N8n licensing model

Questions
1

Hello everyone,

I have a question regarding the n8n licensing model. My company has developed a small tool for processing and managing documents (order confirmations, invoices, delivery notes). For extracting the information, we are currently using an OCR solution that we are not entirely satisfied with. We would like to handle the entire process — from retrieving the files from emails, to extracting the information from PDFs, and transferring the information into an SQL database — using n8n.

In this context, n8n should be self-hosted at the customer’s premises. The customer should also be able to enter their own credentials, for example for OpenAI. We then further process the extracted data in SQL and later visualize the results in a dashboard.

In summary:

  • n8n will be self-hosted by the customer

  • The n8n workflow should retrieve attachments from emails, read the content of the attachments, and write the results into an SQL database

  • The data will be processed in SQL and later visualized in a dashboard

For our tool, we would continue to charge our customers a monthly fee.

Can anyone tell me which n8n license we would need for this project, and whom I could contact regarding this?
Unfortunately, all my attempts to contact n8n directly regarding my question have been unsuccessful. I’m therefore posting it here in the hope of getting an answer.

Many thanks in advance and best regards,
Marcell

2

Hi @perz_mschneider

Because n8n is hosted by the customer and you basically provided workflows which you charge monthly for this should be all fine within the fair code license of n8n.

3

Because n8n is hosted by the customer and you basically provided workflows which you charge monthly for this should be all fine within the fair code license of n8n.

Hi BramKn, thanks for your fast answer. But wouldn’t the monthly fee for the workflow fall under commercial use?
Here is the excerpt from the SUL:

Sustainable Use License permits:

  • Free use, modification, creation of derivative works, and distribution – but only for internal business purposes or personal / non-commercial use

  • No use aimed at enabling others (customers, third parties) to access or derive commercial benefit, even if the software is self-hosted

  • Distribution only free of charge and non-commercial

  • License or copyright notices may not be removed or obscured

4

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