Following a licence application, licences can be purchased according to the license pricing scheme, negotiated or, in exceptional cases, granted for free.

You do not need a licence to use UDC if:

• you apply UDC schedule content for information and knowledge organization from a copy of a publication (printed or CD-ROM) or by accessing an authorised UDC online service
• you manually apply the UDC (i.e. there is no use of the UDC MRF) for organizing and indexing of resources for the purpose of document/shelf arrangement, organization of information gateways and library catalogue and in information retrieval where UDC numbers may appear as a part of your document labels or resource description.

You do need a licence to:

1. Publish the UDC system, either complete or any selections or parts of it, in any language, media, territory and period of time. The concept of publication, also referred to as ‘edition’, applies to any form of reproduction and distribution of UDC schedules, either for free or on a commercial basis, suitable for end-users, either professionals or open public. [terms | price | application]
2. Use the UDC Master Reference File (MRF) data for:
   • pre-publication work, that is, for all the work needed to prepare an UDC edition, before actual publishing, e.g., executing the translation. [terms | price | application]
   • internal reference purposes on a local system for use internally within the organization, or for loading classification data in a given information system. [terms | price | application]
   • institutional research projects of any kind, notably to explore the potential of UDC in particular uses, new services, etc. [terms | price | application]
   • educational purposes, i.e. in library schools and other similar organizations. [terms | price | application]
   • personal use, e.g., individual study and research on UDC. [terms | price | application]