Licensing

VibeAI OS is never sold outright. Self-hosted deployments run under a recurring license: a signed, time-boxed license.json.

How it works

• Licenses are ed25519-signed by the operator’s mothership. Tampering or forging fails verification; only the mothership holds the signing key (/root/.aios-license-keys/signing.b64 — back it up; losing it means you cannot issue licenses).
• Enforcement applies only to installs provisioned --licensed (marker file /root/.aios/.license-required). Managed/owner boxes never enforce.
• Graceful degradation, never data hostage: 14 days before expiry the status turns EXPIRING; after expiry, NEW agent turns are refused with a renewal message — the dashboard, all data, and exports remain fully accessible forever.
• Owner guarantee: a box holding the signing key can never be locked out, by construction. And rm /root/.aios/.license-required is always a one-line local recovery.

Commands

aios license status                 # this box's state
aios license verify <file>          # check a license file's authenticity
aios license keygen                 # mothership setup: generate a keypair
aios license issue --customer "Acme" --expires 2027-07-01 --out license.json

Renewal from the mothership (installs remotely too): aios-control renew --name acme --expires 2028-07-01 — or the renew button on the Clients page.

For customers

Your license state is always visible: aios license status on the box. Expiry never harms your data. Renew by paying your license fee; the new license installs remotely in seconds.