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Bitwarden Switches to Commercial License (community.bitwarden.com)
submitted 4 weeks ago by to c/selfhosted@lemmy.world
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RyanL Bitwarden Employee

Hello everyone!

Starting in the next release, the Bitwarden apps published to the various stores will be the commercially licensed builds. No action is needed, and the apps will work exactly as they do today.

Bitwarden remains committed to open source security and transparency
The GPLv3 OSS licensed version continues to be updated and published on GitHub
All current features are available in both versions
License details are on GitHub
Bitwarden remains committed to a robust, free forever plan for everyone

If you have any questions, please ask them in this thread. Thanks all!

EDIT:

Bitwarden is not going closed-source
You can still fork Bitwarden
No change to self-hosting, the licensing change affects those who are repackaging and reselling Bitwarden
The free plan is here to stay permanently
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[–] 11 points 3 weeks ago (19 children)

What's the benefit for them to change the license?

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  • [–] 39 points 3 weeks ago (16 children)

    commercial providers can’t fork and sell it and give nothing back to the OSS community.

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  • [–] 11 points 3 weeks ago* (13 children)

    No, that would GPL. The benefit for them is that some features will be paid and won't be unlockable just by using Vaultwarden

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago (12 children)

    it literally says in the post that the license change affects companies who are repackaging and reselling bitwarden, but ok.

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  • [–] 21 points 3 weeks ago (11 children)

    But this is the post by bitwarden, defending their decision. AKA marketing.

    Can you explain how bitwarden can be "repackaged and resold", that would be stopped by that change?

    Everybody can still fork/rename/publish the FOSS version which is continued to be available. Everybody can connect to vaultwarden....?

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  • [–] 6 points 3 weeks ago (9 children)

    Everybody can still fork/rename/publish the FOSS version

    Yeah, but there's no guarantee the FOSS version will be the same as the closed one.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago (8 children)

    There is certainty that the Foss version won't be worse than current bitwarden client. Then those will diverge. So?

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago (7 children)

    The current FOSS backend used to be the center of the ecosystem. Going forward that may change. If it stops being that center and it becomes merely a token offering so Bitwarden can claim "we're still doing FOSS" then it will become pointless.

    Simply forking the backend is meaningless without the work to also drag along the entire ecosystem, or establish a new one. Forking a project takes time, effort, vision, persistence, determination.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago (6 children)

    The back end is already solved by vaultwarden, so I'm not sure what you mean

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago* (5 children)

    Both backend and frontend revolve around the API, and Bitwarden owns that not Vaultwarden.

    If Bitwarden decides to modify the API so that only their closed-source backend has the full spec, and only gives that spec to their own apps, everything else (Vaultwarden and 3rd-party apps) will fall behind or become unusable.

    To counter that, Vaultwarden and the 3rd-party apps need to declare their own API and prepare to fly solo completely independently from Bitwarden.

    Such a move would force Bitwarden to show their true colors. If they really mean to stay true to the open version they will keep cooperating and keeping their API in sync with the Vaultwarden API.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago (4 children)

    The api is implemented in Foss front&back end.... I don't know what you are talking about

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago (3 children)

    If there are two version of Bitwarden backend (closed and FOSS), and the closed one changes its API, and the closed Bitwarden apps also switch to the closed API, then what value does the FOSS API have anymore?

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago (2 children)

    What is "the API"?

    The API is implemented by the bitwarden back end.

    The API is also implemented by the vaultwarden back end.

    The open source bitwarden client does talk the current version of this API. The open source client can be forked, so there is without much effort a version speaking this protocol in this version and is FOSS. Just the name will be different. I guess "vaultwarden client" would be fitting, but what ever.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago (1 child)

    What is "the API"?

    Good question. When you have multiple implementations of an API, the API (the authoritative version) is what gives the reference spec that all other apps must follow.

    If the authoritative version will be fully implemented only by the closed backend and in the closed apps, it will cripple the FOSS backend and apps.

    This is a common tactic used by companies that want to sideline the FOSS options and slowly make them irrelevant.

    Yes, today all apps talk to both Bitwarden and Vaultwarden the same way. Be on the lookout in case that changes.

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  • [–] 1 point 3 weeks ago

    I'd totally see the risk if the clients were not available as open source. But they are. So I'm not.

    They might diverge, but vaultwarden users will just fork. Nobody who is using official clients with vaulwarden will be "oh dang, now I have to buy bitwarden, so long vaulwarden, was fun...."

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