Personal, Commercial or Agency license: which one do you need?

Buying a template means buying a right of use, not the design itself. That right depends on the license you choose. Forge offers three. Their full texts are on the Licenses page; this article explains them through examples.

The question to ask

In most cases a single question is enough: who is the website for?

• For you, your non-profit or your company: Personal license.
• For a client who pays you to build it: Commercial license, one per project.
• For many clients, with the same resource: Agency license.

Whether the site makes money changes nothing: the online shop of a designer who uses a template for her own business falls under the Personal license.

Personal license

It covers a website for yourself or your own business. You can freely change the code and the design, and the site can generate revenue.

Example. A baker uses the bakery template for her shop's website. She changes the photos, the opening hours and the colours. Personal license.

What it does not cover. Building a site for someone else, even for free for a friend who runs a business, and sharing the files with other people.

Commercial license

It covers one project built for an end client. You invoice your integration work, the client runs the site.

Example. A freelance developer delivers a garage's website with the garage template. He buys a Commercial license for that client. Six months later, a second garage asks for a similar site: he buys a second Commercial license.

The pitfall. Reusing the license of a finished project for a new one. A license matches one project, even if the first client has closed their site.

Agency license

It covers unlimited client projects with the same resource, for a team of several people. You may also include it in your internal starter kits.

Example. An agency uses the pricing components on all its clients' websites. A single Agency license for those components.

The maths. As soon as you expect three or four client projects with the same resource, compare the price of several Commercial licenses with that of one Agency license.

What no license allows

Whatever the license, the resource cannot be resold or redistributed on its own, as is or modified: offering it for download, listing it on another marketplace or bundling it in a competing site builder is forbidden. You sell a website, not the template.

What about free resources?

Forge's free resources can be used in unlimited projects, personal or commercial. The same limit applies: no redistribution of the resource itself.

Where to find your license

Every purchase creates a license key. It appears in your account, under Downloads, and on your invoice. Keep the invoice: it proves the purchase if a client asks.

Three ambiguous situations

I build the website of the company I work for. The site belongs to your employer: it is their business. Personal license in the company's name, or Commercial if you work as an outside contractor.

I build a site for a friend, for free. The site belongs to someone else: Commercial license.

I rebuild my own site two years later with the same template. It is still your site: the Personal license is enough.

When in doubt, that is what the Contact page is for. Better to ask before delivering the project than after.