China Completes The Fifth Amendment To Its Trademark Law: Key Changes And Remaining Debates

Background

On June 26, 2026, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress adopted the revised Trademark Law at its second reading. This is the fifth revision of the law and a full-scale overhaul: the law grows from 73 articles in eight chapters to 87 articles in nine chapters, with a new standalone chapter on conditions for registration and a much-expanded chapter on trademark administration. The new law will take effect on January 1, 2027.

This round of amendment has been more than three years in the making. In January 2023, the China National Intellectual Property Administration first released a draft for public comments, an ambitious text of 101 articles with various aggressive proposed changes that attracted over three thousand comments. When the draft finally reached the legislature in December 2025, it had already been slimmed down to 84 articles, with several of the most debated yet exciting institutions removed. The legislative journey of the draft, in other