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MIT License

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Also known as MIT, Expat License

permissive free software license

Key facts

Publisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Spdx identifier
MIT, (see list for more)
Debian fsg compatible
Yes
Fsf approved
Yes
Osi approved
Yes
Gpl compatible
Yes
Copyleft
No
Linking from code with a different licen
Yes

via Wikipedia infobox

Wikidata facts

Said to be same as
X11 license
Show 13 more facts
PyPI trove classifier
License :: OSI Approved :: MIT License
approved by
الجميع
inception
1984-01-00
publication date
1988-01-01
work available at URL
opensource.org/licenses/MIT
topic has template
Template:MIT
has edition or translation
X11 license
operating system
macOS
short name
MIT
Commons category
MIT licenses
name
MIT License
Sources (12)

via Wikidata · CC0

~12 min read

Encyclopedic overview

The MIT License is a permissive software license originating at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the late 1980s. As a permissive license, it puts few restrictions on reuse and has high license compatibility.

Unlike copyleft software licenses, the MIT License allows reuse within proprietary software, provided that all copies of the software or its substantial portions include a copy of the terms of the MIT License and also a copyright notice. In 2015 and from at least 2020 through 2025, the MIT License was the most popular software license on GitHub.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “MIT License” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.