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Licensing: Open Weights vs Open Source

🌐 The Open Source AI Space7 min50 BASE XP

Understanding AI Model Licenses

Not all "open" models are truly open source. The distinction between open weights and open source is critical for commercial use.

License Comparison

LicenseCommercial UseModify?Examples
Apache 2.0✅ Unrestricted✅ YesMistral Large 3, Gemma 4, Qwen 3
MIT✅ Unrestricted✅ YesDeepSeek-V3, DeepSeek-R1
Llama Community⚠️ Restricted >700M MAU✅ YesLlama 3.3 70B, Llama 3.1 405B, Llama 3.2
Research Only❌ No✅ YesSome academic models
⚠️ Warning: Meta's Llama 3.1 / 3.3 models require a separate commercial license if your product exceeds 700 million monthly active users, and have geographical restrictions (notably Europe).

The Ecosystem Map

  • Meta: Llama 3.3 (70B), Llama 3.1 (405B/70B/8B), and Llama 3.2 vision/edge family
  • Mistral AI: European sovereignty, full Apache 2.0 stack
  • DeepSeek: Chinese lab, MIT license, reasoning breakthroughs
  • Alibaba (Qwen): Dense + MoE variants, multilingual excellence
  • Google (Gemma): Edge-optimized, Apache 2.0, multimodal
KNOWLEDGE CHECK
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Which license allows fully unrestricted commercial use with no user-count limits?
Llama Community License
Apache 2.0
Creative Commons
GPL v3