UK trade mark screening
See what your name could be mistaken for.
Notum checks a proposed name against UK trade mark records by sound, look and meaning, plots every close mark and says why it is close.
Collision course: SWYFT KETEL is a very close match for SWIFTKETTLE.
Closest mark
SWYFT KETEL
Sounds like your name, 91%similar
Registered, class 30, in your classes, Proprietor A (invented)
Said aloud, the two are the same name.
Every mark on the chart, closest first
- In your classes
- Outside your classes
- Closest mark
- Italic: pending, or in its opposition window
Reading key
One name. Three kinds of lookalike.
Type a name into the free register and it looks for that name. It will not tell you that a registered mark sounds the same said aloud, is spelled one letter apart, or means the same thing in other words. Objections are argued on exactly those near matches.
A mark is a name registered, or applied for, as a trade mark. Notum reads each one against yours on three bearings, and sets its name in Tall Man letters, as pharmacies do for medicines with look-alike names: the letters it shares with yours are heavy, the letters that differ are light.
Everything here is plotted, nothing is illustrated: one set of range rings, three bearings for sound, look and meaning, names in Tall Man letters, and magenta means hazard and only hazard: the closest mark on a collision course, the pale zone inside the 75 ring, and the date by which you must act on an opposition window.
Sounds like
SWYFT KETEL
Said aloud, the two are the same name.
How the name is said: over the phone, across a busy shop, by someone who has only heard it.
Looks like
SWIFTKITTLE
The same first letters and the same length, one letter apart.
How the name sits on a label: the letter shapes, the length, the same first letters.
Means like
FLEETKETTLE
Fleet and swift are different words for the same idea.
What the name means. Two different words can carry the same idea.
Exact match for SWIFTKETTLE on the free register: none found.
The gap
The free register answers the wrong question.
- The free register answers
- Does this exact name exist?
- The question that matters
- Could a similar mark stand in the way of yours?
The UK register is free to search, and it is built to find exact matches. Disputes are rarely about exact matches. The services that measure likeness, and keep watching after a mark is filed, have mostly been priced for large firms and sold through a sales team.
So a founder chooses a name, pays for the logo, prints the signs, and hears about the conflict in a solicitor's letter.
Classes
Your business, turned into classes.
Trade marks are registered for classes of goods and services, 45 in all. The same word can be free in one class and taken in another: a cake and a café sit in different classes.
Most founders do not know their class, but they know their SIC code from Companies House. Give Notum the code, or a short description of the business, and it suggests the classes likely to matter, with a short reason for each.
The codes and classes on the right come from Notum's own mapping.
SIC 10831 Tea processing
Suggested classes, strongest first
- Class 30Coffee, tea, cocoa, sugar, rice, flour, bread, pastries, and condiments
The verdict
One sentence, three reasons, and what it covered.
Every check ends in one sentence: collision course, crowded or open water, with three reasons and one next step. For SWIFTKETTLE it reads like this.
Illustrative example. Not a live result.
Collision course: SWYFT KETEL is a very close match for SWIFTKETTLE.
- 1SWYFT KETEL sounds almost identical (sound 96) and shares the letters KET; it is registered in class 30, one of your classes.
- 2SWIFTKITTLE looks almost identical (look 91) and shares the letters SWIFTK; it is pending in class 30, one of your classes.
- 3FLEETKETTLE has a similar meaning (meaning 86) and shares the letters TKETTLE; it is registered in class 30, one of your classes.
Next step
Get professional advice before filing
A trade mark professional can judge whether the nearest marks would stand in the way of yours.
- Collision course
- 75 to 100
- A mark very close to yours. Take advice before you file or spend on the name.
- Crowded
- 50 to 74
- Marks with real overlap. Read the reasons, then decide or take advice.
- Open water
- 0 to 49
- Only distant matches in what was read. A good sign for that register alone.
What a result covers
Every result names the records it read, their dates, and what it did not read.
Today a search reads UK marks filed up to 28 January 2018, and those published in the Trade Marks Journal since 19 September 2025. Marks published in between are being added, and many of them are live registrations: that is one reason Notum is in early access. EU and international marks are not included.
What you keep
A screening report
A PDF of the check, to keep or to hand to a partner or your attorney.
A Name Certificate (Planned)
A shareable record of the check, with a link anyone can use to verify it.
A filing pack
Your classes and specification prepared, then a hand-off to GOV.UK, where you file. Notum does not file for you.
After you file
It keeps watching after you file.
New applications are published all the time, and each one opens a short, fixed window for opposing it: two months from publication, or three with a notice of threatened opposition. Notum watches for new filings close to your mark as they are published, and reads each one the way a search does, with the date its window closes.
Watch alerts by email, and listed on your Watch page. Watch is in early access.
Illustrative example. Not a live result. Marks and dates are invented; every new filing is shown in italic, because it is still inside its opposition window.
New filings near LUMIVA, class 11, closest first
- LUMIVAXLooks like your mark, class 11, published 7 September 2026Opposition window closes 7 November 2026, or 7 December 2026 with a notice of threatened opposition (form TM7A).81% similar
- LOOMEOSounds like your mark, class 11, published 7 September 202652% similar
- LUMOSTRALooks like your mark, class 35, published 14 September 202644% similar
- GLEAMVIAMeans like your mark, class 9, published 14 September 202636% similar
In use
Where it earns its keep.
Illustrative scenes, not customer stories.
01
The napkin shortlist
A founder naming a tea brand checks three names from the shortlist, sees that one sounds the same as a mark registered for tea, and drops it before the logo is drawn.
02
The client meeting
A small naming agency checks its finalists, hands the client the report, and the name is agreed in one meeting.
03
Six months after filing
An alert arrives: a new application that looks like the owner's mark, in the same class, with the date its opposition window closes beside it.
Limits
A screen, not a ruling.
A check shows what is on the register it read and how close each mark sits. It cannot tell you a name is yours, and finding nothing close does not make a name free to use.
For the name you decide to file, Notum is the first step before a trade mark attorney, so their time goes on judgement rather than legwork.
Early access
Tell us what you are naming.
Early access is by invitation. Tell us the name and what the business does, and we will be in touch.