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Choose a License for Your Work

Follow the steps to select the appropriate license for your work.

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Recommended Choice

Mark Your Work

Choose the kind of work to get appropriate license code or public domain marking.

Website

If you are licensing or marking one work, paste the code next to it. If you are licensing or marking the whole page or blog, you can paste the code at the bottom of the page.

Rich Text

[contextually formatted mark here]

HTML

[contextually formatted mark here]

Print Work or Media

Copy the text below and paste it on the title and/or copyright page of your print work or presentation, or in the credits of your media.

Plain Text

[contextually formatted mark here]

Confused? Need Help?

What are Creative Commons licenses?

Creative Commons licenses are legal tools that help you grant copyright permissions to the general public. Our CC legal tools include six different licenses and one public domain dedication tool. It is important to specify which one of the 7 legal tools you are applying to your material. The license chooser can help you decide which license is right for you.

CC licenses may be applied to any type of copyrightable work. The only types of works for which CC does not recommend its licenses are computer software and hardware, where we recommend a standard free software license instead. For works that are already in the public domain we recommend that you mark them with the Public Domain Mark. If you hold the rights to a work but would like to place it into the public domain, you can use the Chooser to select CC0.

How to apply a Creative Commons license

You can license your work by marking it with the specific CC license you choose. This marking can be as simple as a bit of text stating the license in a copyright notice, or as complex as embedding the license information on your website using the HTML code associated with the particular license. We strongly recommend including a link to the applicable license (e.g., https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

What should I consider?

As a creator licensing a work, among other considerations, you should:

What do the icons mean?

The icons represent key features of the different CC license options:

Attribution Required (BY): Credit must be given to you, the creator.
Commercial Use Not Allowed (NC/NonCommercial): Only noncommercial use of your work is permitted. Noncommercial means not primarily intended for or directed towards commercial advantage or monetary compensation.
Distributed on Same Terms (SA/ShareAlike): Adaptations must be shared under the same terms.
Modifying Not Allowed (ND/NoDerivatives): No derivatives or adaptations of your work are permitted.

What if I have other questions?

You can find a full list of our frequently asked questions on our site.

If you would like peer support in learning the best way to utilize this resource or choosing the best legal tool for you, you can become a part of CC’s Community by filling out the Creative Commons Community Intake Form. You should receive an invitation to our chat platform, Zulip, in 5-10 business days..

Creative Commons

Choose a License for Your Work

CC0 1.0

CC0 1.0 Universal

CC-BY 4.0

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International

CC BY-SA 4.0

Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International

CC BY-ND 4.0

Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International

CC BY-NC 4.0

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International

CC BY-NC-SA 4.0

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International

CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International