Choosing a Company Name: Rules and Checks in Switzerland

The company name is more than cosmetics: it appears on every contract, every invoice and in the commercial register. If you choose it incorrectly, the commercial register office rejects your filing – and you lose time, and in the worst case also money for new articles of association and a second notary appointment. Here you’ll learn which rules apply, how to check your desired name, and where many founders go wrong.

The basic rules by legal form

The Swiss Code of Obligations regulates company name formation with varying strictness, depending on which legal form you choose. If you are still unsure which legal form fits, our article GmbH or sole proprietorship will help.

Legal form	Choice of name	Mandatory element	Scope of protection
Sole proprietorship	Restricted	Owner’s family name	Only at the place of business (local)
GmbH	Freely chosen	“GmbH” suffix	All of Switzerland
AG	Freely chosen	“AG” suffix	All of Switzerland

Sole proprietorship: your surname must be included

The strictest rule applies to the sole proprietorship: the company name must contain the owner’s family name. “Huber Schreinerei” or “Digital Consulting Bernasconi” are permissible; “Alpenblick Consulting” without a surname is not.

Additions are allowed and even advisable: descriptions of the activity (“Gartenbau”), invented terms (“Nova”) or place names, as long as they are not misleading. The first name may be included, but doesn’t have to be. You can find more on the formation process in our sole proprietorship guide.

GmbH and AG: free choice with a legal form suffix

A GmbH (Swiss LLC) and AG (Swiss stock corporation) may in principle choose their names freely – invented names, descriptive terms, personal names, anything is possible. What is mandatory, however, is the legal form suffix: “GmbH” or “AG” must be part of the company name (written out or abbreviated). “Nordwind Solutions” alone is not enough; “Nordwind Solutions GmbH” is correct.

What is prohibited

Even with a free choice of name, there are clear limits:

• Prohibition of deception: the name must not mislead about the activity, size or geographic origin. A “Swiss Bank Consulting AG” that provides no banking services will not be registered. References to official functions (“federal”, “cantonal”) are also delicate.
• Purely descriptive and generic terms: “Treuhand GmbH” or “Bäckerei AG” without a distinguishing element are impermissible. The name needs something distinctive – an invented word, a personal name or an original combination. “Alpenkorn Bäckerei AG” works; “Bäckerei AG” does not.
• Likelihood of confusion: the name must be clearly distinguishable from companies already registered. Minor deviations such as a hyphen or a swapped letter are not enough.

Nationwide exclusivity: who is protected where?

An important distinction that many overlook:

• GmbH and AG enjoy nationwide exclusivity. If “Lumina Design GmbH” is registered in Geneva, no one in Zurich can form a company with the same or a confusingly similar name.
• Sole proprietorships are only protected locally – at the place of business. A “Müller Gartenbau” in Bern does not prevent a “Müller Gartenbau” in Lucerne. Conversely, this means: your sole proprietorship’s name is not exclusive across Switzerland. If nationwide exclusivity matters to you, that speaks in favor of a GmbH or AG.

How to check your desired name

Step 1: Zefix search (free)

Zefix is the federal central business name index and contains all companies registered in the Swiss commercial register. The search is free of charge. Don’t search only for the exact name, but also for word components, similar spellings and translations – the criterion is likelihood of confusion, not identity.

Step 2: EHRA preliminary review (optional)

The Federal Commercial Registry Office (EHRA) offers a voluntary preliminary review of your company name. You receive an assessment of whether the name complies with the legal requirements. This is no guarantee of later registration, but it considerably reduces the risk of rejection – especially for creative or borderline names. How the commercial register filing itself works is covered in the article Commercial register filing and costs.

Step 3: Trademark search at the IPI

The commercial register entry only protects the company name as a business name – not as a trademark. Conversely, an existing trademark can become a threat to your company name: whoever owns an earlier trademark can, under certain circumstances, prohibit you from using it in commerce, even if the commercial register office has registered your name.

So check the trademark database of the Swiss Federal Institute of Intellectual Property (IPI, swissreg.ch). If you want to protect your name as a trademark yourself, filing costs from approx. CHF 450 for three classes of goods and services with a protection period of ten years.

Step 4: Domain and social media handles

Not legally required, but practically decisive: check whether the matching .ch domain is available (e.g. via nic.ch or a registrar) and whether the key social media handles are free. A perfect company name with a taken domain and profiles held by others later causes confusion among customers – and negotiating for domains afterwards quickly gets expensive.

Name checklist before formation

Before you write the name into your articles of association or filing, go through these points:

1. Legal form rule met? Sole proprietorship: surname included. GmbH/AG: legal form suffix included.
2. Zefix checked? No identical or confusingly similar entries.
3. Not misleading? No false claims about activity, size or origin.
4. Distinctive? Not a purely generic term.
5. Trademark search done? No conflict with earlier trademarks (swissreg.ch).
6. Domain available? Ideally .ch, possibly also .com.
7. Social handles available? At least on the platforms relevant to you.
8. Internationally viable? No embarrassing meanings in other languages, easy to pronounce.
9. EHRA preliminary review considered? Sensible for unconventional names.

What a later renaming costs

If you think you could simply change the name later: it’s possible, but more involved than many expect. For a GmbH and AG, a renaming means an amendment to the articles of association with public notarization – i.e. a notary appointment plus commercial register fees, usually several hundred francs. Then come the hidden costs: new printed materials and signage, amended contracts, notifying customers, banks and social insurance offices, plus the loss of visibility built up under the old name. For a sole proprietorship, the change is formally simpler, but the practical effort remains the same. In short: the hour of research before formation is many times cheaper than the correction afterwards.

Conclusion: check first, then form

A carefully checked company name spares you rejections, cease-and-desist letters and expensive renamings. The Zefix check costs nothing and takes minutes – the trademark search little more. Build both firmly into your formation process.

By the way: most formation platforms check your desired name as part of the formation. Our provider comparison calculator shows you in two minutes which provider fits your project – or you can compare the providers directly on our comparison page.