First, understand what you're buying
The US operates a fundamentally different trademark system from the EU. European trademark rights are established primarily from registration; American rights emerge from use in commerce. This "first-to-use" principle shapes almost every cost you will encounter. You will need to prove genuine use of your mark in the US market, with evidence known as specimens, both to complete registration (in many cases) and to keep it alive afterwards. Budgeting for a US trademark therefore means budgeting not just for a filing, but for an ongoing relationship with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).
One more structural point that catches many European businesses off guard: if your company is domiciled outside the US, the USPTO requires you to be represented by a US-licensed attorney. Unlike an EUTM application, there is no realistic DIY route. For you, attorney fees are not an optional extra. They are part of the baseline cost.
Step one: clearance search
Before spending anything on a filing, it pays to know whether your brand is actually available. The US register is crowded, and because unregistered "common law" rights also count, a proper clearance exercise goes beyond a simple database lookup. A professional search and availability opinion from a US attorney typically costs around $150.
At Trama, we provide this trademark clearance search free of charge, with results delivered within 24 hours. Either way, it is the cheapest insurance you will ever buy: discovering a conflict after launch means rebranding costs, wasted filing fees, or worse, a dispute.
Step two: filing fees
In January 2025, the USPTO scrapped its old two-tier application system and introduced a single base application fee of $350 per class of goods or services. Like in Europe, the US uses the Nice Classification, so a business selling software (class 9), offering a SaaS platform (class 42), and selling branded apparel (class 25) would pay $1,050 in base government fees.
The catch is a set of surcharges designed to reward clean, complete applications:
$100 per class applies if the application is missing required information.
$200 per class applies if you describe your goods and services in free-form text instead of choosing pre-approved wording from the USPTO's ID Manual,
plus another $200 for each additional 1,000 characters of custom description.
A carelessly drafted application can therefore cost $650 per class instead of $350, nearly double. This is one area where experienced counsel pays for itself immediately, since a well-drafted specification stays on the base fee.
The intent-to-use route: budget for extra steps
Many European businesses file in the US before they have actually started selling there. That is done through an "intent-to-use" (Section 1(b)) application, which is perfectly normal but adds cost. Once your application is approved, you must file a Statement of Use with evidence of real US sales, at $150 per class. If you are not yet using the mark, you can buy time with six-month extensions at $125 per class each, up to five times. A business that takes two years to launch in the US could easily add $500+ per class to its budget this way.
Prosecution: the cost nobody budgets for
A significant part of US applications, especially the ones filed without an attorney, receive at least one Office Action, a refusal or objection from the examining attorney. Many are minor (a disclaimer, a specification tweak); others, like a likelihood-of-confusion refusal, require substantive legal argument.
Responding typically costs $1,000–$1,500+ in attorney fees depending on complexity. This is the least predictable part of the budget, and another reason clean drafting at the filing stage matters.
Keeping it alive: maintenance costs
A US registration is not "set and forget." Between the fifth and sixth year, you must file a Section 8 (or Section 71 for Madrid-based registrations) declaration proving continued use, at $325 per class.
At the ten-year mark and every decade thereafter, you file a combined renewal and use declaration at $650 per class ($325 for the Section 8 declaration plus $325 for the Section 9 renewal). Missing a deadline triggers grace-period surcharges of $100 per class, and missing it entirely cancels the registration. Many owners also file an optional Section 15 declaration of incontestability after five years ($250 per class), which significantly strengthens the registration against challenges.
The realistic bottom line
Consider a typical expansion story: a French direct-to-consumer skincare brand preparing its US launch. It sells its own cosmetics (class 3) and runs the online store under the same brand (class 35), so it needs a two-class, intent-to-use application.
Fixed costs, identical for everyone:
Government filing fees: $700 ($350 × 2 classes, using pre-approved wording so no surcharges apply)
Statement of Use once US sales begin: $300 ($150 × 2 classes)
Professional fees, where the range opens up:
Specialised firm: around $500 for initial consultation and clearance search, plus $1,000-2,000 to file the application depending on your attorney of choice. Total: roughly $2,500–$3,500+
Tech-enabled service like Trama: $250 for the same lawyer-prepared filing, clearance search included free. Total: roughly $1,250 all-in
The legal work, choosing the filing basis, drafting the specification to stay on the base fee, meeting the US attorney requirement, is the same in both cases; the difference is the delivery model.
Compared with the commercial value of exclusive rights to your brand in the world's largest consumer market, even the higher figure is a modest premium, and far smaller than the cost of discovering mid-expansion that someone else got there first. The most expensive US trademark is the one you didn't file.
