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Free use FAQ

Can I use Rho for free? The 20 most common questions. In short: personal / academic / non-profit = free; for-profit company = needs commercial license (except for spec self-implementation).

Personal users

Q: My personal blog uses @rho/md to render my articles — free?

✅ Fully free. Personal projects aren't commercial.

Q: My personal portfolio adds interact demos to showcase my work — free?

✅ Free. Personal portfolio doesn't count as commercial.

Q: I install Rho desktop app on my personal computer to read my own notes — free?

✅ Free.

Q: I open a personal GitHub repo forking @rho/md and modify it for my own use — free?

✅ Free — as long as you don't commercially distribute the modified version. If you want to distribute publicly, retain the PolyForm NC license.

Q: I freelance privately for a client and use Rho in the project — free?

⚠️ Depends on your client.

  • Client is personal / academic / non-profit → ✅ Free
  • Client is a for-profit company → ✅ You personally use for free, but the final deliverable to a commercial client → Client needs commercial license (you should inform them)

Academic / education

Q: My university lab does a research project; the paper demo uses @rho/md — free?

✅ Free. Academic research is explicitly included.

Q: I teach a university course on Rho format / have students write Rho documents — free?

✅ Free. Teaching use.

Q: I run an open MOOC / Khan-Academy-style free online course; use Rho for interactive exercises — free?

✅ Free — if the platform doesn't charge (students learn for free). ⚠️ If the platform charges (Coursera paid specialization), it's commercial → needs license.

Q: My university tech transfer office spins off a research project into a startup — free?

✅ Free during the academic phase. ⚠️ Once the company is incorporated + commercially operating → needs commercial license (we usually offer transition licensing).

Non-profit / government

Q: My non-profit organization (registered charity / NGO) uses Rho in its web project — free?

✅ Free. Non-profit organizations are explicitly included in PolyForm NC 1.0.

Q: My government department uses Rho in an internal information system — free?

✅ Free. Government agencies fall in non-commercial scope.

Q: I run an open-source software project (no money) using @rho/md — free?

✅ Free. Open-source hobby projects don't constitute commercial use. Note: your project can't operationally productize Rho derivatives as a paid SaaS.

For-profit companies

Q: My startup has 2 people, no funding, no revenue; we use @rho/md for a product prototype — free?

⚠️ Technically needs license — but practically:

  • Trial phase (30-90 days) → in evaluation scope, OK
  • Productization / revenue generation → needs commercial license
  • We have startup-friendly pricing — email us: [email protected]

Q: My large company wants to integrate @rho/md into our internal dashboard — free?

❌ Needs commercial license. Internal tools / employee-facing products are commercial use. → Contact [email protected] for pricing.

Q: I run a SaaS; users write interactive docs with @rho/md — free?

❌ Needs commercial license. Any for-profit SaaS integration = commercial. → Contact [email protected].

Q: I npm install stl-md (current package name) for testing / write demos on my own computer — free?

✅ Free — that's evaluation. Even if your employer is a large company, you personally testing on your own computer isn't production commercial use.

Q: I'm a company developer testing Rho integration — free?

✅ Free — eval phase. Production deploy / customer-facing → needs license.

Spec route (bypass PolyForm NC)

Q: My commercial company wants to use Rho format but doesn't want to pay for a license — possible?

✅ Fully possible — implement a reader yourself instead of using @rho/md:

  • Rho format Spec is CC BY 4.0
  • Your reader implementation's license is yours (MIT / Apache / closed / commercial / anything)
  • You only need to attribute the spec in your docs: "Implements Rho format spec by scos-lab"

See Implementing your own reader.

Implementation effort: ~13 person-days (full spec implementation). If your engineering time is worth it, this is a reasonable option.

Q: I implement from spec + commercially deploy — free?

✅ Fully free — spec is CC BY 4.0.

Cloud (cloud.rho.md)

Q: I personally use cloud.rho.md to publicly share my notes — free?

✅ Free tier — personal public sharing is free.

Q: I want private sharing (URL not public) — free?

❌ Pro tier — private features are in Pro.

Q: My team uses cloud.rho.md for collaboration — free?

❌ Team tier.

Edge cases

Q: My personal blog has Google AdSense — still non-commercial?

⚠️ Gray area. Our stance:

  • Personal blog with occasional ads (< $500/year ad revenue) → personal, free
  • Ad revenue is your main / sideline income → commercial, needs license
  • When unsure → email [email protected]

Q: My open-source project's README uses Rho; readers download and use; the open-source project isn't commercial — free?

✅ Free. The open-source project itself is free → using Rho in README is non-commercial use.

Q: My company uses Rho for customer support KB (public free docs) — free?

❌ The company is itself for-profit → even if the KB is free, the company operating the KB is commercial → needs license.

Still not sure?

3-step decision:

  1. Am I a for-profit company? Yes → typically needs license (unless pure evaluation)
  2. Am I using the @rho/md library? Yes → PolyForm NC applies, refer to #1. No (self-implement) → fully free (CC BY)
  3. Am I using a paid cloud.rho.md tier? Yes → subscription fee regardless of commercial / personal

Still unsure → [email protected], tell us your use case + company nature, we reply within 24h to confirm.

See also