Best License Management Software of 2026

What is license management software?

License management software is a tool that helps asset and information technology (IT) management professionals keep track of all their software licenses (also known as SaaS licenses). It monitors the license usage, distribution, and ownership details to stay compliant with licensing rules and avoid overpaying for unnecessary licenses. 

The IT asset management software alerts users about license agreement renewals, preventing service disruption due to expired agreements. This helps businesses avoid penalties related to licensing agreement breaches while also saving money by identifying underutilized or unused licenses that can be reallocated elsewhere within the business.

What are the core features of license management software?

• License inventory: Keep a detailed record of all software licenses owned or used by an organization. This feature provides information on the software deployment type, purchase date, expiry date, and terms of use. It helps avoid legal complications related to non-compliance with a licensing agreement and assists in making informed purchasing decisions based on usage data.

• Compliance management: Ensure adherence to software licensing agreements and regulations, preventing legal issues or fines. Software license compliance management features monitor license usage and simplify audits by providing detailed reports on an organization's current state of licenses. This helps stay compliant with vendor-specific licensing rules.

What are the benefits of using license management software?

• Reduces risk of non-compliance: A software license management system automatically tracks software licenses, ensuring every application in use is properly licensed. It tracks and manages licenses, alerts when they're near expiry, prevents overuse violations, and provides evidence for audits. This prevents misuse of licenses, which can lead to costly fines for breaching the terms of service agreements.

• Optimizes software investments: The software enables businesses to prevent over-licensing and under-utilization by providing a clear view of owned, used, and unused licenses. This helps businesses reallocate software applications more effectively into other important areas of business operations, leading to significant cost savings in software investment.

• Simplifies software audit: A license management solution automatically documents detailed reports on license usage, compliance status, and unauthorized installations. This makes it easier for auditors to verify compliance with licensing agreements, reducing the risk of non-compliance penalties. It also saves time managing these records manually, allowing asset managers to focus on other critical tasks.

What are the potential issues with license management software?

• Inefficient renewal process: If the selected software license manager doesn't effectively monitor and notify about impending expiration dates, users may find themselves unable to access their licensed tools when in need. This could disrupt business continuity and productivity due to unexpected downtime while renewing licenses manually. Additionally, it could also result in unnecessary costs if licenses are renewed late due to the involvement of cumbersome procedures.

• Incorrect allocation: Incorrect allocation occurs when licenses are not correctly distributed among users or devices, leading to compliance issues with a software license agreement and possible financial penalties for over-usage. This can lead businesses to purchase more licenses than needed due to inaccurate tracking results and imply unnecessary expenses.

• Vendor complexity: Dealing with multiple software vendors and license formats, each with varying terms and conditions, adds another layer of complexity to the license management process. Integrating and standardizing this data into a single system can be time-consuming and costly. Inconsistent licensing data from different vendors can lead to incomplete or inaccurate reporting, affecting the ability to make informed decisions about license compliance and cost optimization.

How much does license management software cost?

Most software license manager software products are priced “per month” basis, and their entry-level pricing plan ranges from $2.5 to $66.25+*. An enterprise product priced higher may include additional features such as advanced security configurations, purchase orders, automation rules, and scheduled reports. 

*The pricing included is for the entry-level/lowest-priced offerings found on vendor websites as of Feb. 07, 2024.

What is license management software used for?

A software licensing management system centralizes all licenses and software-related documents for software asset management professionals to accurately track the renewal dates, monitor compliance, and optimize usage costs. However, the software can have multiple use cases based on the data fed into the system and the tool's features leveraged. Some of them are:

• License protection: A license management system prevents unauthorized duplication and distribution of software products. Copy or license protection safeguards intellectual property rights by using encryption, digital signatures, or license keys to restrict usage, copying, or modification beyond set rules allowed in the terms of the purchase agreement.

• Software bundling: License management software allows the bundling of different software products and services into a single package. This simplifies the distribution process, allowing multiple licenses to be sold as one product suite or bundle—making it easier for customers to purchase several related items at once.

• License tracking: The tool monitors and manages the software license usage within a business. License tracking helps avoid non-compliance with licensing agreements by keeping track of active, expired, or near-expiry licenses, thereby ensuring efficient software asset management. It also identifies underutilized licenses that could be reassigned rather than purchasing new ones to optimize costs to the business.

Which software tools integrate with license management software?

A license management tool integrates with various solutions for data export and import. We looked across thousands of reviews from the software users to identify the products that the users frequently mentioned they integrated with their tools:

• ManageEngine ServiceDesk Plus help desk software integrates with a license management system to provide the help desk or service desk agents access to licensing issues causing user problems. This helps speed the query resolution time and enhance customer satisfaction. The integrated systems trigger automatic license checks during ticket creation, alerting agents for potential compliance issues or nearing expiration. 

• Microsoft Azure virtual machine software integrates with license management software to centralize and track licenses related to the business-owned virtual machines. The integrated system automatically discovers and tracks licenses deployed across all virtual machines, including individual and bundled licenses across the virtual machine environment. Asset managers can leverage this integration to identify underutilized licenses and reallocate them to optimize cost and avoid non-compliance due to over-deployment.

• Drake Tax is a tax practice management software that integrates with a license management tool to identify underutilized licenses of software assets at a tax practice and eliminate them to avoid paying unnecessary fees. The integrated systems track software license usage across the practice to inform future investments and negotiate better deals with vendors. This also frees time for the tax professionals at the practice to focus on more strategic work.

• FastSpring ecommerce software integration with a software license management tool allows businesses to sell software products online. Customers can purchase licenses directly through the online store and receive instant access to their software and license keys. They can also manage their software assets and licenses, helping view usage data, activate new licenses, or request upgrades through a self-service portal. 

• WordPress website builder software integrates with license management software to manage all website builder licenses (themes, plugins, etc.) in a centralized system alongside other software licenses. Asset or website managers can automatically assign and deploy licenses to new websites or updates and manage user access and permissions for different team members.

We identified these integrations mentioned most often in verified reviews of license management software published on Software Advice within the past two years (as of Feb. 07, 2024).

Key considerations when purchasing license management software

• Verify the capabilities for compliance reporting. Compliance reporting is a key aspect of license management as it ensures that all software complies with licensing regulations, preventing legal issues and fines. An ideal license management software should easily generate compliance reports to help organizations monitor their license usage effectively and adhere to terms and conditions.

• Assess multiple license management. Managing multiple licenses can be complex, but managing these in license management software can help prevent unauthorized usage and ensure compliance with licensing agreements. It should allow tracking, allocating, reallocating, and recovering unused licenses across various platforms to optimize cost efficiency.

• Evaluate the ability to monitor software usage. A software license management system helps understand how and when the licenses are being used. This helps prevent over-usage or unauthorized use, ensure compliance with licensing agreements, plan for future needs accurately, and save the business from financial penalties during audits.

Sources

Products evaluated for the pricing calculation were taken from Software Advice’s license management software. The pricing ranges exclude freemium versions of the products. The features highlighted were identified based on their relevance and the percentage of products in Software Advice's directory that offer them. 

Disclaimer

This license management software buyers guide was authored by Software Advice’s content team. We develop our guides using the author's expertise, insights from 2M+ unique user reviews, and our proprietary data science algorithms to identify trends in user sentiment, preferences, and priorities. Some text was generated with assistance from artificial intelligence tools.