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Cite as:  591 U. S. ____ (2020) 

1 

Opinion of the Court 

NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the 
preliminary  print  of  the  United  States  Reports.  Readers  are  requested  to 
notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Wash-
ington, D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in order that 
corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to press. 

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES 

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No. 19–46 
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UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE, 
ET AL., PETITIONERS v. BOOKING.COM B. V. 

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF 
APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT 

[June 30, 2020] 

JUSTICE GINSBURG delivered the opinion of the Court. 
This case concerns eligibility for federal trademark regis-
tration.  Respondent Booking.com, an enterprise that main-
tains  a  travel-reservation  website  by  the  same  name, 
sought to register the mark “Booking.com.”  Concluding that
“Booking.com” is a generic name for online hotel-reservation
services, the U. S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) re-
fused registration.

A generic name—the name of a class of products or ser-
vices—is ineligible for federal trademark registration.  The 
word  “booking,”  the  parties  do  not  dispute, is  generic  for 
hotel-reservation services.  “Booking.com” must also be ge-
neric, the PTO maintains, under an encompassing rule the
PTO currently urges us to adopt: The combination of a ge-
neric word and “.com” is generic. 

In accord with the first- and second-instance judgments
in  this  case,  we  reject  the  PTO’s  sweeping  rule.    A  term 
styled “generic.com” is a generic name for a class of goods 
or services only if the term has that meaning to consumers.
Consumers,  according  to  lower  court  determinations  un-
contested  here  by  the  PTO,  do  not  perceive  the  term