Should I register my UK design before sampling?

Make the decision before releasing drawings

Treat registration as a decision before sampling, especially where the product's appearance is its main selling point. Registration helps establish ownership and creation timing, and offers a longer potential protection period. Relying on unregistered rights may suit a short-lived product, but first check which right covers the features you value.

Identify the appearance you want to preserve, who designed it, and what has already been shared. Keep quotation drawings separate from the complete sampling pack. Our IP and tooling guide covers wider supplier precautions; this guide addresses the UK design protection choice.

Match protection to the feature

Registered designs protect appearance, including the shape, arrangement of parts, decoration, colour and pattern. They do not protect functionality. A distinctive casing and a mechanism that works differently therefore need separate consideration.

UK unregistered design right covers the shape and configuration of three-dimensional objects. Supplementary unregistered design right covers appearance, including shape, colours, texture, materials and ornamentation. If your value lies in a printed pattern, do not base your decision solely on the shape and configuration right.

Check eligibility and first disclosure

Registered protection requires novelty and individual character. Compare your design with existing products before filing. Registration is not proof that this comparison has passed: IPO examination does not include a search for earlier designs.

For UK unregistered design right, qualification depends on qualifying people or businesses, with a UK disclosure requirement where qualification comes through first marketing. Ask an adviser to check the designer, commissioning business and ownership documents, especially if a factory contributes design work. Supplementary unregistered protection is established by first disclosure in the UK.

Before a factory photographs, exhibits or lists your sample, agree who may disclose it and when. Keep a record of recipients and confidentiality arrangements. If anything has already been made public, give an adviser the actual material, date and location before choosing a filing or disclosure strategy.

Compare duration and evidence

Registration lasts 5 years and can be renewed every 5 years, up to 25 years. Shape and configuration design right ends at the earlier of 10 years from the end of the year of first availability for sale, or 15 years from the end of the creation year. Its final 5 years carry a licence of right: others can request permission to use the design. Supplementary unregistered protection lasts 3 years from first public disclosure in the UK.

For unregistered rights, you need proof of when you created the design. IPO suggests signed and dated drawings or photographs certified and retained by a solicitor or intellectual property attorney. Also retain original files, revision history, sample photographs and disclosure records. Use our design revision guide to keep the factory's sampling version traceable.

Keep UK protection separate from factory control

A registered UK design protects you in the UK and provides no overseas protection. The unregistered rights described here protect in the UK. Do not treat either route as permission to circulate complete production files freely to an overseas factory.

Before commissioning, give your sourcing team an approved drawing version, a named recipient list and instructions on photography and publicity. Keep design ownership, tooling arrangements and sample approval in separate written records. Our sampling guide covers the ordering process. Cambridge China Bridge's own staff in China can coordinate the sampling brief with the factory.