Nice classification 101 for non-attorneys

May 5, 2026

If you’ve ever filed a trademark or read a watch alert, you’ve run into the Nice classification. It looks like bureaucratic plumbing, and it is — but it’s also the single biggest lever you have over how broad, how expensive, and how enforceable your trademark is.

This post is the version I wish someone had handed me before my first filing. No legal advice; just the mental model.

What the Nice classification is

The Nice classification — formal name, Nice Agreement Concerning the International Classification of Goods and Services for the Purposes of the Registration of Marks — is a single, internationally agreed list of 45 classes that all signatory trademark offices use to categorise what a brand is registered for. Classes 1–34 cover goods (physical products); classes 35–45 cover services. WIPO maintains it, and a new edition lands every five years (we’re currently on the 12th edition; minor revisions ship annually).

Why does it exist? A trademark is never absolute. “Apple” is registered for computers and for music streaming, but a fruit stand can still call itself Apple Orchard without infringing. The Nice classification is the formal mechanism for that: trademarks live inside specific classes, and conflicts between marks generally only matter within or across related classes.

The 45 classes, briefly

You don’t need to memorise them, but knowing the shape of the list helps:

Range	What lives there
1–5	Chemicals, paints, cosmetics, lubricants, pharmaceuticals
6–11	Metal goods, machines, hand tools, scientific apparatus, electronics, vehicles, lighting
12–17	Vehicles, firearms, jewellery, instruments, paper, rubber/plastic
18–23	Leather, building materials, furniture, kitchenware, textiles, yarn
24–28	Fabrics, clothing, lace, carpets, games and toys
29–34	Food, beverages, agricultural products, tobacco
35–40	Advertising/business, insurance, telecommunications, transport, materials processing
41–45	Education and entertainment, scientific and tech services, food/lodging, medical/personal, legal/security

The most useful insight here is that classes are not by industry, but by output type. A software company’s product (downloadable software) lives in class 9 alongside thermometers and circuit boards. The same company’s service (software-as-a-service, hosting) lives in class 42 alongside scientific research. That’s why software brands almost always file in both.

Why classes 9, 25, 35, 41, and 42 are the popular ones

Look at any year’s filing statistics from WIPO and you’ll see the same heavy hitters:

Class 9 — Electronics, downloadable software, scientific apparatus. Any app you can install — mobile or desktop — lives here. So do video games, recorded media, glasses, headphones, and most consumer electronics.
Class 25 — Clothing, footwear, headgear. Fashion is enormous, and the class is narrow enough that you almost can’t avoid it if you sell apparel.
Class 35 — Advertising, business management, retail services. Catches e-commerce, retail stores, marketplaces, and most “we sell other people’s stuff” business models. If you run a Shopify store, you probably belong here.
Class 41 — Education, entertainment, training. Online courses, podcasts, publishing, sports events, gaming services as a service. A surprisingly large basket.
Class 42 — Software-as-a-service, scientific services, design. Where the rest of the software industry lives. Hosting, SaaS, custom development, UX design, IT consulting.

If your business sits anywhere near consumer tech, retail, or media, you’ll end up in two or three of these. That’s normal.

How to pick the right class

Three rules of thumb that won’t replace counsel but will save you from obvious mistakes.

1. File for what you sell, not what you do internally. A coffee company doesn’t file in class 30 (coffee, the substance) just because they buy coffee beans. They file in class 30 if they sell coffee under that brand. The trademark protects what reaches the customer.

2. Distinguish goods from services. “We have a downloadable app and a web app” usually means class 9 and class 42. “We sell a physical product and run a retail website that also sells other people’s products” usually means the goods class and class 35. Pretending you only need one class because the offerings feel like one thing is the most common founder mistake.

3. File where you operate, not where you exist. The class strategy and the country strategy are independent. You can file class 9 in the US, EU, and Japan and not in the UK. Most companies start with their home market plus their two or three biggest export markets — adding more is cheap to plan but expensive to actually file.

Common pitfalls

A short list of things that bite new filers:

Filing too narrowly. “Software for accountants” inside class 9 is enforceable only against software-for-accountants conflicts; a filing of the same mark for “software for dentists” might slip through. Conversely, filing too broadly invites office actions and partial refusals.
Forgetting class 35 for retail. If you sell things online, class 35 protects the retail service, not the goods themselves. Surprising number of D2C brands miss this.
Filing class 41 for SaaS. Class 41 is education and entertainment, not software. SaaS belongs in class 42, even if your product happens to be a learning tool. (The content might be class 41; the platform is class 42.)
Translating the spec verbatim from one office to another. Class specifications — the actual text describing your goods — vary by office. USPTO is famously picky about specificity; WIPO and EUIPO are looser. Don’t copy-paste.

Watching by class

Once you’ve filed, the Nice class also drives how you watch. A clothing brand in class 25 doesn’t need an alert when somebody else files the same mark in class 9 (electronics) — those goods don’t compete. Filtering watches by relevant classes drops the noise floor dramatically.

The user guide on watches walks through how to filter your Trademark Sentinel watchlist by Nice class, including the option to broaden to “related” classes (e.g., 25 plus 18 for leather goods, plus 35 for clothing retail).