Авторское право принадлежит правообладателю.

Because it has to agree with право.

In Russian, adjectives change their endings to match the noun in:

• gender
• number
• case

Here, право is:

• neuter
• singular
• nominative

So the adjective also takes the neuter singular nominative ending:

• авторский — masculine dictionary form
• авторское — neuter form

So:

• авторское право = copyright

This is a fixed legal expression in Russian.

Правообладателю is in the dative case.

That is because the verb принадлежать means to belong to, and in Russian the person or thing something belongs to is normally put in the dative.

So the structure is:

• что принадлежит кому
• what belongs to whom

In this sentence:

• авторское право = the thing that belongs
• правообладателю = the person/entity it belongs to

Compare:

• Книга принадлежит студенту. = The book belongs to the student.
• Дом принадлежит семье. = The house belongs to the family.

So правообладателю means to the right holder / copyright holder.

Because its subject is авторское право, which is grammatically singular.

The verb принадлежит is the 3rd person singular form of принадлежать.

So:

• авторское право принадлежит = copyright belongs
• not принадлежат, because that would be plural

For example:

• Авторское право принадлежит правообладателю. = singular subject
• Авторские права принадлежат правообладателю. = plural subject

Russian verbs agree with the subject in number.

Here принадлежит means belongs to or is owned by, depending on how naturally you want to translate it.

Literal meaning:

• принадлежать = to belong to

In legal or formal English, this sentence may be translated as:

• The copyright belongs to the right holder.
• The copyright is owned by the right holder.

The Russian verb itself is closer to belongs to, but in legal context English often prefers is owned by.

Because Russian has no articles.

English uses:

• a
• an
• the

Russian does not have direct equivalents in normal grammar. Whether something means a or the depends on context.

So:

• Авторское право принадлежит правообладателю can mean
  The copyright belongs to the right holder
  or, depending on context, something like
  Copyright belongs to the right holder

In a legal notice or formal statement, English usually supplies the where appropriate, even though Russian does not.

Yes. Авторское право is the standard Russian term for copyright.

Literally, it looks like:

• авторское = author’s / author-related
• право = right / law

But together, авторское право is the established legal term meaning copyright.

A learner might expect something more directly like копирайт, but in normal Russian legal language, авторское право is the standard expression.

Related expressions:

• авторские права = copyrights / authors’ rights
• нарушение авторских прав = copyright infringement

Правообладатель is a formal legal word meaning right holder.

It is built from:

• право = right
• обладатель = holder / possessor

So literally it is something like holder of rights.

In copyright context, it usually means the person or organization that legally holds the rights.

Because this is a formal legal term, it sounds more official than a simpler everyday phrase.

Its form in the sentence is:

• dictionary form: правообладатель
• dative singular: правообладателю

Yes, Russian word order is more flexible than English, but the original order is the most neutral and standard for a formal statement.

Neutral version:

• Авторское право принадлежит правообладателю.

You could also say:

• Правообладателю принадлежит авторское право.

This puts more emphasis on правообладателю.

Because Russian uses case endings, the roles of the words are still clear:

• авторское право = subject
• правообладателю = dative object/complement

In formal legal writing, the original version sounds very natural.

Yes, but the meaning shifts slightly.

• авторское право = copyright, authorship right as a legal concept
• авторские права = copyrights / author’s rights, often referring to the rights themselves in a broader or more practical sense

So:

• Авторское право принадлежит правообладателю. = Copyright belongs to the right holder.
• Авторские права принадлежат правообладателю. = The copyright rights belong to the right holder.

In many contexts both are possible, but they are not always perfectly interchangeable. The singular авторское право often sounds more like the legal institution or concept, while авторские права often refers to the bundle of rights.

It is definitely formal and sounds legal or administrative.

Clues:

• авторское право is a legal term
• правообладатель is a legal/official word
• принадлежит is perfectly normal Russian, but in this context the whole sentence sounds like official language

You would expect to see this in:

• a copyright notice
• legal text
• a publishing contract
• a website footer
• a document about intellectual property

A casual conversation would usually use simpler wording unless people were specifically discussing legal rights.