About Combining Licenses

Explains which network licenses can and cannot be combined.

The reason for combining network licenses is to support multiple Autodesk products running on the same network. At the time you purchase and register one or more products, Autodesk issues a license file for that product or products. If you later purchase additional products, Autodesk issues a license file for the new set of products. Combining the two license files enables you to run all the products on the same network.

When you combine two license files, you copy the bottom part of one file (everything after the VENDOR line) and append it to the contents of the other file. The resulting file has two INCREMENT sections. The file also has a PACKAGE section for each license purchased on Subscription.

The issue date in each license file is very important. If the two license files contain different issue dates, and there are some products that exist in both files, the versions issued earlier will be superseded by the later versions, with the result that the total number of licenses is reduced.

License files that can be combined

• Licenses for different Autodesk products, such as Revit and Showcase, regardless of the version.
• Licenses for different versions of the same product, such as Revit 2013 and Revit 2014.

License files to avoid combining

• Multiple licenses for the same product and version, issued on different dates. For example, if I have 12 AutoCAD 2014 licenses and later purchase 8 more licenses for the same product, the 8 later ones supersede 8 of the earlier ones, and I have access to 12 licenses, not 20.
• License files for a package (multiple versions of a product) and for a specific product that is included in the package. For example, if I have a new package license for Building Design Suite 2011 through 2014, and I combine this with an older single license for Revit 2013, the older Revit license is cancelled, superseded by the version in the suite.
• License files for two suites that have products in common and different issue dates. In this case, the older product licenses for previous versions of products are superseded by the newer ones. For example, combining license files for 2014 package versions of Building Design Suite and Product Design Suite would result in canceling the licenses in one suite for 2011–2013 versions of products common to both suites, such as 3ds Max Design, AutoCAD, and Navisworks Manage.

To avoid losing access to licenses as a result of combining license files, contact Autodesk Support and request a new license file that includes all of the licenses you want to combine. This new license file will have a single issue date for all product licenses, which prevents any of them from superseding earlier licenses.