If you are deciding whether to file a Canadian trademark application, a natural question is how likely it is to succeed. The honest answer is that there is no single, permanent number. Whether an application registers depends on the mark, the goods and services, the examination issues it draws, whether the applicant answers CIPO's correspondence, and whether anyone opposes. What the public record can offer is context, and useful context at that. CIPO publishes the complete record of Canadian trademark applications and registrations as open data, and Clearview maintains a research database built from it, covering the prosecution history of more than two million applications. Grouping applications by the year they were filed shows how often filings from a given year have ended in registration.
Why a recent filing year is a trap
The temptation is to look at the most recent filings and read a success rate off them. That does not work, because most recent applications have not finished. Of the applications filed in 2025, only 15.2% had registered as of the July 2026 data snapshot. That is not a 15.2% success rate. It is the share that has reached registration so far, and the rest are overwhelmingly still pending rather than failed. Watching the number move makes the point, because it climbs with every weekly data refresh as more of those applications complete examination. A filing year has to mature before its registration rate means anything, which is why the rates below come from 2015 to 2022, cohorts old enough that the large majority of their applications have reached a final outcome.
What mature cohorts show
For applications filed from 2015 to 2022, the share that has registered lands in a consistent band, from the mid-60s to the low-70s in percentage terms.
| Filing year | Applications | Registered | Registration rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 53,493 | 36,116 | 67.5% |
| 2016 | 55,798 | 39,230 | 70.3% |
| 2017 | 60,088 | 41,377 | 68.9% |
| 2018 | 64,351 | 42,646 | 66.3% |
| 2019 | 71,157 | 46,654 | 65.6% |
| 2020 | 73,048 | 51,431 | 70.4% |
| 2021 | 84,973 | 60,037 | 70.7% |
| 2022 | 73,433 | 52,333 | 71.3% |
Two things stand out. The band is narrow, roughly 66% to 71% across eight years, so the overall likelihood has been fairly stable. And even the oldest cohorts are not entirely finished, because a small number of applications can stay pending for years, which nudges the older rates down slightly rather than up.
Where the rest of the applications go
If roughly seven in ten applications from a mature year registered, most of the remainder were abandoned.
| Filing year | Applications | Abandoned | Abandonment rate |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 53,493 | 17,169 | 32.1% |
| 2016 | 55,798 | 16,400 | 29.4% |
| 2017 | 60,088 | 18,247 | 30.4% |
| 2018 | 64,351 | 21,096 | 32.8% |
| 2019 | 71,157 | 22,334 | 31.4% |
| 2020 | 73,048 | 18,837 | 25.8% |
| 2021 | 84,973 | 19,595 | 23.1% |
| 2022 | 73,433 | 15,160 | 20.6% |
Abandonment is not a single story. An application can be abandoned because the applicant never answered an examiner's report, because a deadline passed, because the business changed direction, or because the owner made a deliberate decision to walk away. The lower abandonment rates in the 2020 to 2022 cohorts should be read with care, because some of those applications are still moving, so their final abandonment share may yet rise.
Why the overall number is not your odds
An overall rate describes a huge, mixed population of applications. It is not a forecast for any single mark, because the applications behind it differ in ways that strongly affect the outcome. The factors that move an individual application's chances include:
- the strength of the mark, since a clearly descriptive term can draw a registrability objection that a coined word would not, while a coined word can still be cited for confusion
- the results of a clearance search, since a mark that conflicts with an earlier one is exposed to confusion objections
- the scope and drafting of the goods and services
- the number of classes, since a broader filing has more surface area for objections
- whether the applicant answers CIPO's correspondence on time and on point
- whether the application draws an opposition
- whether the filing was prepared with professional help
- how recently it was filed, because the newest applications have not run their course
Some of these are visible in the same dataset. Applications filed with a representative on record registered at 76.3%, compared with 47.6% for those without one, across the 2015 to 2022 cohorts, a gap Clearview examines in its analysis of representation and registration outcomes. And examiner's reports turn out to be common rather than rare, so a report is part of the normal path to registration rather than a sign the mark is doomed.
What preparation before filing usually covers
An average describes the population, not any one file, and the preparation that goes into a Canadian application covers a familiar set of ground.
- A clearance search surfaces predictable confusion problems before the branding budget is spent. It is not a filing requirement, and applications are filed without one every day.
- A clearly descriptive or surname element is easier to deal with while the branding can still change than after an examiner raises it.
- Goods and services drafted to be specific enough for acceptance but broad enough to cover the business affect both examination and the scope of any registration.
- Naming the correct owner at filing avoids a defect that is awkward to correct later.
- Time set aside to answer an examiner's report on point, rather than at the deadline, keeps the application moving.
The full registration process sets out each step, and if timing is part of the decision, the Canadian trademark timeline data shows how long each stage has actually been taking.
Where these numbers come from
Every figure in this post is Clearview's calculation from CIPO's published records, not a statistic published by CIPO. Each cohort counts every application with a filing date in the year shown, and "registered" and "abandoned" mean the record carried a registration or abandonment date as of the July 2026 data snapshot. As a check on the pipeline, register-wide totals were reconciled against CIPO's published annual trademark statistics, and registrations issued line up within a fraction of a percent for the two most recent fiscal years. Because a filing cohort keeps maturing, Clearview keeps the current figures on its Canadian Trademark Data page, updated monthly, and freezes each post like this one at its snapshot date.
The takeaway
So what are the odds of registering a Canadian trademark? For a mature filing year, roughly two-thirds to just over seven in ten applications have ended in registration, and most of the rest were abandoned. But that average is built from hundreds of thousands of very different applications, and yours is not average. The mark, the goods and services, the search results, and the quality of the filing all bear on the outcome in ways an overall rate cannot capture, and those are the things a careful application settles before submission.
Clearview can assess registrability risk before you file and prepare a Canadian trademark application with the search results, goods and services, and owner details considered from the start. Fixed-fee trademark registration packages start at $999 plus applicable taxes, prepared and filed by a lawyer who is also a registered trademark agent. Contact Clearview to talk through your mark before you file.