VERBA LEGAL's Intellectual Property Practice comprising Alexey Darkov, the Practice Head, Counsel and Attorney, and Maria Moish, Senior Associate and registered Russian patent attorney, provide clarifications on the new restrictions on the use foreign words in public-facing notices.  The legislation was passed by the State Duma on June 17, 2025, in the third reading.  The law is expected to take effect on March 1, 2026, and will affect consumer information and names of real estate projects.

1) Consumer information

Now, any consumer information, other than advertisements, should be in the Russian language.

According to the explanatory note to the bill, such consumer information includes:

class / type of a product;

additional end-user performance characteristics and properties of a product;

terms of accessibility of an entity;

information on promotions, deals, discounts, sales and privileges;

trade name.

In the opinion of the co-authors of the bill, any use of such words as, for example, "coffee," "fresh," "sale," "shop," "open," etc., should be made impossible.

Exceptions:

trade names and trademarks may be used in a foreign language;

there may be used languages of the peoples of the Russian Federation and foreign languages subject to simultaneous placement of their translation into the Russian language using the same font, size and color.

Accordingly, if any foreign words are planned to be used in any consumer information, it is advisable to register such words as trademarks.

2) Names of Real Estate Projects and Low-rise Residential Complexes

In advertising materials, names of any such projects (e.g. residential complexes) shall be written using the Cyrillic alphabet only.  No exceptions for trademarks or trade names are provided.

This rule, however, will not extend to projects commissioned by March 1, 2026.