Free Academic Licenses
The free Academic License for Gurobi has all the features and performance of the full Gurobi Optimizer. A free Academic License has no limits on model size. The only restrictions on the use of these licenses are: (i) they can only be used by faculty, students, or staff of a degree-granting academic institution, (ii) they can only be used for research or educational purposes, and (iii) they must be validated from a recognized academic domain, as described below. They expire six (6) months after the date on which your license was generated, but eligible faculty, students, or staff can renew a license by repeating this process.
Obtaining a Free Academic License
To obtain a free Academic License for Gurobi, please follow these steps:
- Login to your Gurobi Account. If you do not already have an account, then first Request an Account.
- Click on 'Download' in the User's Menu, and download the version for your platform. You should also download README.txt.
- After downloading the software, follow the instructions in the README.txt to install the software. As part of the installation, you will be instructed how to determine the information necessary to generate a license key.
- Once you have the necessary license information, return to your Gurobi Account and click on 'Licenses' in the User's Menu, then click on the 'License Request' tab. Follow the instructions to enter your license information, including specifying the license type as ACADEMIC, and request that a corresponding license key be generated. Your license key file will then be downloaded to your computer.
- Follow the instructions in the installation guide to place your license key file in the proper location.
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Finally, you will need to 'validate' your academic license by running the 'grbvalidate' program while
connected to the Internet from a recognized academic domain (e.g., any '.edu' address). Upon successful
validation, Gurobi will run unrestricted.
If you have trouble validating your academic license, please refer to our Academic Validation Troubleshooting instructions.
Note: There is no limit on the number of free Academic licenses that you can obtain. However, each such license must be generated individually.
Using a Free Academic License with Modeling Systems
You may use a free Academic License for Gurobi with an existing license for AIMMS, AMPL, GAMS or MPL. To do this, first follow the instructions above to install Gurobi Optimizer and obtain a free Academic License. Next, you will need to configure Gurobi as a solver for your modeling system. This may require you to install additional tools. For AIMMS, detailed instructions can be found in the section marked "To link GUROBI to AIMMS" in AIMMS Knowledge Base Article - KB000053. For AMPL, detailed instructions can be found in the AMPL-Gurobi Guide. For GAMS, please see the instructions for CoinGurobi on the GAMS website. For MPL, the academic version already comes with the Gurobi solver installed, so no additional configuration steps are needed.
To purchase an academic license for AMPL, please see our price list, which can be found through your Gurobi Account. To purchase an academic license for AIMMS or GAMS, please contact AIMMS or contact GAMS directly. Maximal Software offers free academic licenses for MPL; see the MPL Academic Program for details.
Technical Support
Gurobi academic licenses do not include technical support. To allow our users to discuss the product and to ask questions, we have set up a Gurobi discussion group. You can read current and past messages online, or subscribe to receive messages via email:
We encourage users to answer each others' questions; Gurobi staff members will monitor the group and answer questions as time permits.
Other Academic Licenses
In addition to the free Academic License for Gurobi, we also offer paid academic licenses. In particular, we offer a node license that has no periodic validation requirement, and we offer an unlimited network license. For details, please see our price list, which can be found through your Gurobi Account.