One shared text for every project.
Read the terms, understand how they work, and find the exact file a project would use.
Purpose Source License 1.0 was published on
2026-10-01 by the Purpose Source Association. It is the text a project adopts: the canonical plain text, unchanged.
Its SPDX listing is requested; until it is listed, files name it LicenseRef-PurposeSource-1.0. A project keeps the terms of the licence version it chose; publication of a later
text does not replace those terms automatically.
Read the licence.
Go straight to the full text, or take the exact file. Each address is permanent.
- Purpose Source License 1.0: the full text, its SHA-256 and its status.
- The canonical plain text: the file a project commits, unchanged.
- Metadata: its publication date, SPDX status and hash, as JSON.
- In plain English: what the licence says, in everyday words. It explains the text and changes nothing; the licence text governs.
Four years from each software release.
The licence makes each version of a project's software available under Apache-2.0 four years after the project publishes that version. A later software release starts its own clock.
Publishing the licence text does not start one shared countdown for every project. The four-year period is common; the dates depend on the software releases.
Existing releases keep their terms
A new licence version is a choice for future releases. It does not rewrite the terms on code already published.
The English text governs
Annotations and translations are non-authoritative reading aids. They do not change its terms; the canonical English text is the reference.
Where this text comes from
The public licence repository holds the published text of the licence. This website stores an exact copy with a SHA-256 hash. Every build checks that copy and, where the copy is pinned to an upstream commit or tag, compares it with the text there byte for byte.
Each build checks GitHub for published releases with the required version manifest. It verifies the release's exact commit and text hash before adding a new version. A version's status comes from that manifest — working draft, published by the Association, or issued by counsel; a GitHub release alone makes no draft a licence. Published text keeps its permanent URL and hash.
The pages are generated from verified local copies. If GitHub is temporarily unavailable, a previously verified cache can keep the build available; newer releases will appear after the next successful sync and website publication.
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