The number of classes covered in trade mark applications in 2023 fell by 2% compared to 2022, according to data published by WIPO.

The annual World Intellectual Property Indicators (WIPI) Report found that there were 11.63 million trade mark applications covering 15.23 million classes in 2023.

According to the WIPI, the highest volume of filing activity came from applicants based in China with a combined domestic and abroad application class count of around 7.4 million; followed by US applicants (849,876), those based in the Russian Federation (543,692), and applicants from India (496,293) and Germany (441,293).

Among the top five origins, both India (+6.1%) and the Russian Federation (+30.1%) experienced growth in filings in 2023, while China (–3.4%), Germany (–7.3%) and the US (–10.1%) saw declines.

Applications from 13 of the top 20 countries of origin fell in 2023. The biggest declines were in Switzerland (-10.5%), Türkiye (-17.6%) and the US (-10.1%).

But trade mark filing grew in seven of the top 20, including Indonesia (+10%), Mexico (+11.1%), the Russian Federation (+30.1%) and Brazil (+8.5%).

In 2023, the research and technology sector accounted for 20.1% of global reported non-resident trade mark filing, followed by the health (13.7%), clothing and accessories (12.4%) and leisure and education (10.1%) sectors.

According to the WIPI, there were an estimated 88.2 million active trade mark registrations across 155 IP offices globally in 2023, an increase of 6.4% compared to 2022.

China had the highest number of trade mark registrations in force in 2023 (46.1 million) followed by the offices of India and the US, with nearly 3.2 million registrations in force each.

The WIPI also includes data on patents, designs, plant varieties and geographical indications. Find out more on WIPO’s website here. The image above is also taken from this page.