Licensing
XChain Platform is open source, dual-licensed under:
- GNU Affero General Public License v3.0 (AGPL-3.0) — free for everyone, forever.
- A commercial license — for companies that want to keep proprietary modifications private.
You may use XChain under either license, whichever fits you.
The short version
| If you… | License | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Use XChain personally, for research, or education | AGPL-3.0 | Free |
| Run XChain unmodified (even inside a company) | AGPL-3.0 | Free |
| Modify XChain and share your changes under AGPL | AGPL-3.0 | Free |
| Modify XChain and want to keep your changes private/proprietary | Commercial | Paid |
| Embed XChain in a closed-source product | Commercial | Paid |
Free use (AGPL-3.0)
XChain is genuinely open source. Under the AGPL you can, at no cost:
- Read all of the source code.
- Run XChain anywhere — personally or inside a for-profit company.
- Modify it and self-host your version.
- Distribute it and contribute improvements back.
The AGPL asks one main thing in return: if you modify XChain and run it as a service for others over a network, you must make your modified source code available to those users under the AGPL. Share-alike. You also keep the attribution and the NOTICE file.
When you need a commercial license
The AGPL’s share-your-changes requirement is exactly what some companies can’t accept — they want to build private, proprietary features on top of XChain and not publish them. That’s fine: buy a commercial license and the copyleft obligation is lifted.
So: the open-source version is free and always will be. You only pay if you want to keep your modifications private.
Contact legal@dankest.llc for commercial licensing.
FAQ
Is this really open source? Yes. The AGPL-3.0 is an OSI-approved open-source license. Anyone can read, run, modify, and share XChain for free.
Can a for-profit company use XChain for free? Yes — if they run it unmodified, or if they’re willing to open-source their modifications under the AGPL. They only need a commercial license to keep modifications private.
I just want to run a node / wallet / explorer. Do I pay anything? No. That’s free under the AGPL.
We want to fork XChain, add proprietary features, and run it as our own private service. Is that free? You can — under the AGPL, if you publish your modified source to your users. If you want to keep those modifications private, you need a commercial license.
Can I call my deployment “XChain”? The software license lets you run the code; it does not grant rights to the XChain name or brand. See TRADEMARK.md.
This page is a plain-language summary for convenience. The binding documents are the AGPL-3.0 LICENSE and any signed commercial agreement; if anything here conflicts with them, they control.