G1/25: The Enlarged Board of Appeal buries cosmetic cleanups

The systematic review and purging of patent descriptions to match amended claims was long regarded as one of the EPO’s most frustrating administrative quirks for both Examiners and Applicants. 
With decision G 1/25, that practice ends: adaptation merely for the sake of "formal concordance" is dead.

What changes?

Applicants and Proprietors are finally freed from routine housekeeping. Instead, the Enlarged Board defined “inconsistency” by shifting the burden of proof squarely onto Examiners and Opponents.
No amendment can be required unless Examiners or Opponents demonstrate, with sound reasoning, that an incompatibility leaves the skilled person in “real doubt” after a holistic reading under G 1/24, and that doubt breaches a specific EPC provision.
 
RIP Guidelines F-IV, 4.3: The infamous chapter mandating that any non-claimed embodiment be deleted or branded as "not part of the invention" is officially a dead letter. The long wait until the March 2027 Guidelines starts now.
 
The Enlarged Board took an adventurous route, stepping beyond narrow answers and dropping strategic landmines: 
 
Unamended claims included
These principles apply even without claim amendments. Opponents gain a new angle to attack granted patents by hunting for “real doubts” in original texts. A new skill to test on the EQE?
 
The Rule 80 EPC clash
Expect fierce debates at the close of oral proceedings over whether an ambiguity could simply be resolved via G 1/24.
For every amendment, the question becomes: is it a mandatory substantive adaptation under G 1/25, or a purely aesthetic edit prohibited by Rule 80 EPC?
 
High-stakes file wrapper
In the (hopefully rare) cases where amendments must be made, deletions require substantive justification.
Any surrender becomes an explicit record, cementing the doctrine of deliberate exclusion (Okklusion) across Europe and before the UPC.
 
Fewer deletions, but higher stakes for every word removed.