Cisco Software License Portability FAQ

A.    License portability entitles customers to move their software licenses to a new device; allowing customers to leverage an existing investment in Cisco software without needing to repurchase licenses during a hardware refresh. Depending on feature sets used, license portability can lead to significant savings. License portability is a key benefit that Cisco provides to customers who maintain their Cisco Software Support Service (SWSS) contract.

A.    You are eligible for portability if you purchased your perpetual licenses through a licensing model that supports Cisco SWSS (e.g., Cisco ONE). If licenses purchased are subscriptions that include embedded software support, you are automatically entitled to portability. If licenses purchased are perpetual, you must have maintained an active Cisco SWSS contract from the initial date of software purchase. To avoid any gaps in coverage due to late purchase or late renewal of SWSS, which puts customers at risk of not having technical support, software updates, ongoing innovation, or eligibility for license portability, account teams must ensure customers purchase SWSS within the 90 day grace period.

A.    No. Cisco Smart Net Total Care provides support for hardware platform and OS software. SNTC offers many business-critical services like advance hardware replacement, however, it does not provide license portability.

A.    For most software, yes you can. Contact your Cisco Account Manager to reinstate your SWSS contract, reinstatement fees may apply.

There are some circumstances where reinstatement is not possible. For instance, there is no reinstatement of support for software that has reached the Last Day of Support milestone of the Cisco End of Life process. In the aforementioned example, customers should purchase the replacement software product and necessary support offer.

A.    There are three main use cases for license portability:

A.    Since hardware replacement is outside the scope of the software license portability policy, follow existing procedures for hardware replacement. Hardware replacements may be covered under Warranty Replacement or through Cisco Smart Net Total Care. Alternatively, you may replace the hardware with a spare device that you have available. Once hardware has been replaced, transfer existing entitlements - including software licenses and any software maintenance agreements (Cisco SWSS) - to the new device, this is a called a rehost. Directions for rehosting can be found in the Cisco Licensing Portal Reference Guide.

A.    The hardware product family, on which you have deployed your licenses, determines portability options.

There is no cost associated for porting a software license to a device within the same or lower portability tier, such as Cisco ISR 4331 to Cisco ISR 4351. There is a software upgrade fee for refreshing to a higher-tier device, such as Cisco ISR 4331 to Cisco ISR 4451, as you receive greater capabilities. Device family classifications for Cisco Software are available in the Device Tiering Guide for License Portability.

A.    Cisco supports only one-to-one license portability. Please refer to the license portability use cases in the Device Tiering Guide for License Portability.

A.    Smart License porting requests are filled via the Smart Software Manager (SSM). Classic License porting requests are filled via the License Registration Portal (LRP) (cisco.com login required). If the license is Right-To-Use (RTU), no license transfer process is required. You can immediately start using the licensed functionalities on a new device. Directions for license portability of Smart and Classic Licenses can be found here.

A.    No. Individual components of a suite are not portable individually. Cisco ONE products cannot be unbundled into separate components for portability to different devices.

A.    Entitlement to software capabilities are portable, but that does not imply that all devices can run all the software within a Cisco ONE Software product. The Cisco ONE Offer Structure (cisco.com login required) shows which features can be enabled on what device. While you are entitled to features within your purchased software, you should verify that the device you intend to operate actually supports those features.

A.    You are responsible for verifying that you remain compliant with licenses purchased. Cisco reserves the right to audit the customer environment through a third party to ensure compliance.

Cisco Smart Accounts provide your company with a central location where you can manage Cisco licenses across the entire organization. You can view, store, manage, and move your Cisco software assets to where they are needed.

A.    Typically, platform/OS software is tied to the hardware device and therefore not portable.