Your design, their registration: what the UK designs reforms mean for product launches and investors

Respondents to the government’s consultation on the UK designs framework reported rivals registering designs created by others, sometimes from copied product images and marketing materials, and then using the registrations to have listings taken down on online marketplaces.  They put the cost of dealing with it at anywhere from under £10,000 to over £50,000.

The UK Intellectual Property Office (the “IPO”) does not check whether a design is new before registering it, and a registration can be enough for a platform to remove listings.  That is the platform’s decision under its own rules, not a ruling on whether the registration is valid.  Listings can disappear, and sales suffer, long before anyone decides that question.

Decided, but not yet law

On 4 November 2026 the government published its response to that consultation, which closed in November 2025.  None of it is law yet, and most of it awaits legislation “when parliamentary time allows”, whenever that may be.

The planned reforms should make a hostile registration harder to obtain, not impossible.  But how well a business is protected will still turn on decisions it takes before launch, starting with who owns its designs and when it first shows them.

A registration is not a validation

Under the Registered Designs Act 1949 (the “Act”), a registered design is valid only if it is new and has individual character: it must not be identical to, or differ only in immaterial details from, any design already made available to the public (the ‘prior art’), and it must give the informed user a different overall impression from the prior art.  That is tested only if someone challenges the registration.  The government intends to give the registrar power to search and examine for novelty and individual character in “a proportion of applications”.

A bad-faith ground of refusal is not yet promised, opposition and observation periods have been dropped, and a fast-track invalidation process will only be “considered further”.  Nothing decided so far shortens the time between a takedown and a ruling on validity.

The planned examination is a reason to file now, not merely to review filing, while registration without any search for earlier designs remains available.  The candidates are designs whose appearance matters commercially, which the business owns, which appear new and to have individual character, and which justify the filing and renewal costs in the relevant territories over their likely commercial life.  Allow for how far a design may change before launch; that may call for further filings rather than delay.  For a short-lived design, qualifying automatic rights may be enough, though they differ from registration in scope and duration and require proof of copying.  Whether applications pending when examination begins will be examined is not known, and a registration granted without a search is no more valid for that.

When a takedown lands

The most common response reported to the consultation was “appealing take-down notices and applying to the IPO to invalidate a design”.  A takedown appeal asks the platform to reverse its own decision under its own procedure; an invalidity application asks the IPO to cancel the registration.  Both turn on evidence of four things.

First, the complaint: the actual allegation, the registration number and its registered representations, the relevant dates, the affected listings, the platform’s stated reason for removal and the appeal deadline.

Second, ownership: who created the design, under what employment or commissioning arrangements, and the assignments linking it to the business; this is what an entitlement challenge turns on.

Third, earlier disclosure: what design was publicly disclosed, when, where and by whom.  Dated catalogues, archived web pages, launch materials and sales records must be tied to the particular appearance; an invoice may prove when a sale took place but not, on its own, which design was sold.  This is what a challenge to novelty and individual character turns on.

Fourth, the disputed appearance: the registered representations, including any disclaimer, compared with the affected product.  The representations fix the scope of the right, so comparing the parties’ current marketing photographs may miss what the registration protects.

The takedown submission should identify the affected listings and the stated reason for removal, explain precisely why the complaint is disputed, attach the registered images and the ownership or disclosure evidence that answers it, and ask for review and reinstatement under the platform’s procedure.  A request to the complainant to retract its report can run alongside: eBay’s UK seller guidance, for example, suggests contacting the rights owner to request a retraction.  None of these steps, nor an invalidity application or a registration of your own, is certain to restore a listing.

Knocking out a copyist’s registration takes evidence and title

Anyone with an interest can challenge a registration for lack of novelty or individual character, but only the true proprietor can rely on the entitlement ground.  By default, the designer owns a design, and an employer owns one created by an employee in the course of employment.  Paying a freelancer or agency does not of itself make a business the owner: since 1 October 2014 the default for a commissioned design has been that the designer owns it, subject to the contract.[1]  A company without an assignment may not be the person entitled to object.  At present, putting a registration into the true owner’s name without the registrant’s agreement needs a court order; the government intends to give the registrar power to rectify the register, including on entitlement and ownership, to an extent still to be decided.

The government is keeping the existing framework for computer-generated designs while it gathers evidence on AI use.  Where such a design has no human author, whoever made the arrangements necessary for its creation is treated as the author, though paying for an AI subscription or entering a prompt does not by itself settle every ownership question.  The design must still be new and have individual character; copyright originality is a separate question.

A complaint can also expose the complainant to a claim for unjustified threats.  But an allegation of copying is not automatically a threat: the test is whether a reasonable recipient would understand that a registered design exists and that someone intends to bring infringement proceedings over acts in the UK.  Whether a claim is worth bringing turns on what was said, the statutory exceptions and defences, whether the complainant is worth suing, the loss or continuing harm and the relief realistically available.

What a growth company can register

A design is the appearance of the whole or part of a product, resulting from features such as lines, contours, colours, shape, texture, materials or ornamentation.  ‘Product’ includes packaging, get-up, graphic symbols and typefaces, but not computer programs.  So a device’s casing, a brand’s packaging, icons, app screens or a dashboard can be registered.

A logo can be registered as a design as well as a trade mark; the design registration needs no proof of distinctiveness, only novelty and individual character.  For the businesses we act for, the candidates are usually the product and its packaging, the icon and principal screens of an app, the casing of a connected device and the logo.

The code behind an interface cannot be registered, nor can features solely dictated by technical function or, outside qualifying modular systems, features that must be reproduced exactly so that a product can connect to or fit another.  A registration gives a monopoly in the registered appearance for up to 25 years, renewed every five.

That monopoly is why a registration deters even if it is never sued on.  To establish infringement, the registered proprietor must show a registration in force, whose validity the defendant can put in issue; an act done in the UK without consent, such as making, selling, importing or using a product; and that the product’s design does not produce a different overall impression on the informed user, allowing for the designer’s freedom.  Disclaimers and statutory exceptions limit the right: acts done privately and for non-commercial purposes do not infringe, nor do acts done for experimental purposes.  Copying need not be proved, so a competitor cannot answer the claim simply by showing that it did not copy.

The deterrent works best when the registration is visible.  Damages are not awarded against an infringer who proves it did not know, and had no reason to suppose, that the design was registered, and marking a product ‘registered’ does not fix it with that knowledge unless the registration number, or a web link to it, accompanies the word.  So mark the product, its packaging or its listing with the number once the design is registered, and not before: falsely claiming registration is itself an offence.

Intentionally copying a registered design in the course of business, knowing or having reason to believe it is registered, is also a criminal offence, though a reasonable belief that the registration was invalid is a defence; the government has decided against creating one for unregistered designs.

The screens your customers use are design assets

For a screen, current practice under the IPO’s Designs Practice Notice 01/26 asks whether the images filed show a single, unitary design.  A self-contained animation, or a screen with a simple pop-up on hover, can be one design in up to 12 views; a run of distinct screens through a user journey will usually be several designs, though they can go in one application.

The government intends to amend the definitions of ‘design’ and ‘product’ to cover animation and transitions expressly; the EU’s definition of design was expanded to include animation from 1 May 2025.  It will consider allowing video and 3D files to be filed, and intends to extend the rights in a registered design to files that record it.  As consulted on, that means files recording a design for the purpose of enabling a product to be made, not every file or screenshot that shows it; the final scope awaits legislation.

In parallel, copyright can protect code as a literary work, and interface artwork such as icons or charts as artistic works, but only where the work is its author’s own intellectual creation; effort alone is not enough.  In THJ Systems v Sheridan the Court of Appeal upheld a finding that charts displayed by software were original, observing that their low visual creativity meant only a close copy would infringe.  UK unregistered design right protects only shape or configuration, so is unlikely to help with a flat screen.

Your launch calendar has legal consequences

First, deferment, which lets a business file early and keep the design off the register until launch.  Registration and publication can currently be deferred for up to 12 months.  The government intends to extend that to 30 months from the earlier of the priority and filing dates, in line with the EU and the Hague system, with limited details still published.  Longer confidentiality makes it harder for another business to identify a potentially conflicting design before its own launch.  As a safeguard, the government intends to extend prior-use provisions to deferred applications, though how far they will protect a good-faith adopter during deferment awaits the legislation.

Second, the grace period, which is unchanged.  A designer’s own disclosure in the 12 months before filing does not destroy the novelty of a UK registration, and a disclosure made under conditions of confidentiality does not count at all.  A pitch to investors bound to confidentiality by a signed NDA or by the terms of a data room should not count; a demo-day livestream, a Product Hunt listing or a crowdfunding page starts the clock.  A business that has already launched should establish its earliest relevant public disclosure and promptly assess whether UK registration remains available.  If it does not, unregistered rights may still protect the design, for shorter periods and only against copying.

Third, territory.  A UK registration protects the design only in the UK.  Elsewhere, it means national or regional filings in the markets that matter commercially, or designations under the Hague system, a single international filing route covering only the participating jurisdictions chosen, not a worldwide right.  A UK application can generally support a claim to priority abroad made within six months of its filing date.  That period is separate from the UK’s 12-month grace period, and deferring publication does not extend it.  Nor does the UK grace period keep filing options open abroad.

Fourth, automatic rights.  Supplementary unregistered design, which lasts three years, currently arises only from first disclosure in the UK or a designated country or territory, so a launch at a trade show abroad may forfeit it; the government intends to let disclosure anywhere count, if it has come to the attention of the relevant UK trade circles.  It has dropped its proposal to abolish UK unregistered design right and will, as a minimum, seek to harmonise the qualification requirements and term of the two UK unregistered rights.  A ten-year term had good support, but nothing has been decided.

A cheaper court route, without interim relief

Extending the Small Claims Track of the Intellectual Property Enterprise Court (“IPEC”) to straightforward, lower-value registered design cases, which the government will explore with stakeholders, could improve access to enforcement, but would not itself provide the interim relief an urgent takedown dispute may require.  It hears claims worth £10,000 or less, each side largely bears its own costs, and it cannot grant interim injunctions.

For now, registered design claims in England and Wales go to the IPEC multi-track, where recoverable costs are normally capped at £60,000 on liability and £30,000 on an inquiry or account, or to the Patents Court, which remain the routes to urgent relief.

What to do, and when

Before a launch:  Check the chain of title for each product, package, icon and principal screen, including an agency’s title to its staff’s and subcontractors’ work, and obtain any missing assignments; keep dated design and disclosure records; and search the UK and EU registers for your designs in someone else’s name.

When a takedown complaint arrives:  Meet the platform’s appeal deadline while assessing, in parallel, any registration challenge and the need for urgent court relief.

In investment or acquisition diligence:  Ask whether the registrations and other rights protect the products and interfaces generating revenue now, in the markets where they are sold; whether the chain of title to them is complete; and whether the company has received any takedown notice, threat or invalidity challenge.  A separate question goes to clearance: could third-party design rights obstruct the company’s current or planned products, and what clearance assessment has been undertaken?  Owning registrations does not establish freedom to operate, and register searches will not reveal unpublished applications, including deferred ones, or unregistered rights.

This piece was written by Robert Humphreys and Tristan Morse.  Please contact either of them, or another member of the HLaw team, with any questions about protecting or enforcing designs.

All the thoughts and commentary that HLaw publishes on this website, including those set out above, are subject to the terms and conditions of use of this website.  None of the above constitutes legal advice and is not to be relied upon.  Much of the above will no doubt fall out of date and conflict with future law and practice one day.  None of the above should be relied upon.  Always seek your own independent professional advice.

Humphreys Law

[1] Section 2 of the Act and section 215 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, each as amended by the Intellectual Property Act 2014 from 1 October 2014.  The old rule, under which the commissioner was the first owner, still applies to a design created after that date under a commissioning contract entered into before it: section 2(3) of the 2014 Act (UK unregistered design right) and article 4 of SI 2014/2330 (registered designs).