2012-04: DRAFT, FOR REVIEW ONLY — NOT AN OFFICIAL STATEMENT OF THE OSI
This page lists all the licenses that have been approved by the OSI via the License Review Process. (For questions about the Public Domain, please see this FAQ entry.)
When choosing a license, first, if at all possible, work with a lawyer to determine the Open Source license that’s best for your project. If your project is important to you, then find someone with legal expertise to help you choose the appropriate Open Source license. All the licenses on this page are OSI-approved, and all are fine for releasing Open Source software. But they are not all exactly the same, and a lawyer who knows your project will best be able to explain the effects of different license choices.
If you don’t have access to a lawyer, then consider using a license from the small group below. Those licenses are widely-used and most likely to be familiar to many people — in particular, to potential users of, and contributors to, your software. But this is not legal advice, and we emphasize again that it is best to get legal advice from your lawyer before choosing a license.
Licenses that are most widely-used and familiar:
- Apache License 2.0 (Apache-2.0)
- GNU General Public License version 3.0 (GPL-3.0) [note this is a copyleft-style license]
- BSD 2-Clause License (BSD-2-Clause) [also called “Simplified BSD” or “FreeBSD”]
- MIT license (MIT)
(If you would like to discuss adding or removing licenses from the above group, please ask on our license-discuss mailing list.)
Complete list of OSI-Approved Licenses:
These are listed semi-randomly, but we have attempted to put them in very rough order of popularity and broad applicability — with some adjustment for licenses that are popular but only within a particular community (such as a software framework or programming language). The ordering is not written in stone. We welcome data on relative usage; please bring such data to the license-discuss mailing list.
- GNU General Public License version 3.0 (GPL-3.0)
- GNU General Public License version 2.0 (GPL-2.0)
- GNU Library or “Lesser” General Public License version 3.0 (LGPL-3.0)
- GNU Library or “Lesser” General Public License version 2.1 (LGPL-2.1)
- BSD 2-Clause “Simplified” or “FreeBSD” License (BSD-2-Clause)
- BSD 3-Clause “New” or “Revised” License (BSD-3-Clause)
- MIT license (MIT)
- GNU Affero General Public License v3 (AGPL-3.0)
- Apache License 2.0 (Apache-2.0)
- Mozilla Public License 2.0 (MPL-2.0)
- Eclipse Public License 1.0 (EPL-1.0)
- European Union Public License, Version 1.1 (EUPL-1.1) (links to every language’s version on their site)
- Artistic license 2.0 (Artistic-2.0)
- Educational Community License, Version 2.0 (ECL-2.0)
- X.Net License (Xnet)
- PHP License 3.0 (PHP-3.0)
- Python License (Python-2.0) (overall Python license)
- Academic Free License 3.0 (AFL-3.0)
- Apple Public Source License (APSL-2.0)
- Microsoft Public License (Ms-PL)
- Microsoft Reciprocal License (Ms-RL)
- Sleepycat License (Sleepycat)
- Sun Public License (SPL)
- Open Software License 3.0 (OSL-3.0)
- The PostgreSQL License (PostgreSQL)
- Common Development and Distribution License 1.0 (CDDL-1.0)
- Common Public Attribution License 1.0 (CPAL-1.0)
- Simple Public License 2.0 (Simple-2.0)
- Reciprocal Public License 1.5 (RPL-1.5)
- Zope Public License 2.0 (ZPL-2.0)
- zlib/libpng license (Zlib)
- Adaptive Public License (APL-1.0)
- Attribution Assurance Licenses (AAL)
- W3C License
- wxWindows Library License (WXwindows)
- NASA Open Source Agreement 1.3 (NASA 1.3)
- Boost Software License (BSL-1.0)
- Computer Associates Trusted Open Source License 1.1 (CATOSL-1.1)
- CUA Office Public License Version 1.0 (CUA-OPL-1.0)
- EU DataGrid Software License (EUDatagrid)
- Eiffel Forum License V2.0 (EFL-2.0)
- Entessa Public License (Entessa)
- Frameworx License (Frameworx-1.0)
- Historical Permission Notice and Disclaimer (HPND)
- IBM Public License 1.0 (IPL-1.0)
- IPA Font License (IPA)
- ISC License (ISC)
- LaTeX Project Public License 1.3c (LPPL-1.3c)
- Lucent Public License Version 1.02
- MirOS Licence
- Motosoto License (Motosoto)
- Multics License
- NTP License (NTP)
- Naumen Public License (Naumen)
- Nethack General Public License (NGPL)
- Nokia Open Source License
- Non-Profit Open Software License 3.0 (Non-Profit OSL 3.0)
- OCLC Research Public License 2.0 (OCLC-2.0)
- Open Font License 1.1 (OFL 1.1)
- Open Group Test Suite License (OGTSL)
- CNRI Python license (CNRI portion of Python License)
- Q Public License (QPL-1.0)
- RealNetworks Public Source License V1.0 (RPSL-1.0)
- Ricoh Source Code Public License (RSCPL)
- Sybase Open Watcom Public License 1.0 (Watcom-1.0)
- University of Illinois/NCSA Open Source License (NCSA)
- Vovida Software License v. 1.0 (VSL-1.0)
- Fair License
You can also view a list of licenses which have been superceded or retired.