# Choose a license

> One license goes on each model, and it is the agreement between you and everyone who gets the files.

Canonical: https://benchy.world/docs/creators/licensing
Last updated: 2026-10-25

You can change it later, but never for someone who already has them.

## What a license decides [#what-it-decides]

**The license, not the price.** A paid model under a non-commercial license is still non-commercial, and a free model under a commercial one may be sold as prints. If you mean to sell commercial use, choose a license that grants it.

It also decides whether someone may put your file on another site or publish a changed version of it, and whether they must credit you when they do.

## The licenses on offer [#the-licenses]

Every license here allows private use and private changes. They differ in what may leave the person's own workshop.

| License | Commercial projects | Sell prints | Share the files | Share changes | Credit you |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [CC0 1.0](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No |
| [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| [CC BY-ND 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/) | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | Yes |
| [CC BY-NC 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| [CC BY-NC-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) | No | No | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| [CC BY-NC-ND 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) | No | No | Yes | No | Yes |
| [MIT](https://opensource.org/license/mit) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| [CERN-OHL-P 2.0](https://ohwr.org/cern_ohl_p_v2.txt) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| [CERN-OHL-W 2.0](https://ohwr.org/cern_ohl_w_v2.txt) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| [CERN-OHL-S 2.0](https://ohwr.org/cern_ohl_s_v2.txt) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| [LGPL 3.0 or later](https://www.gnu.org/licenses/lgpl-3.0.html) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| [GPL 3.0 or later](https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.html) | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Commercial use allowed | Yes | Yes | No | No | No |
| Personal use only | No | No | No | No | No |

A reciprocal license also requires a published adaptation to carry the same license or a compatible one: CC BY-SA 4.0, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0, CERN-OHL-W 2.0, CERN-OHL-S 2.0, LGPL 3.0 or later, GPL 3.0 or later.

## Open-hardware and software terms [#open-hardware]

Creative Commons suits most of what is on World. A functional part, an enclosure or anything with a board in it is closer to hardware, and these are the licenses an engineer looks for:

- **MIT** — permissive: do anything, keep the notice with the files.
- **CERN-OHL-P 2.0** — permissive, written for hardware. Like MIT, but changes must be recorded, and it covers a design's documentation.
- **CERN-OHL-W 2.0** and **CERN-OHL-S 2.0** — reciprocal hardware licenses. The weak one reaches only your design; the strong one also reaches the wider product it is built into.
- **GPL 3.0** and **LGPL 3.0** — software copyleft, for firmware, scripts or a parametric model's source. GPL reaches anything built on it; LGPL stops at changes to the thing itself.

None of these restricts selling what you print: their conditions attach to passing the files on.

## World’s own two terms [#benchy-terms]

Two choices are World's own, for a file you want printed and sold but not passed around:

- **Commercial use allowed** — the person may use the model in paid work, sell what they print from it, and change it for themselves. They may not redistribute or resell the files, changed or not. No credit is required.
- **Personal use only** — the person may print and modify it for themselves, nothing else. Commercial use, selling prints and passing the files on need your separate permission.

A buyer sees their exact rights before paying, on the listing and again in their library.

## A license is frozen into a release [#frozen]

When a release is published, its rights are copied into the release, its package, its offer and every purchase from it, and recorded in the package's manifest. A buyer's library shows the license they bought under, not today's.

> **What this means in practice**
>
> Nothing you do later can narrow what someone already has. To stop a model being available, stop new sales or unpublish it; people keep what they took.

## Changing a license [#changing]

Change it in the model editor. On a paid listing this pauses sales until you review the offer, which pins a specific set of rights. Downloaders filter on what a license allows, so it also decides where a model shows up.

## Remixes and credit [#remixes]

A remix is a model of its own with its own license, and World lists the parent on the remix and the remix on the parent. Meeting the parent's credit or same-license terms is the remixer's obligation; World can't grant it. A NoDerivatives license forbids publishing changes. See [Community on World](https://benchy.world/docs/community).