IDE licensing options
License Vault provides two IDE licensing options for your organization: prepaid and postpaid.
Your IDE licensing choice determines your billing schedule, price per license, and default license distribution settings. The table below compares the two options.
- FAQ: Can I use prepaid and postpaid IDE licensing in my IDE Services?
You can if you use the pay-as-you-go billing model. With this option, you get the best of both worlds. You can add your previously purchased IDE licenses to License Vault and then set up additional postpaid license pools. These postpaid pools will help you accommodate temporary peaks in license usage and allow you to provide licenses to new employees on the fly.
If you're using the prepaid billing model, postpaid licenses are not available.
- FAQ: Which IDE licensing option should I choose for my organization?
The choice between prepaid and postpaid IDE licensing depends on the specific needs of your organization:
Prepaid licensing is best suited for organizations with predictable license usage and budgets. You can take advantage of applicable discounts and benefit from optional features like Floating mode for broader access. However, you’ll pay for your IDE subscriptions upfront, even if you don’t use all of them during the billing period.
Postpaid licensing is ideal for teams with dynamic or unpredictable license needs. Licenses are supplied on demand and billed based on actual usage, ensuring 100% utilization. It includes Floating mode at no extra cost so there's no need to manually track and revoke unused licenses. All this makes it flexible and efficient for growing or fluctuating teams.
Combining prepaid and postpaid licensing is useful if your organization has both predictable and fluctuating usage needs. This way, you can benefit from prepaid licenses for steady usage and postpaid licenses for accommodating peaks or temporary spikes in demands.
Note that postpaid licenses are available only with the pay-as-you-go billing model.
Prepaid IDE licensing | Postpaid IDE licensing | |
|---|---|---|
Compatibility with IDE Services billing models | Available with the pay-as-you-go or prepaid billing models | Available with the pay-as-you-go billing model |
License management | License Vault distributes your previously purchased regular JetBrains licenses after you add them to the server | License Vault supplies IDE licenses automatically when your team needs them |
Billing schedule | Billed separately from IDE Services based on your standard IDE billing schedule | Billed quarterly or annually along with any other IDE Services products you use |
Price per IDE license | Standard monthly or yearly pricing with any discounts you're eligible for | Standard monthly pricing without discounts |
Optional If enabled, a 20% surcharge applies | Always on At no additional cost | |
5 revocations per month by default or Unlimited with Floating mode | Always unlimited | |
License utilization | Often below 100% You pay for your IDEs even when your team is not using them. You have to track your license usage and manually cancel unused subscriptions. | Always 100% License Vault provides licenses on demand and releases them when they are no longer in use. You only pay for your IDEs when your team actually needs them. |
Prepaid IDE licensing
If your organization already owns licenses for JetBrains tools, you can move them to License Vault and distribute them automatically.
How to start using prepaid licenses
To start using prepaid IDE licensing, simply add your licenses to the License Vault. Then share the IDE Services URL with your team. License Vault will automatically provide licenses to authorized users.
Additionally, you can make your prepaid licenses floating to quickly transfer them between users.
Postpaid IDE licensing
Postpaid IDE licensing allows you to use JetBrains IDEs without purchasing subscriptions upfront. License Vault supplies IDE licenses on demand exactly when your team needs them, and automatically frees up the licenses when they're not in use.
Postpaid IDE licensing can help you:
Easily get started with JetBrains tools. You don't need to pay for your subscriptions upfront or try to figure out how many of them your team might need. With postpaid licensing, you can get any number of licenses on demand.
Save money by using temporary postpaid licenses instead of buying annual subscriptions that might only be in use for a couple of weeks or months.
Save time by handling your subscription payments at the same time, at the end of the billing period, instead of going through tiresome paperwork for each individual license.
Scale your team quickly and seamlessly, providing licenses for new users on the fly.
Avoid interruptions to your team's work during peak usage times.
Consider using this feature if you do not yet have any subscriptions for JetBrains tools or want to take advantage of a more flexible licensing model.
- Can we use the postpaid licensing option for plugin licenses?
Postpaid licensing is available only for JetBrains IDE and .NET tool licenses. But you can distribute prepaid plugin licenses using License Vault.
How it works
From the user's perspective, a postpaid license is the same as a regular prepaid one. However, there are a couple of important differences from the administrator's point of view:
Postpaid billing: You pay for postpaid licenses at the end of the billing period in which you used them. If you didn't use any, there's no charge.
Floating mode: Postpaid licenses are always distributed in Floating mode. A postpaid license that is no longer in use is automatically released after 20 minutes.
In every other aspect, a postpaid license works just as a regular prepaid one would.
Start using postpaid IDE licensing
Make sure you are using the pay-as-you-go billing model for your entire IDE Services suite. Postpaid IDE licensing is not available for prepaid IDE Services instances.
Enable License Vault and, if necessary, set postpaid license limits. Refer to Manage IDE Services products for instructions.
Share the IDE Services URL with your team, and License Vault will automatically provide licenses to authorized users.