Phusion Passenger is an Apache and Nginx module for deploying Ruby and Python web applications. It has a strong focus on ease of use, stability and performance. Phusion Passenger is built on top of tried-and-true, battle-hardened Unix technologies, yet at the same time introduces innovations not found in most traditional Unix servers. Since mid-2012, it aims to be the ultimate polyglot application server.



Since Phusion Passenger Enterprise was launched in August, we’ve received a lot of feedback about our End User License Agreement (EULA). Coming from an open source background, we want to give our customers a good bang for the buck while still being able to make a good living from this business. We therefore take customer feedback very seriously, not just regarding technical issues but also regarding legal issues. After many weeks of going back and forth with our legal advisor, we are proud to announce a version 2012-10-01 of the Phusion Passenger Enterprise EULA.

This new EULA version will prove to be very favorable to many customers. We know that nobody likes reading EULAs, so for your convenience we’ve compiled a human-friendly summary of the changes. Be warned though: this summary has no legal value, and no rights can be derived from this summary. You are encouraged to read the EULA text itself.

Non-production servers

Many people have asked us for cheaper development and staging licensing. According to the old EULA, you must purchase regular licenses for development and staging servers as well. To accomodate for these wishes we now allow customers to use Phusion Passenger Enterprise on a limited number of development and staging servers, for free! [See details]

Pro and Deluxe licensees to use Phusion Passenger Enterprise on 4 servers per license. Our of these 4 servers, at most 2 may be production servers. This means that the following (non-exhaustive examples of) setups are allowed: 2 production servers + 1 staging server + 1 development server

2 production servers + 2 development servers

1 production server + 3 staging servers

1 development server + 3 staging servers EULA 2012-10-01 allowsandlicensees to use Phusion Passenger Enterprise on 4 servers per license. Our of these 4 servers, at most 2 may be production servers. This means that the following (non-exhaustive examples of) setups are allowed: The following (non-exhaustive examples of) setups are not allowed because they would exceed the max-2-production-servers limit: 3 production servers + 1 staging server

4 production servers EULA 2012-10-01 allows Startup licensees to use Phusion Passenger on at most 2 production servers and at most 2 non-production servers, per license. This means the following (non-exhaustive examples of) setups are allowed: 1 production server + 2 staging servers

2 production servers + 2 development servers But the following (non-exhaustive examples of) setups are not allowed: 3 production servers + 1 staging servers (no more than 2 production servers is allowed)

1 production server + 3 development servers (no more than 2 non-production servers is allowed)

Student, educational institution and non-profit discounts

The Startup license may now also be purchased by students, educational institutions and non-profit organizations. The Startup license was originally meant to help bootstrapping startups like us, but we figured that it would be fair to help students, educational institutions and non-profit organizations in a similar way because they too are strapped on cash. We still want to give them access to world-class technology so we’ve introduced these more favorable licensing terms.

Volume discounts

Volume discount allows you to purchase many licenses for a special discount. The discount increases as you purchase more licenses. Furthermore, the volume discount is tiered, with each tier allowing a range of server counts. This is ideal for those who have a lot of servers, or those who run in a cloud environment and change their server capacity all the time. Contact us to negotiate volume discount.

Upgrading your EULA

If you are a new customer, then EULA 2012-10-01 will automatically apply to you. If you are an existing customer then you need to upgrade to the new EULA before you can take advantage of the new terms and conditions. This is just a matter of reading the license and clicking on “I Agree”.

Login to the Customer Area. The Customer Area will tell you that a new EULA version is available (see figure). Click on “Read (and possibly accept) latest EULA”. Read the license, and click on “I Agree”. The Customer Area should now tell you that you are on EULA version 2012-10-01.

Figure: The Customer Area tells you that a new EULA version is available.

Support us by buying Phusion Passenger Enterprise

Phusion Passenger Enterprise comes with a wide array of additional features not found in the open source Phusion Passenger. And as we’ve stated before, we remain committed to maintaining and developing the open source version. This is made possible by the support of our customers; your support. If you like Phusion Passenger or if you want to enjoy the premium Enterprise features, please consider buying one or more Phusion Passenger Enterprise licenses. Development of the open source Phusion Passenger is directly funded by Phusion Passenger Enterprise sales.