What is MIT License?

History

The MIT License originated at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in the 1980s as part of the development of the X Window System. It was designed to be simple, permissive, and free of restrictions.

Timeline:

• 1980s — First MIT license texts appear at MIT
• 1998 — Open Source Initiative (OSI) officially approves MIT License
• 2010s — Becomes the #1 most popular license on GitHub
• Today — Used by millions of open-source projects worldwide

Plain Language Explanation

✅ What MIT License ALLOWS

📌 What you MUST do

Include the original copyright notice and the MIT License text in all copies or substantial portions of the software.

❌ What MIT does NOT provide

• No warranty of any kind
• No patent protection (use Apache 2.0 for that)
• No trademark rights

Two Variants of MIT License

Official License Text

 1
 2
 3
 4
 5
 6
 7
 8
 9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21

MIT License

Copyright (c) [YEAR] [AUTHOR]

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all
copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN
THE SOFTWARE.

Paragraph-by-Paragraph Breakdown

“Permission is hereby granted…”

We give you the right to use this code for free.

"…to deal in the Software without restriction…"

Do whatever you want with it — use, copy, sell, modify.

"…subject to the following conditions…"

There’s just one condition below.

“The above copyright notice shall be included…”

You must keep the original author’s name and this license text.

“THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED ‘AS IS’…”

We’re not responsible if something breaks. Use at your own risk.

SPDX Identifier

When specifying MIT License in code files, use the SPDX identifier:

1
2

# SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT
# Copyright (c) 2026 Your Name

1
2

// SPDX-License-Identifier: MIT
// Copyright (c) 2026 Your Name

Quick Reference