5 $ license ( legacy codebase)

[dlong500]

We appreciate the feedback. Not only was our internal $5 license (among other internal licenses) an extreme discount at the time (>80%) we stuck to that price for 20 solid years without any adjustments, even as the market, inflation, and tech landscapes shifted dramatically.

That’s an unheard-of span for a software license, especially at that price point, and something we’re really proud to have offered.

But, all software offerings have their lifecycle, and no license—whether it’s $5 or $1,000/month—will go on forever. This change isn’t about forgetting our roots or undervaluing our partners; it’s about adapting to ensure we can continue in a sustainable way.

For context, over the years, our competitors have consistently adjusted prices, structures, or products, while we’ve kept this going a long time without interruptions. We wish we could maintain that forever, but realistically, it’s not something we can sustain indefinitely.

If fair, modern pricing feels like a shock, it's because our old pricing was such an incredible deal for so long—highlighting just how exceptional the value has been over the past 20 years.

I get what you are saying in regards to the "internal" licensing, but I feel like the retail lifetime customers are just ignored in all of these discussions. I paid for two $299 lifetime licenses just so I could not run into issues when upgrading/transferring my single server. I'm also a very small time host that only ever used the software to host a 15 or so websites as a courtesy to clients with whom I have/had a business relationship. I was never "reselling" DA accounts for the general public or hosting an insanely large number of users. I thought that at my price point the software offered good value (even with the double license purchase) for my small usage. And despite you talking about nothing lasting forever, the license was ABSOLUTELY advertised that way. I think a lot of the frustration would go away if you either just kept basic legacy support going for OS/php/webservers/database upgrades -OR- offered a limited free plan (only for legacy lifetime license holders) that allowed 20 or so users/websites.

 

[klasje]

I agree that DA should never be abused in any way.
But you should have just raised prices for datacenter licensing or something, they would have just billed it forward to their own clients...
Now you are just damaging da's reputation, this could have been avoided.

Fyi: I'm no datacenter and I have no datacenter license, I'm one of those regular private lifetime license holders, hosting about 15 sites as well.
The only reason I'm defending datacenter licensing is because I believe it can help DA in the future.
Destroying the relationship with all datacenters is a bit a harsh reaction...
Just raise the price untill you feel appreciated.
Eg:
28$ forced end client price, 14$ datacenter purchase price. 50-50 seems like a good partnership and the client gets 1$ discount.
Better then just stealing their clients ;-)

 

[Richard G]

the license was ABSOLUTELY advertised that way.

This still doesn't mean that in businesses it would be lifetime as "until you die" which is uncommon practice in ICT land, especially for kindlike software.
Also, how long did you make use of the license? Last one sold was in 2019, so you have 5 years of using (and it still works), so earned it already back and more, compared to the normal prices.

We are all in the same boat, we have 6 licenses, all external ones like you have and also a small time hosting company. Just a bit more customers.

You can both convert your license to a full monthlyl license for 15/month.

Compare to what other panels and software are doing.
And no, datacenter licensing can for sure not help DA in the future, because datacenters don't want to pay anymore and also it was not a lot of help to DA in the past, see my previous arguments about that.
Again, it's more like datacenters are stealing DA's clients than the other way around. They profited for years, and still making al ot of money of their licenses while DA is earning nothing from them. So saying DA is stealing is BS.

 

[dlong500]

This still doesn't mean that in businesses it would be lifetime as "until you die" which is uncommon practice in ICT land, especially for kindlike software.
Also, how long did you make use of the license? Last one sold was in 2019, so you have 5 years of using (and it still works), so earned it already back and more, compared to the normal prices.

We are all in the same boat, we have 6 licenses, all external ones like you have and also a small time hosting company. Just a bit more customers.

You can both convert your license to a full monthlyl license for 15/month.

Compare to what other panels and software are doing.
And no, datacenter licensing can for sure not help DA in the future, because datacenters don't want to pay anymore and also it was not a lot of help to DA in the past, see my previous arguments about that.
Again, it's more like datacenters are stealing DA's clients than the other way around. They profited for years, and still making al ot of money of their licenses while DA is earning nothing from them. So saying DA is stealing is BS.

I'm not making any argument in regards to internal/data center licenses. As I stated before I feel like all the discussion keeps getting redirected back to the previous dirt cheap internal licenses which are something I never used. I'm not really making any profit from the use of DA either--just using it as a convenience for the small amount of hosting I do as a courtesy. Even at $15 a month that would be money coming out of my pocket (forever), and there's absolutely no guarantee (as you've already stated) that things won't change again in the future. For my small hosting needs if nothing changes at DA I'll just be riding it out until EOL for software support then I'll switch Webmin/Virtualmin or just roll my own. Honestly at this point if all you're doing is websites it's really not that hard to just manually configure the stuff and get first class support with official distribution packages for all the components.

 

[klasje]

For my hobby, basically it forces me to become a hosting provider, meaning:
directadmin: 29$/month
whmcs: 25$/month
a theme: 400$/year
= 1048$ / year income I would need to start generating at least, ignoring the server costs etc

Honestly, the biggest part that is missing for me in directadmin is a proper sales and invoicing system.
But I doubt any of the other systems like webmin or plesk have this.

I understand now that the relation with datacenters is burnt down and cannot be repaired already from what I read.
I doubt all of them are that evil, but anyway.
DA will definately win with this in the short term, let's hope also in the long term.

 

[Richard G]

Even at $15 a month that would be money coming out of my pocket (forever)

You are a bit late. As said I'm also having 6 external licenses, so no internal datacenter licenses. But we already had a very very long thread with discussions about this. It's no use to start that again.
Just look around and see that it's not unfair what DA is doing, there is not a single other company where you can get this kind of deal what we all have had, internal or external.

And as stated, if you go back to MariaDB 10.5 then the OS (Alma 9) supports it until 2032, so if nothing else changes, you can at least use the license then until 2032.
There are more company's which will switch to free panels, it's a choice. And there is also another newcomer of professional panel which counts a certain price per domain.
Compared to the other professional panels DA has done a great job without price raises for many years. Check the other ones, no other did.

For my hobby, basically it forces me to become a hosting provider, meaning:

Why? If it's a hobby and you're no hosting provider, you can have a license of 5/month for 10 domains. A hobbyist normally has no more domains.
Next to that if you're a hoster, you can upgrade your lifetime license and from external lifetime it will be 15/month, not 29.

Honestly, the biggest part that is missing for me in directadmin is a proper sales and invoicing system.

Sorry? There is not a single professional panel which has a sales and invoicing system. This has always been some external software, like AWS or WHMCS or cheaper ones. And no other panels don't have this either and won't be doing it for the near future either.

 

[Ohm J]

@klasje
hosting provider only paid to DA License, other thing like billing system, theme,..., you can create by yourself.

if other thing are too much for you, just hire IT staff, it will lower price than renting software from somewhere.