License Information

Aspose.Words FOSS for .NET is an open-source library released under the MIT License. No license key or activation is needed.

MIT License

The MIT License permits:

Free use in commercial and personal projects
Modification and redistribution
Private use without disclosure

The only requirement is to include the original copyright notice and license text. The full license text ships with the repository as LICENSE.

No License Key Required

Unlike the proprietary Aspose.Words for .NET, this FOSS edition does not require a license file, activation, or evaluation watermark. Clone the repository and build it — that’s the entire licensing step:

git clone https://github.com/aspose-words-foss/Aspose.Words-FOSS-for-.NET.git
cd Aspose.Words-FOSS-for-.NET
dotnet build Aspose.Words.sln -c Release

See the Installation Guide for the full setup, including how to reference the built library from your own project.

What’s Included vs. the Commercial Edition

Aspose.Words FOSS is not a rewrite — it is the genuine Aspose.Words for .NET codebase, the same document engine used in production since 2003, reduced to a free, open-source core. To keep this edition free, some commercial subsystems were removed: page layout and rendering (no PDF/XPS/image export or printing), additional format converters (DOC, RTF, ODT, HTML, EPUB), mail merge execution, LINQ Reporting, document comparison, document signing (verify-only in this edition), and embedded-font subsetting.

Aspect	Aspose.Words FOSS	Aspose.Words for .NET (commercial)
License	MIT	Commercial
License key	No	Yes
Source code	Open	Closed
Page layout / rendering (PDF, XPS, image export)	Not included	Included
Support	Community (GitHub issues)	Paid

If a project outgrows this edition’s feature set, upgrading is a matter of swapping the package reference — the underlying object model is the same. See the commercial Aspose.Words for .NET product page.

FAQ

Is there a watermark or evaluation limitation?

No. Aspose.Words FOSS for .NET produces clean output with no watermark and no evaluation restrictions.

Can I use it in a commercial product?

Yes. The MIT License explicitly allows commercial and personal use, including modification and redistribution.

Do I need to call a `License` or `SetLicense` API before using the library?

No. This FOSS edition has no licensing API to call — there is no license class or activation step. Build the library from source and start creating documents directly with Document and DocumentBuilder.

Is a NuGet package available?

Not yet. A NuGet package is planned; until it is published, build from source as shown in the Installation Guide.

License Information