No. 16 of 28 ·Open Source License Compliance Software

ClearlyDefined

Web · Self-hosted · API

Freedom report

Two barsScore 6.3

Free tierA free tier is on its own pricing page
Open codeNo open-source code on record
Runs widely1 of 6 device platforms
DocumentedPlans, terms and facts published

ClearlyDefined is ranked #16 of 28 in open source license compliance software on Freedom251. It runs on API, Self-hosted, Web. There is a free plan.

ClearlyDefined plans and pricing

All plans

ClearlyDefined Free All data is available for everyone to see and use docs.clearlydefined.io · 4 Oct 2026

Compared on open source license compliance software

Obligation tracking: No
Deployment options: both
Source scan methods: multiple

Best ClearlyDefined alternatives

See all 20

Two bars FOSSology Free tier No. 1Free6.6 Two bars Apache Flink CDC Free tier No. 2Free6.5 Two bars DeepFilterNet Free tier No. 3Free6.5 Two bars licscan Free tier No. 4Free6.5 Two bars OHRisk Free tier No. 5Free6.5 Two bars OSS Review Toolkit Free tier No. 6Free6.5

The record

Purpose: ClearlyDefined is an open source project that crowdsources the gathering, curation, and upstreaming of licensing, security, and other data about free and open source projects.
Data: The project manages harvested data, curated data, and a merge of both, relating data to source code or packages.
License information: Definitions can include declared and discovered licenses, attribution parties, file details, and source information.
Harvesting: ClearlyDefined can harvest component data using tools such as ScanCode and FOSSology.
Curation: Contributors can submit curation changes through the API, where they ultimately surface as pull requests in the configured curation repository.
Access: Users can browse the data in a web UI or connect their systems through the REST API.
Integrations: The documented provider list includes GitHub, Maven Central, NpmJS, NuGet, GitLab, crates.io, and other package providers.
API limits: On the production API, POST requests to definitions, curations, and notices are limited to 250 per minute, while other endpoints allow up to 2,000 requests per minute.
Open source terms: The source code is licensed under MIT and the data is distributed under CC0.
Governance: The FAQ says ClearlyDefined is managed by the Open Source Initiative.
Scope limit: ClearlyDefined assigns unique coordinates to components and allows links between them, but says it is not attempting to solve the identity problem.
Community support: The project invites participation through its GitHub community and Discord forum.
Price from: Free

Where it ranks on Freedom251

Best Open Source License Compliance Software in 2026#16 of 28

Is ClearlyDefined yours?

Claim it for free: prove the domain, then correct facts, plans and screenshots. An editor reviews every change.

Claim it free Promote ClearlyDefined

Sources

docs.clearlydefined.io/docs/resources/faq· checked 4 Oct 2026
docs.clearlydefined.io/docs/get-involved/using-data· checked 4 Oct 2026
docs.clearlydefined.io/docs/get-involved/intro· checked 4 Oct 2026
docs.clearlydefined.io/docs/resources/providers· checked 4 Oct 2026