This comparison only covers software licenses which have a linked Wikipedia article for details and which are approved by at least one of the following expert groups: the Free Software Foundation, the Open Source Initiative, the Debian Project and the Fedora Project. For a list of licenses not specifically intended for software, see List of free-content licences.
FOSS licenses
FOSS stands for "Free and Open Source Software". There is no one universally agreed-upon definition of FOSS software and various groups maintain approved lists of licenses. The Open Source Initiative (OSI) is one such organization keeping a list of open-source licenses. The Free Software Foundation (FSF) maintains a list of what it considers free. FSF's free software and OSI's open-source licenses together are called FOSS licenses. There are licenses accepted by the OSI which are not free as per the Free Software Definition. The Open Source Definition allows for further restrictions like price, type of contribution and origin of the contribution, e.g. the case of the NASA Open Source Agreement, which requires the code to be "original" work. The OSI does not endorse FSF license analysis (interpretation) as per their disclaimer.
The FSF's Free Software Definition focuses on the user's unrestricted rights to use a program, to study and modify it, to copy it, and to redistribute it for any purpose, which are considered by the FSF the four essential freedoms. The OSI's open-source criteria focuses on the availability of the source code and the advantages of an unrestricted and community driven development model. Yet, many FOSS licenses, like the Apache License, and all Free Software licenses allow commercial use of FOSS components.
General comparison
This article may be confusing or unclear to readers. In particular, values used in the below table are not defined and some are ambiguous. (May 2020) |
For a simpler comparison across the most common licenses see free-software license comparison.
The following table compares various features of each license and is a general guide to the terms and conditions of each license, based on seven subjects or categories. Recent tools like the European Commissions' Joinup Licensing Assistant, makes possible the licenses selection and comparison based on more than 40 subjects or categories, with access to their SPDX identifier and full text. The table below lists the permissions and limitations regarding the following subjects:
- Linking - linking of the licensed code with code licensed under a different license (e.g. when the code is provided as a library)
- Distribution - distribution of the code to third parties
- Modification - modification of the code by a licensee
- Patent grant - protection of licensees from patent claims made by code contributors regarding their contribution, and protection of contributors from patent claims made by licensees
- Private use - whether modification to the code must be shared with the community or may be used privately (e.g. internal use by a corporation)
- Sublicensing - whether modified code may be licensed under a different license (for example a copyright) or must retain the same license under which it was provided
- TM grant - use of trademarks associated with the licensed code or its contributors by a licensee
In this table, "permissive" means the software has minimal restrictions on how it can be used, modified, and redistributed, usually including a warranty disclaimer. "Copyleft" means the software requires that its source code be made publicly available and that all provisions in the license be preserved in derivative works.
| License | Author | Latest version | Publication date | Linking | Distribution | Modification | Patent grant | Private use | Sublicensing | TM grant |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Academic Free License | Lawrence E. Rosen | 3.0 | 2002 | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | Yes | Yes | Permissive | No |
| Affero General Public License | Affero Inc | 2.0 | 2007 | Copylefted | Copyleft except for the GNU AGPL | Copyleft | ? | Yes | ? | ? |
| Apache License | Apache Software Foundation | 2.0 | 2004 | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | Yes | Yes | Permissive | No |
| Apple Public Source License | Apple Computer | 2.0 | August 6, 2003 | Permissive | ? | Limited | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Artistic License | Larry Wall | 2.0 | 2000 | With restrictions | With restrictions | With restrictions | No | Permissive | With restrictions | No |
| Beerware | Poul-Henning Kamp | 42 | 1998 | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | No | Permissive | Permissive | No |
| BSD License | Regents of the University of California | 3.0 | ? | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | Manually | Yes | Permissive | Manually |
| Boost Software License | ? | 1.0 | August 17, 2003 | Permissive | ? | Permissive | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Creative Commons Zero | Creative Commons | 1.0 | 2009 | Public Domain | Public Domain | Public Domain | No | Public Domain | Public Domain | No |
| CC BY | Creative Commons | 4.0 | 2002 | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | No | Yes | Permissive | No |
| CC BY-SA | Creative Commons | 4.0 | 2002 | Copylefted | Copylefted | Copylefted | No | Yes | Copylefted | No |
| CeCILL | CEA / CNRS / INRIA | 2.1 | June 21, 2013 | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | No | Permissive | With restrictions | No |
| Common Development and Distribution License | Sun Microsystems | 1.0 | December 1, 2004 | Permissive | ? | Limited | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Common Public License | IBM | 1.0 | May 2001 | Permissive | ? | Copylefted | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Cryptix General License | Cryptix Foundation | — | 1995 | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | Manually | Yes | ? | Manually |
| Eclipse Public License | Eclipse Foundation | 2.0 | August 24, 2017 | Permissive | Copylefted | Copylefted | Yes | Yes | Copylefted | No |
| Educational Community License | Indiana University | 1.0 | 2007 | Permissive | ? | Permissive | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| European Union Public Licence | European Commission | 1.2 | May 2017 | Permissive, according to EU law (Recitals 10 & 15 Directive 2009/24/EC) | Copylefted, with an explicit compatibility list | Copylefted, with an explicit compatibility list | Yes | Yes | Copylefted, with an explicit compatibility list | No |
| FreeBSD | The FreeBSD project | — | April 1999 | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | Manually | Permissive | Permissive | Manually |
| GNU Affero General Public License | Free Software Foundation | 3.0 | 2007 | GNU GPLv3 only | Copylefted | Copylefted | Yes | Network usage is not considered private use | Copylefted | Yes |
| GNU General Public License | Free Software Foundation | 3.0 | June 2007 | GPLv3 compatible only | Copylefted | Copylefted | Yes | Yes | Copylefted | Yes |
| GNU Lesser General Public License | Free Software Foundation | 3.0 | June 2007 | With restrictions | Copylefted | Copylefted | Yes | Yes | Copylefted | Yes |
| IBM Public License | IBM | 1.0 | August 1999 | Copylefted | ? | Copylefted | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| ISC license | Internet Systems Consortium | — | June 2003 | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | Manually | Permissive | Permissive | Manually |
| LaTeX Project Public License | LaTeX project | 1.3c | ? | Permissive | ? | Permissive | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Microsoft Public License | Microsoft | — | ? | Copylefted | Copylefted | Copylefted | No | Permissive | ? | No |
| MIT license / X11 license | MIT | — | 1988 | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | Manually | Yes | Permissive | Manually |
| Mozilla Public License | Mozilla Foundation | 2.0 | January 3, 2012 | Permissive | Copylefted | Copylefted | Yes | Yes | Copylefted | No |
| Netscape Public License | Netscape | 1.1 | ? | Limited | ? | Limited | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Open Software License | Lawrence Rosen | 3.0 | 2005 | Permissive | Copylefted | Copylefted | Yes | Yes | Copylefted | ? |
| OpenSSL license | OpenSSL Project | — | ? | Permissive | ? | Permissive | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| PHP License | PHP Group | 3.01 | 2019 | With restrictions | With restrictions | With restrictions | Yes | Yes | With restrictions | Manually |
| Python Software Foundation License | Python Software Foundation | 3.9.1 | May 10, 2020 | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | Yes | Permissive | Permissive | No |
| Q Public License | Trolltech | ? | ? | Limited | ? | Limited | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Sleepycat License | Sleepycat Software | — | 1996 | Permissive | With restrictions | Permissive | No | Yes | No | No |
| Unlicense | unlicense.org | 1 | December 2010 | Permissive/Public domain | Permissive/Public domain | Permissive/Public domain | ? | Permissive/Public domain | Permissive/Public domain | ? |
| W3C Software Notice and License | W3C | 20021231 | December 31, 2002 | Permissive | ? | Permissive | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| Do What The Fuck You Want To Public License (WTFPL) | Banlu Kemiyatorn, Sam Hocevar | 2 | December 2004 | Permissive/Public domain | Permissive/Public domain | Permissive/Public domain | No | Yes | Yes | No |
| XCore Open Source License also separate "Hardware License Agreement" | XMOS | ? | February 2011 | Permissive | Permissive | Permissive | Manually | Yes | Permissive | ? |
| XFree86 1.1 License | The XFree86 Project, Inc | ? | ? | Permissive | ? | Permissive | ? | ? | ? | ? |
| zlib/libpng license | Jean-Loup Gailly and Mark Adler | ? | ? | Permissive | ? | Permissive | ? | ? | ? | ? |
Other licenses that don't have information:
| license | Author | Latest version | Publication date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Eiffel Forum License | NICE | 2 | 2002 |
| Intel Open Source License | Intel Corporation | — | ? |
| RealNetworks Public Source License | RealNetworks | ? | ? |
| Reciprocal Public License | Scott Shattuck | 1.5 | 2007 |
| Sun Industry Standards Source License | Sun Microsystems | ? | ? |
| Sun Public License | Sun Microsystems | ? | ? |
| Sybase Open Watcom Public License | Open Watcom | — | 2003-01-28 |
| Zope Public License | Zope Foundation | 2.1 | ? |
| Server Side Public License | MongoDB | 1.0 | 2018-10-16 |
Approvals
This table lists for each license what organizations from the FOSS community have approved it – be it as a "free software" or as an "open source" license – , how those organizations categorize it, and the license compatibility between them for a combined or mixed derivative work. Organizations usually approve specific versions of software licenses. For instance, a FSF approval means that the Free Software Foundation (FSF) considers a license to be free-software license. The FSF recommends at least "Compatible with GPL" and preferably copyleft. The OSI recommends a mix of permissive and copyleft licenses, the Apache License 2.0, 2- & 3-clause BSD license, GPL, LGPL, MIT license, MPL 2.0, CDDL and EPL.
| License and version | FSF approval | GPL (v3) compatibility | OSI approval | Debian approval | Fedora approval |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Academic Free License | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes |
| Apache License 1.x | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Apache License 2.0 | Yes | GPLv3 only | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Apple Public Source License 1.x | No | No | Yes | No | No |
| Apple Public Source License 2.0 | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes |
| Artistic License 1.0 | No | No | Yes | Yes | No |
| Artistic License 2.0 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Beerware License | see "Informal license" section | see "Informal license" section | No | No | Yes |
| Original BSD license | Yes | No | No | Yes | Yes |
| Revised BSD license | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Simplified BSD license | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Zero-Clause BSD License | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? |
| Boost Software License | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| CeCILL | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Common Development and Distribution License | Yes | GPLv3 (GPLv2 disputed) | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Common Public License | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Creative Commons Zero | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| Creative Commons BY-SA 4.0 | Yes | GPLv3 | ? | Yes | ? |
| Cryptix General License | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Eclipse Public License | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Educational Community License | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
| Eiffel Forum License 2 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| European Union Public Licence | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| GNU Affero General Public License | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| GNU General Public License v2 | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| GNU General Public License v3 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| GNU Lesser General Public License | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| GNU Free Documentation License | Yes | No | Yes | No | No |
| IBM Public License | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Intel Open Source License | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | No |
| ISC license | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| LaTeX Project Public License | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Microsoft Public License | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes |
| Microsoft Reciprocal License | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes |
| MIT license / X11 license | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Mozilla Public License 1.1 | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Mozilla Public License 2.0 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| NASA Open Source Agreement | No | No | Yes | ? | No |
| Netscape Public License | Yes | No | No | No | Yes |
| Open Software License | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes |
| OpenSSL license | Yes | No | No | Yes | Yes |
| PHP License | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Python Software Foundation License 2.0.1; 2.1.1 and newer | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Q Public License | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes |
| Reciprocal Public License 1.5 | No | No | Yes | No | No |
| Sleepycat License | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Sun Industry Standards Source License | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes |
| Sun Public License | Yes | No | Yes | No | Yes |
| Sybase Open Watcom Public License | No | No | Yes | No | No |
| Unlicense | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes |
| W3C Software Notice and License | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Do What The Fuck You Want To Public License (WTFPL) | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | Yes |
| XFree86 1.1 License | Yes | Yes | No | No | No |
| zlib/libpng license | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Zope Public License 1.0 | Yes | No | No | No | Yes |
| Zope Public License 2.0 | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
- The original version of the Artistic License is defined as non-free because it is overly vague, not because of the substance of the license. The FSF encourages projects to use the Clarified Artistic License instead.
- But can be made compatible by upgrading to GPLv3 via the optional "or later" clause added in most GPLv2 license texts.
- But not with GPLv2 without "or later" clause.
- MPL 2.0 is GPL compatible unless marked "Incompatible with Secondary Licenses".
- Listed as WTFPL.
See also
- Free software
- Free-software license
- List of free and open-source software packages
- List of open-source hardware projects
- List of open-source video games
- Open-source license
- Open-source software
- Source-available software
- SPDX-License-identifier
- License proliferation
- European Union Public Licence
Notes
- See footnote of the Beerware article
References
- Open source licenses - Licenses by Name on opensource.org
- "Various Licenses and Comments about Them". Free Software Foundation. Retrieved August 8, 2011.
- "Various Licenses and Comments about Them: NASA Open Source Agreement". Free Software Foundation.
- "Licenses by Name". Open Source Initiative. 16 September 2022.
- "Other Resources & Disclaimer". Open Source Initiative.
While the OSI acknowledges these as potentially helpful resources for the community, it does not endorse any content, contributors or license interpretations from these websites.[...]The OSI does not promote or exclusively favor any of the above resources, but instead mentions them as a neutral, separate third-party.
- "Relationship between the Free Software movement and Open Source movement", Free Software Foundation, Inc
- "What is Free Software", Free Software Foundation, Inc
- opensource.org/about "Open source is a development method for software that harnesses the power of distributed peer review and transparency of process. The promise of open source is better quality, higher reliability, more flexibility, lower cost, and an end to predatory vendor lock-in."
- Popp, Dr. Karl Michael (2015). Best Practices for commercial use of open source software. Norderstedt, Germany: Books on Demand. ISBN 978-3738619096.
- "Joinup Licensing Assistant". Retrieved 31 March 2020.
- "OSL 3.0 Explained".
- "affero.org: Affero General Public License version 1 (AGPLv1)". Archived from the original on November 23, 2019.
- "affero.org: Affero General Public License version 2 (AGPLv2)". Archived from the original on November 23, 2019.
- "the section 4 of the apache license version 2".
- "BSD license". 22 May 2011.
- "Using CC0 for public domain software". Creative Commons. April 15, 2011. Archived from the original on May 14, 2011. Retrieved May 10, 2011.
- "Various Licenses and Comments about Them". GNU Project. Retrieved April 4, 2015.
- cc-by-4-0-and-cc-by-sa-4-0-added-to-our-list-of-free-licenses (2015)
- "Compatible Licenses". Creative Commons.
- "Eclipse Public License - v 2.0".
- "How to Use Popular Open Source Licenses, Explained".
- Greenstein, Daniel; Wheeler, Brad (1 March 2007). "Open Source Collaboration in Higher Education: Guidelines and Report of the Licensing and Policy Framework Summit for Software Sharing in Higher Education" – via scholarworks.iu.edu.
- "EUPL compatible open source licences".
- "EUPL text (1.1 & 1.2)".
- "FreeBSD license".
- https://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl.html : section 13 of the GNU AGPLv3 license
- https://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl-howto.html : GNU licenses copyleft
- "the GNU Affero General Public License version 3".
- https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#IfLibraryIsGPL : If library is under GPLv3
- https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#LinkingWithGPL : Linking with the GNU GPLv3
- "the GNU General Public License version 3".
- https://www.gnu.org/licenses/lgpl.html : the section 4 of the GNU Lesser General Public License version 3
- "the GNU Lesser General Public License version 3".
- "MIT License". 31 October 2006.
- "MPL version 2".
- "PHP License 3.01".
- Free Software Foundation. "Various Licenses and Comments about Them". Licenses. Free Software Foundation.
- Free Software Foundation. "To be GPL-Compatible has to be compatible with Licenses GNU GPLv3 and GNU GPLv2 – Free Software Foundation". Software Licenses. Free Software Foundation.
- Free Software Foundation. "GPL-Compatible Free Software Licenses – Free Software Foundation". Software Licenses. Free Software Foundation.
- Free Software Foundation. "GPL-Incompatible Free Software Licenses – Free Software Foundation". Software Licenses. Free Software Foundation.
- Free Software Foundation. "GPL-compatible Definition by FSF – Free Software Foundation". GPL-compatible Definition. Free Software Foundation.
- Free Software Foundation. "GPL-compatible Definition previous version by FSF – Free Software Foundation". GPL-compatible Definition. Free Software Foundation.
- Open Source Initiative (16 September 2022). "The Approved Licenses". License Information. Open Source Initiative.
- Debian. "Debian – License information". Licenses. Debian.
- "The DFSG and Software Licenses". Debian wiki.
- Fedora. "Licensing – FedoraProject". Licenses. Fedora Project.
- Free Software Foundation. "Apache License, Version 2.0". Licenses. Free Software Foundation.
- "Apple Public Source License (APSL), version 1.x". Retrieved 2013-08-07.
- "Various Licenses and Comments about Them". Free Software Foundation. 2016-01-05. Retrieved 2016-01-05.
- "Licensing/Beerware". Fedora Project. Retrieved 2015-03-10.
- "The BSD License:Licensing". Open Source Initiative. Archived from the original on 29 November 2009. Retrieved 1 February 2021.
- "[License-review] Please rename "Free Public License-1.0.0" to 0BSD". Open Source Initiative. Retrieved 2019-02-11.
- "Various Licenses and Comments About Them - Common Development and Distribution License". Free Software Foundation. Retrieved 2006-12-31.
- Michael Larabel (6 October 2015). "Ubuntu Is Planning To Make The ZFS File-System A "Standard" Offering". Phoronix.
- Dustin Kirkland (18 February 2016). "ZFS Licensing and Linux". Ubuntu Insights. Canonical.
- Are GPLv2 and CDDL incompatible? on hansenpartnership.com by James E.J. Bottomley "What the above analysis shows is that even though we presumed combination of GPLv2 and CDDL works to be a technical violation, there's no way actually to prosecute such a violation because we can’t develop a convincing theory of harm resulting. Because this makes it impossible to take the case to court, effectively it must be concluded that the combination of GPLv2 and CDDL, provided you’re following a GPLv2 compliance regime for all the code, is allowable." (23 February 2016)
- Moglen, Eben; Choudhary, Mishi (26 February 2016). "The Linux Kernel, CDDL and Related Issues".
- GPL Violations Related to Combining ZFS and Linux on sfconservancy.org by Bradley M. Kuhn and Karen M. Sandler (February 25, 2016)
- "Various Licenses and Comments about Them - GNU Project - Free Software Foundation".
- "Frequently Answered Questions". opensource.org. 21 October 2007.
CC0 was not explicitly rejected, but the License Review Committee was unable to reach consensus that it should be approved
- "Licensing:Main".
- "Creative Commons BY-SA 4.0 declared one-way compatible with GNU GPL version 3 — Free Software Foundation — working together for free software".
- Free Software Foundation. "Educational Community License 2.0". Licenses. Free Software Foundation.
- https://www.gnu.org/licenses/ : "We use only licenses that are compatible with the GNU GPL for GNU software."
- "Frequently Asked Questions about the GNU Licenses – Is GPLv3 compatible with GPLv2?". gnu.org. Retrieved 3 June 2014.
No. Some of the requirements in GPLv3, such as the requirement to provide Installation Information, do not exist in GPLv2. As a result, the licenses are not compatible: if you tried to combine code released under both these licenses, you would violate section 6 of GPLv2. However, if code is released under GPL "version 2 or later," that is compatible with GPLv3 because GPLv3 is one of the options it permits.
- "Re: Proposed statement WRT GNU FDL".
- "SPDX License List | Software Package Data Exchange (SPDX)".
- "General Resolution: Why the GNU Free Documentation License is not suitable for Debian main".
- Free Software Foundation. "A Quick Guide to GPLv3". Licenses. Free Software Foundation.
- Mozilla Foundation. "MPL 2.0 FAQ". Licenses. Mozilla Foundation.
- "Various Licenses and Comments about Them - GNU Project - Free Software Foundation".
- "[License-review] Request for legacy approval: The Unlicense".
- "OSI Board Meeting Minutes, Wednesday, March 4, 2009". 4 May 2009.
- Free Software Foundation. "XFree86 1.1 License". Licenses. Free Software Foundation.
This comparison only covers software licenses which have a linked Wikipedia article for details and which are approved by at least one of the following expert groups the Free Software Foundation the Open Source Initiative the Debian Project and the Fedora Project For a list of licenses not specifically intended for software see List of free content licences FOSS licensesFOSS stands for Free and Open Source Software There is no one universally agreed upon definition of FOSS software and various groups maintain approved lists of licenses The Open Source Initiative OSI is one such organization keeping a list of open source licenses The Free Software Foundation FSF maintains a list of what it considers free FSF s free software and OSI s open source licenses together are called FOSS licenses There are licenses accepted by the OSI which are not free as per the Free Software Definition The Open Source Definition allows for further restrictions like price type of contribution and origin of the contribution e g the case of the NASA Open Source Agreement which requires the code to be original work The OSI does not endorse FSF license analysis interpretation as per their disclaimer The FSF s Free Software Definition focuses on the user s unrestricted rights to use a program to study and modify it to copy it and to redistribute it for any purpose which are considered by the FSF the four essential freedoms The OSI s open source criteria focuses on the availability of the source code and the advantages of an unrestricted and community driven development model Yet many FOSS licenses like the Apache License and all Free Software licenses allow commercial use of FOSS components General comparisonThis article may be confusing or unclear to readers In particular values used in the below table are not defined and some are ambiguous Please help clarify the article There is a discussion about this on Talk Comparison of free and open source software licences General comparison confusing May 2020 Learn how and when to remove this message For a simpler comparison across the most common licenses see free software license comparison The following table compares various features of each license and is a general guide to the terms and conditions of each license based on seven subjects or categories Recent tools like the European Commissions Joinup Licensing Assistant makes possible the licenses selection and comparison based on more than 40 subjects or categories with access to their SPDX identifier and full text The table below lists the permissions and limitations regarding the following subjects Linking linking of the licensed code with code licensed under a different license e g when the code is provided as a library Distribution distribution of the code to third parties Modification modification of the code by a licensee Patent grant protection of licensees from patent claims made by code contributors regarding their contribution and protection of contributors from patent claims made by licensees Private use whether modification to the code must be shared with the community or may be used privately e g internal use by a corporation Sublicensing whether modified code may be licensed under a different license for example a copyright or must retain the same license under which it was provided TM grant use of trademarks associated with the licensed code or its contributors by a licensee In this table permissive means the software has minimal restrictions on how it can be used modified and redistributed usually including a warranty disclaimer Copyleft means the software requires that its source code be made publicly available and that all provisions in the license be preserved in derivative works License Author Latest version Publication date Linking Distribution Modification Patent grant Private use Sublicensing TM grantAcademic Free License Lawrence E Rosen 3 0 2002 Permissive Permissive Permissive Yes Yes Permissive NoAffero General Public License Affero Inc 2 0 2007 Copylefted Copyleft except for the GNU AGPL Copyleft Yes Apache License Apache Software Foundation 2 0 2004 Permissive Permissive Permissive Yes Yes Permissive NoApple Public Source License Apple Computer 2 0 2003 08 06 August 6 2003 Permissive Limited Artistic License Larry Wall 2 0 2000 With restrictions With restrictions With restrictions No Permissive With restrictions NoBeerware Poul Henning Kamp 42 1998 Permissive Permissive Permissive No Permissive Permissive NoBSD License Regents of the University of California 3 0 Permissive Permissive Permissive Manually Yes Permissive ManuallyBoost Software License 1 0 2003 08 17 August 17 2003 Permissive Permissive Creative Commons Zero Creative Commons 1 0 2009 Public Domain Public Domain Public Domain No Public Domain Public Domain NoCC BY Creative Commons 4 0 2002 Permissive Permissive Permissive No Yes Permissive NoCC BY SA Creative Commons 4 0 2002 Copylefted Copylefted Copylefted No Yes Copylefted NoCeCILL CEA CNRS INRIA 2 1 2013 06 21 June 21 2013 Permissive Permissive Permissive No Permissive With restrictions NoCommon Development and Distribution License Sun Microsystems 1 0 2004 12 December 1 2004 Permissive Limited Common Public License IBM 1 0 2001 05 May 2001 Permissive Copylefted Cryptix General License Cryptix Foundation 1995 Permissive Permissive Permissive Manually Yes ManuallyEclipse Public License Eclipse Foundation 2 0 2017 08 24 August 24 2017 Permissive Copylefted Copylefted Yes Yes Copylefted NoEducational Community License Indiana University 1 0 2007 Permissive Permissive European Union Public Licence European Commission 1 2 2017 05 May 2017 Permissive according to EU law Recitals 10 amp 15 Directive 2009 24 EC Copylefted with an explicit compatibility list Copylefted with an explicit compatibility list Yes Yes Copylefted with an explicit compatibility list NoFreeBSD The FreeBSD project 1999 04 April 1999 Permissive Permissive Permissive Manually Permissive Permissive ManuallyGNU Affero General Public License Free Software Foundation 3 0 2007 GNU GPLv3 only Copylefted Copylefted Yes Network usage is not considered private use Copylefted YesGNU General Public License Free Software Foundation 3 0 2007 06 June 2007 GPLv3 compatible only Copylefted Copylefted Yes Yes Copylefted YesGNU Lesser General Public License Free Software Foundation 3 0 2007 06 June 2007 With restrictions Copylefted Copylefted Yes Yes Copylefted YesIBM Public License IBM 1 0 1999 08 August 1999 Copylefted Copylefted ISC license Internet Systems Consortium 2003 06 June 2003 Permissive Permissive Permissive Manually Permissive Permissive ManuallyLaTeX Project Public License LaTeX project 1 3c Permissive Permissive Microsoft Public License Microsoft Copylefted Copylefted Copylefted No Permissive NoMIT license X11 license MIT 1988 Permissive Permissive Permissive Manually Yes Permissive ManuallyMozilla Public License Mozilla Foundation 2 0 2012 03 January 3 2012 Permissive Copylefted Copylefted Yes Yes Copylefted NoNetscape Public License Netscape 1 1 Limited Limited Open Software License Lawrence Rosen 3 0 2005 Permissive Copylefted Copylefted Yes Yes Copylefted OpenSSL license OpenSSL Project Permissive Permissive PHP License PHP Group 3 01 2019 With restrictions With restrictions With restrictions Yes Yes With restrictions ManuallyPython Software Foundation License Python Software Foundation 3 9 1 2020 10 05 May 10 2020 Permissive Permissive Permissive Yes Permissive Permissive NoQ Public License Trolltech Limited Limited Sleepycat License Sleepycat Software 1996 Permissive With restrictions Permissive No Yes No NoUnlicense unlicense org 1 2010 12 December 2010 Permissive Public domain Permissive Public domain Permissive Public domain Permissive Public domain Permissive Public domain W3C Software Notice and License W3C 20021231 2002 12 31 December 31 2002 Permissive Permissive Do What The Fuck You Want To Public License WTFPL Banlu Kemiyatorn Sam Hocevar 2 2004 12 December 2004 Permissive Public domain Permissive Public domain Permissive Public domain No Yes Yes NoXCore Open Source License also separate Hardware License Agreement XMOS 2011 02 February 2011 Permissive Permissive Permissive Manually Yes Permissive XFree86 1 1 License The XFree86 Project Inc Permissive Permissive zlib libpng license Jean Loup Gailly and Mark Adler Permissive Permissive Other licenses that don t have information license Author Latest version Publication dateEiffel Forum License NICE 2 2002Intel Open Source License Intel Corporation RealNetworks Public Source License RealNetworks Reciprocal Public License Scott Shattuck 1 5 2007Sun Industry Standards Source License Sun Microsystems Sun Public License Sun Microsystems Sybase Open Watcom Public License Open Watcom 2003 01 28Zope Public License Zope Foundation 2 1 Server Side Public License MongoDB 1 0 2018 10 16ApprovalsThis table lists for each license what organizations from the FOSS community have approved it be it as a free software or as an open source license how those organizations categorize it and the license compatibility between them for a combined or mixed derivative work Organizations usually approve specific versions of software licenses For instance a FSF approval means that the Free Software Foundation FSF considers a license to be free software license The FSF recommends at least Compatible with GPL and preferably copyleft The OSI recommends a mix of permissive and copyleft licenses the Apache License 2 0 2 amp 3 clause BSD license GPL LGPL MIT license MPL 2 0 CDDL and EPL License and version FSF approval GPL v3 compatibility OSI approval Debian approval Fedora approvalAcademic Free License Yes No Yes No YesApache License 1 x Yes No Yes Yes YesApache License 2 0 Yes GPLv3 only Yes Yes YesApple Public Source License 1 x No No Yes No NoApple Public Source License 2 0 Yes No Yes No YesArtistic License 1 0 No No Yes Yes NoArtistic License 2 0 Yes Yes Yes Yes YesBeerware License see Informal license section see Informal license section No No YesOriginal BSD license Yes No No Yes YesRevised BSD license Yes Yes Yes Yes YesSimplified BSD license Yes Yes Yes Yes YesZero Clause BSD License Yes Boost Software License Yes Yes Yes Yes YesCeCILL Yes Yes Yes Yes YesCommon Development and Distribution License Yes GPLv3 GPLv2 disputed Yes Yes YesCommon Public License Yes No Yes Yes YesCreative Commons Zero Yes Yes No Yes YesCreative Commons BY SA 4 0 Yes GPLv3 Yes Cryptix General License Yes Yes Yes Yes YesEclipse Public License Yes No Yes Yes YesEducational Community License Yes Yes Yes No YesEiffel Forum License 2 Yes Yes Yes Yes YesEuropean Union Public Licence Yes Yes Yes Yes YesGNU Affero General Public License Yes Yes Yes Yes YesGNU General Public License v2 Yes No Yes Yes YesGNU General Public License v3 Yes Yes Yes Yes YesGNU Lesser General Public License Yes Yes Yes Yes YesGNU Free Documentation License Yes No Yes No NoIBM Public License Yes No Yes Yes YesIntel Open Source License Yes Yes Yes No NoISC license Yes Yes Yes Yes YesLaTeX Project Public License Yes No Yes Yes YesMicrosoft Public License Yes No Yes No YesMicrosoft Reciprocal License Yes No Yes No YesMIT license X11 license Yes Yes Yes Yes YesMozilla Public License 1 1 Yes No Yes Yes YesMozilla Public License 2 0 Yes Yes Yes Yes YesNASA Open Source Agreement No No Yes NoNetscape Public License Yes No No No YesOpen Software License Yes No Yes No YesOpenSSL license Yes No No Yes YesPHP License Yes No Yes Yes YesPython Software Foundation License 2 0 1 2 1 1 and newer Yes Yes Yes Yes YesQ Public License Yes No Yes No YesReciprocal Public License 1 5 No No Yes No NoSleepycat License Yes Yes Yes Yes YesSun Industry Standards Source License Yes No Yes No YesSun Public License Yes No Yes No YesSybase Open Watcom Public License No No Yes No NoUnlicense Yes Yes Yes YesW3C Software Notice and License Yes Yes Yes Yes YesDo What The Fuck You Want To Public License WTFPL Yes Yes No Yes YesXFree86 1 1 License Yes Yes No No Nozlib libpng license Yes Yes Yes Yes YesZope Public License 1 0 Yes No No No YesZope Public License 2 0 Yes Yes Yes No YesThe original version of the Artistic License is defined as non free because it is overly vague not because of the substance of the license The FSF encourages projects to use the Clarified Artistic License instead But can be made compatible by upgrading to GPLv3 via the optional or later clause added in most GPLv2 license texts But not with GPLv2 without or later clause MPL 2 0 is GPL compatible unless marked Incompatible with Secondary Licenses Listed as WTFPL See alsoFree and open source software portalFree software Free software license List of free and open source software packages List of open source hardware projects List of open source video games Open source license Open source software Source available software SPDX License identifier License proliferation European Union Public LicenceNotesSee footnote of the Beerware articleReferencesOpen source licenses Licenses by Name on opensource org Various Licenses and Comments about Them Free Software Foundation Retrieved August 8 2011 Various Licenses and Comments about Them NASA Open Source Agreement Free Software Foundation Licenses by Name Open Source Initiative 16 September 2022 Other Resources amp Disclaimer Open Source Initiative While the OSI acknowledges these as potentially helpful resources for the community it does not endorse any content contributors or license interpretations from these websites The OSI does not promote or exclusively favor any of the above resources but instead mentions them as a neutral separate third party Relationship between the Free Software movement and Open Source movement Free Software Foundation Inc What is Free Software Free Software Foundation Inc opensource org about Open source is a development method for software that harnesses the power of distributed peer review and transparency of process The promise of open source is better quality higher reliability more flexibility lower cost and an end to predatory vendor lock in Popp Dr Karl Michael 2015 Best Practices for commercial use of open source software Norderstedt Germany Books on Demand ISBN 978 3738619096 Joinup Licensing Assistant Retrieved 31 March 2020 OSL 3 0 Explained affero org Affero General Public License version 1 AGPLv1 Archived from the original on November 23 2019 affero org Affero General Public License version 2 AGPLv2 Archived from the original on November 23 2019 the section 4 of the apache license version 2 BSD license 22 May 2011 Using CC0 for public domain software Creative Commons April 15 2011 Archived from the original on May 14 2011 Retrieved May 10 2011 Various Licenses and Comments about Them GNU Project Retrieved April 4 2015 cc by 4 0 and cc by sa 4 0 added to our list of free licenses 2015 Compatible Licenses Creative Commons Eclipse Public License v 2 0 How to Use Popular Open Source Licenses Explained Greenstein Daniel Wheeler Brad 1 March 2007 Open Source Collaboration in Higher Education Guidelines and Report of the Licensing and Policy Framework Summit for Software Sharing in Higher Education via scholarworks iu edu EUPL compatible open source licences EUPL text 1 1 amp 1 2 FreeBSD license https www gnu org licenses agpl html section 13 of the GNU AGPLv3 license https www gnu org copyleft gpl howto html GNU licenses copyleft the GNU Affero General Public License version 3 https www gnu org licenses gpl faq html IfLibraryIsGPL If library is under GPLv3 https www gnu org licenses gpl faq html LinkingWithGPL Linking with the GNU GPLv3 the GNU General Public License version 3 https www gnu org licenses lgpl html the section 4 of the GNU Lesser General Public License version 3 the GNU Lesser General Public License version 3 MIT License 31 October 2006 MPL version 2 PHP License 3 01 Free Software Foundation Various Licenses and Comments about Them Licenses Free Software Foundation Free Software Foundation To be GPL Compatible has to be compatible with Licenses GNU GPLv3 and GNU GPLv2 Free Software Foundation Software Licenses Free Software Foundation Free Software Foundation GPL Compatible Free Software Licenses Free Software Foundation Software Licenses Free Software Foundation Free Software Foundation GPL Incompatible Free Software Licenses Free Software Foundation Software Licenses Free Software Foundation Free Software Foundation GPL compatible Definition by FSF Free Software Foundation GPL compatible Definition Free Software Foundation Free Software Foundation GPL compatible Definition previous version by FSF Free Software Foundation GPL compatible Definition Free Software Foundation Open Source Initiative 16 September 2022 The Approved Licenses License Information Open Source Initiative Debian Debian License information Licenses Debian The DFSG and Software Licenses Debian wiki Fedora Licensing FedoraProject Licenses Fedora Project Free Software Foundation Apache License Version 2 0 Licenses Free Software Foundation Apple Public Source License APSL version 1 x Retrieved 2013 08 07 Various Licenses and Comments about Them Free Software Foundation 2016 01 05 Retrieved 2016 01 05 Licensing Beerware Fedora Project Retrieved 2015 03 10 The BSD License Licensing Open Source Initiative Archived from the original on 29 November 2009 Retrieved 1 February 2021 License review Please rename Free Public License 1 0 0 to 0BSD Open Source Initiative Retrieved 2019 02 11 Various Licenses and Comments About Them Common Development and Distribution License Free Software Foundation Retrieved 2006 12 31 Michael Larabel 6 October 2015 Ubuntu Is Planning To Make The ZFS File System A Standard Offering Phoronix Dustin Kirkland 18 February 2016 ZFS Licensing and Linux Ubuntu Insights Canonical Are GPLv2 and CDDL incompatible on hansenpartnership com by James E J Bottomley What the above analysis shows is that even though we presumed combination of GPLv2 and CDDL works to be a technical violation there s no way actually to prosecute such a violation because we can t develop a convincing theory of harm resulting Because this makes it impossible to take the case to court effectively it must be concluded that the combination of GPLv2 and CDDL provided you re following a GPLv2 compliance regime for all the code is allowable 23 February 2016 Moglen Eben Choudhary Mishi 26 February 2016 The Linux Kernel CDDL and Related Issues GPL Violations Related to Combining ZFS and Linux on sfconservancy org by Bradley M Kuhn and Karen M Sandler February 25 2016 Various Licenses and Comments about Them GNU Project Free Software Foundation Frequently Answered Questions opensource org 21 October 2007 CC0 was not explicitly rejected but the License Review Committee was unable to reach consensus that it should be approved Licensing Main Creative Commons BY SA 4 0 declared one way compatible with GNU GPL version 3 Free Software Foundation working together for free software Free Software Foundation Educational Community License 2 0 Licenses Free Software Foundation https www gnu org licenses We use only licenses that are compatible with the GNU GPL for GNU software Frequently Asked Questions about the GNU Licenses Is GPLv3 compatible with GPLv2 gnu org Retrieved 3 June 2014 No Some of the requirements in GPLv3 such as the requirement to provide Installation Information do not exist in GPLv2 As a result the licenses are not compatible if you tried to combine code released under both these licenses you would violate section 6 of GPLv2 However if code is released under GPL version 2 or later that is compatible with GPLv3 because GPLv3 is one of the options it permits Re Proposed statement WRT GNU FDL SPDX License List Software Package Data Exchange SPDX General Resolution Why the GNU Free Documentation License is not suitable for Debian main Free Software Foundation A Quick Guide to GPLv3 Licenses Free Software Foundation Mozilla Foundation MPL 2 0 FAQ Licenses Mozilla Foundation Various Licenses and Comments about Them GNU Project Free Software Foundation License review Request for legacy approval The Unlicense OSI Board Meeting Minutes Wednesday March 4 2009 4 May 2009 Free Software Foundation XFree86 1 1 License Licenses Free Software Foundation
