free license (self managed or on premise) no longer available?

[ATS_Tao]

a few of 3CX install we manage are on free standard license. I don't see any free license available apart from the hosted startup? is free license no longer available for self managed and on premise 3CX installs?

 

[lrosenman]

I currently have a 4SC Standard hosted here at the house (basically hobbyist) that expires on

03/27/2023 4:26:54 PM If I try to renew it, it wants $150. Will it autorenew and continue to work as is?

 

[SnakeRiverWebDevelopment]

@Nick Galea has stated, not to worry your 4SC Standard will continue to work for at least 1 more year.

 

[thomasdb]

@Nick Galea i tried adding an install on amazon, in a micro ec2 instance this is 45 € per year to have online with 100 gb of data available monthly.. plenty for pbx. - then it is ( was ) cloud but less configurable, as the 3cx self hosted
evenif self hosted one costs more to run on electricity, it handles local ata's easy.
i do have routerphones available but cloud independence is great, been using VPN in to reach the pbx to the local ip of the instance that works even over a 4g connection without ports open over cloudflare zero trust at the local instance lan address. ( zero trust also free for limited use) thus then the call log is available locally or without my main modem being up
stil
please make/keep a 1sc available for local , for symbolic price even after if possible.
thanks for informing us the 4sc goes for now to 2024 already, that leaves some less worries for a while.

i recently have tested a 3cx free -cloud instance with routerphone and was able to sucessfully manually provision a fritz!box ata on an extension number over the routerphone , telling the system the ata is a fanvil. so if the licence would stop i won't be dead in the water, only with les comfort , like not being able to look at the logs if something does not work, and the ata not showing as being ' up ' albeit being funtional. that and i have not succeeded in setting my voip number as a trunk and making it connect (what worked fine from a self hosted )

 

[N_G]

Yes it makes sense to have some kind of license for experimentation. Our current thinking is that we will give a free license if you finish basic or intermediate certification. Give us some time to think about it

Keep in mind that these very small amazon instances will not be enough even for a 10 user setup and pbx and web server will struggle to deliver a quality experience because there simply isnt enough memory

 

[mcsphones]

Thanks @Nick Galea for reading and responding to these questions. While a great majority of our 3CX customer installs are Pro or higher, we do have a few "free" ones. Many are non-profit - think churches, clothing shelters, counseling centers, etc. - but some are regular businesses, but just plain small. It's these "regular" ones that shouldn't have a problem paying for a small, cheap license for 3CX annually, and the "truly free" customers like those non-profits can keep doing their thing.

 

[zo_fo_draziw]

I was finally getting close to having time to put my on-prem free license to use at home after a few months, but am now reluctant to proceed.

The intercom/paging feature page states that, "The intercom feature along with paging, for easy one-way announcements to ring groups, is included for free in all 3CX licenses." This is what got me started on 3CX to begin with. This is also not true, based on what I learned after chatting with support about the inconsistency of the information on the feature page compared to the full feature matrix, which indicates intercom is available with pro or above only. I feel disappointed.

I think it would be really helpful to potential users if the company would invest some additional effort in aligning the marketing and website information across the product tiers and features to address inconsistencies and make the language clearer about what exactly is free, for which products, and for how long.

 

[Cortexian]

Add me to the boat of confused users that are currently using on-premise equipment with no third party involved other than my VoIP provider. I'm running my own virtualized instance of 3CX on-premise/self-hosted on my own server hardware in my home-lab for testing purposes. I run a (very) small business where I occasionally do contract work and take on select clients that I know well and may need some IT help, but I have never installed or sold them on a PBX system as I'm not familiar enough with it yet (working through the certification in 3CX Academy).

I see there was mentioned that a free license may be issued for people that complete the certifications, and I love this idea. It would also cut down on the amount of community and forum support is required, as it will force people into some mandatory education if they even want to dabble...

That said, I'm already setup and getting a message saying I will expire on 05/28/2023. I'm not in a financial situation where I can pay more than say $50 a month on expenses like this that don't earn me anything.

Do I have terminal access to a Startup Free instance? I have several older VoIP devices I have accumulated and that were once supported but are no longer. To even get these partially working in 3CX I need to edit configs and various other files in the install that I wouldn't be able to do if there's no terminal access to the host. If that's the case, Startup Free wouldn't be an option for me either.

Bottom-line, it doesn't make much sense to me that a hosted instance like Startup Free will continue to be available while someone like me, providing my own on-premise hardware, electricity, infrastructure, network, etc will be forced into paying? I feel like for someone in my situation, it's better for everyone financially if you come up with a license option for on-premise free. I'm not utilizing any resources on a third party cloud provider or on 3CX if I'm on-premise.

 

[SweetAction]

I'm not in a financial situation where I can pay more than say $50 a month on expenses like this that don't earn me anything.

How about $12.09 a month?

Do I have terminal access to a Startup Free instance?

Nope. Not even Hosted do you have access to the terminal or underlying file system.

 

[Cortexian]

How about $12.09 a month?


Nope. Not even Hosted do you have access to the terminal or underlying file system.

Where are you seeing something that would work-out to $12.09 per month? Everything I can see for licensing is at least $17+. I'll be honest, the 3CX website is very misleading and confusing regarding pricing, plans, what is included, etc. 3 pages will have 3 different pieces of info and the more I look into this, the more confused I am getting.

Terminal and file system access is a requirement for me as a tinkerer/home-labber. One of the main reasons I was drawn to on-premises.

 

[SteveITS]

The 4 SC Pro license is US $145/year without hosting: https://www.3cx.com/ordering/pricing/pricelist/

 

[Jim.Lloyd]

Add me to the boat of confused users...

I am in a similar situation. That being said, doing a search on my sparse forum participation will bring up an earlier post where I justified paying $145 for a year of Professional (about 12.08/mo) will let me finish my last year of my SIP contract that has a base monthly rate of $50.

So, in the scheme of things, I figure that 3CX is providing a professional service that they should be compensated for. Even though my free license is extended to the end of the year, my SIP contract ends in June of next year. To line up with the contract, I am choosing to buy a year of 3CX. That is a heck of a bargain considering that I will have been using it for 3 years. That averages out to roughly $4.03 per month. Awesome!

Yes, Start Up! has a list of supporting SIP companies to choose from. My current provider is not on the list, so I need to find if one of them will be adequate for my use. BTW: I recently retired and use it for my residential phone. It took me a while to find a provider willing to go residential. I may end up porting back to my ISP, which will be sucky for me.

 

[Cortexian]

So my trial license has expired, what are my options for a free On-Premise license now? I can't find any sensible links to follow to replace the license key with the "free" On-Premise version?

 

[SweetAction]

So my trial license has expired, what are my options for a free On-Premise license now? I can't find any sensible links to follow to replace the license key with the "free" On-Premise version?

Currently no On Prem FREE version exists for new installations/customers. 3CX says Startup FREE is the only offer currently available for free.

a 4SC Pro, at $145/yr (so $12.09/m roughly) is the cheapest on prem license (you mentioned needing terminal access, so onprem/self host) that you can get.

 

[Cepto]

Yes it makes sense to have some kind of license for experimentation. Our current thinking is that we will give a free license if you finish basic or intermediate certification. Give us some time to think about it

@Nick Galea
Is this still an idea? I really appreciate this. I'm just a private user / computer nerd without any business use case. A simple 2SC variant would be enough for me. I don't have a free license since I was too late now. :-( But 145 $ would be too much for my private hobby as I don't have so much calls here.
I cannot use the StartUP stuff since my (German) VoIP provider allows registration on my fiber connection only - also I don't like cloud usage.

 

[Jim.Lloyd]

Yes it makes sense to have some kind of license for experimentation. Our current thinking is that we will give a free license if you finish basic or intermediate certification. Give us some time to think about it

Keep in mind that these very small amazon instances will not be enough even for a 10 user setup and pbx and web server will struggle to deliver a quality experience because there simply isnt enough memory

Nick, that would be awesome if you do this! Having recently retired and being stuck through May 2024 on a Broadvoice contract, that would be a financial advantage for me. I have a fancy PBX on my home line, at least for a year I have taken the tests under three different emails, one for a previous employer.

3CX still deserves $145 from me for the utility I have enjoyed, but my retirement income is much less than my working income was.

 

[ajohnson443]

I've been using the self-managed free version for a long time for my home phone and small business. By small business, I mean 1 employee (myself). The 3CX system allows my little one man show to appear to be more than it is to callers with digital attendant and custom greetings.

It began as just a hobby to learn but I became reliant upon it always being there, rock solid, never failing. A dusty little Shuttle MicroPC running 3CX Linux sitting on a shelf.

Sadly, my license expired 2 months ago and I can't refresh. Oh well, I suppose the free ride is over, all good things come to an end eventually

I just setup the Free forever hosted last night and am slowly getting it setup again (luckily I took full advantage of the regular backup of my Linux system so I still have all the VM files, recordings etc..).

It's a little different, but a lot is the same. Mainly I am having trouble getting used to not have that full, behind the scenes access but I am figuring it out.

I just want to thank 3CX for offering the absolute best product out there for a small business, and doing it for FREE! I have enjoyed the product for years and I know there are at least a couple of people using it based on my recommendation.

So, thanks again 3CX!

Anthony Johnson
Service Disabled Small Business Owner
Tony's T-Shirt Co.
+1 904-239-3616
https://www.tonystshirts.com

 

[uuuuu]

Even with all of these posts, there is still some confusion. A year ago, I got the on-premises free-forever license. Now, it is said in the above posts that it is only through 12-2024? What happened to free-forever?

Also, the website still says this today, direct copy and paste:
Get 3CX - Absolutely Free!
Link up your team and customers Phone System Live Chat Video Conferencing
Hosted or Self-managed. Up to 10 users free forever.

That last line:
Hosted or Self-managed. Up to 10 users free forever.

Isn't the "Self-managed" the on-premises version? And it still says free forever??? Yet it isn't????

 

[SweetAction]

Even with all of these posts, there is still some confusion. A year ago, I got the on-premises free-forever license. Now, it is said in the above posts that it is only through 12-2024? What happened to free-forever?

Also, the website still says this today, direct copy and paste:
Get 3CX - Absolutely Free!
Link up your team and customers Phone System Live Chat Video Conferencing
Hosted or Self-managed. Up to 10 users free forever.

That last line:
Hosted or Self-managed. Up to 10 users free forever.

Isn't the "Self-managed" the on-premises version? And it still says free forever??? Yet it isn't????

3CX can always change anything they want and have done so in the past many times. Everything below is correct as I understand it today, but again, can change.

Simply put, the old version is not free forever, as it currently stands it will expire at some point before 2025.

The current "free forever" is for Startup, which is only available as hosted and not on prem. It's also licensed by user and not by simultaneous calls - 10 users on the free edition.

I understand how the website wording is confusing, please don't shoot the messenger, I'm simply explaining what the current state is of 3CX's free offering.

 

[MarkyMark69]

Add me to the confused list, We are currently a Bronze Partner - We self host everything, its the way we like it. Never put a support ticket in since we started working with 3CX - Our goal as a customer is to expand our 3CX operation, getting our larger clients to switch over. We dont make millions, but its worth the effort.

Part of the reason we choose 3CX - is the fact it allows us to provide the smaller busineses 1-4 users there own PBX at a competetive price point compared to BT and other service providers - We kind of see it as a way for us to generate a little bit of revenue - and as these companies grow we can move them onto the paid for versions.

If we now have to purchase at $145 we can no longer be competative. So simply wont bother. OK fair enough I have not explored the 3cx hosted version - It may well work for us. But in all honesty its so much simpler jsut having everything in one place.

I may just point out on the 3CX website it still says free for life 'Hosted by 3CX or Self-Managed in private cloud or on-premise'

This is what i have been working too and if I have received notification of the changes i must admit I have not seen them.

In this forum someone said Bronze and Silver partners will still be able to self host and have the free license within reason, Is this true and what are the terms.

 

[SweetAction]

3CX will tell you to use Startup for those 1-4 user cases for free.

I personally don't understand how a $12.09/month subscription doesn't allow you to be competitive, but I don't know your buisness.

For bronze, 5 free licenses are allowed - see the bottom of this page: https://www.3cx.com/blog/news/4sc-free-subscription/