Licence and updates

Desktop Plan is one program. Without a licence it runs as the free version, which never expires:

In the free version you work on one plan of your own, your free plan (see Files, tabs and recovery). Any other plan you open, for example one a colleague sent you, is view-only, and so is a plan with more tasks than the free version allows. You can look at it, search and filter it, see its dashboard strip and change which dates the chart shows, but not change the plan. A line across the top says so, with Buy a licence and Enter a licence key buttons.

Click Buy Desktop Plan Pro at the far right of the menu row. It opens our pricing page in your browser. The same page opens from Buy a licence wherever the free version says something needs a licence, and from Buy Desktop Plan Pro under No licence key yet? on the activation form.

When you click something the free version doesn’t include, such as the critical path or the dashboard, a card explains what a licence adds.

1. Choose Help › Activate licence… (or File › App settings…).

2. Under Licence, click Enter a licence key.

3. Fill in Your name, the Email used at purchase and the Licence key, then click Activate. On a team licence, put your own work email in the email box (see Team licences). By activating, you agree to the Desktop Plan EULA, which the form links to.

Your computer needs to be online for this. The limits are lifted straight away, with nothing to reinstall.

If activation says it could not reach the licence server (in older versions, the shop), see When activation cannot reach us. On a work computer, your IT team has a page of its own: Network and licence requirements for IT teams.

The name you enter is what colleagues see when you have a shared plan open. See Files, tabs and recovery.

App settings then shows who the copy is licensed to, and the name of this computer. Help › About Desktop Plan shows who it is licensed to as well: your name, or Free version.

One licence per person, on up to 3 computers

A licence is for one person, who can use it on up to 3 of their own computers at a time – an office PC, a laptop and a home computer, say.

Each Windows sign-in counts as one of the three. If three people share one computer, each signing in as themselves, each of them needs their own licence. If you sign in to two Windows accounts of your own on one computer, that uses two of your three.

To move your licence to a new computer, first click Deactivate this machine in App settings on the old one, then activate on the new one. Activating the same computer again, as the same Windows user, doesn’t use up another of the three.

If all three are in use, activation says so, and offers Manage your computers.

Team licences

When a company buys Desktop Plan Pro for several people in one order, it gets one licence key for all of them: a key bought for 10 people lets 10 people in, each on up to 3 of their own computers.

• Everyone uses the same key, and types their own work email in the email box – not the email of whoever bought it. Nothing is sent to that address; it only lets Desktop Plan count each person once.
• Use the same work email on every computer, home ones included. Two different addresses look like two different people and use two places.
• If the licence was bought with a company address, addresses at that company work – for example @acme.com. Activation says which addresses to use if yours is not one of them.
• Someone with another address, such as a consultant on Gmail, can join too: whoever bought the licence adds that exact address on My activations, under Who may join. A licence bought with a personal address (Gmail, Outlook and so on) lets in only its buyer and the addresses they add there. Taking an address off frees that person’s place; their copy goes back to the free version at its next check.
• When all the places are taken, activation says so. Whoever bought the licence manages it: on My activations they can see everyone’s computers and remove someone who has left, which frees their place for the next person.

A computer you no longer have

If a computer was sold, broken or wiped before you could deactivate it, click Manage your computers in App settings (or go to shop.desktopplan.com/my-activations) and enter your licence key. We email a sign-in link to the address the licence was bought with; open it within 30 minutes and click Remove beside the computer. That frees its place straight away. Uninstalling Desktop Plan does not free it – deactivate first, or remove it here.

Offline use

You don’t need to be online to use Desktop Plan. It checks the licence in the background, at most once a day, when it starts or while it stays open. Being offline never removes your licence.

Desktop Plan checks for a new version when it starts, at most once a day. It says nothing unless one is available.

To check yourself, choose Help › Check for updates….

When a new version is ready, a bar appears under the ribbon. It never gets in the way of your work.

• What’s new opens the list of changes on our website, in your browser.
• Update now downloads the new version, asks you to save any unsaved plans, installs it and reopens Desktop Plan.
• Later hides the bar.

Nothing is installed without your click. Each update is checked to confirm it comes from us.

The portable copy can’t update itself. The bar offers a Download button instead. Download the new copy and use it in place of the old file. Your settings and licence carry over.

When your year of updates ends

A licence includes a year of updates. Every version that comes out in that year is yours to keep and use in full, for good.

After the year ends, the update bar tells you about a new version but offers Renew updates instead of installing it, and the version you have keeps working as it is. If you install a version that came out after your updates ended, it works as the free version, and a line under the ribbon offers Renew updates. Where the free version would offer Buy a licence, you are offered Renew updates instead, since you already have a licence. Renewing adds a year of new versions to the licence you have.

Help › About Desktop Plan… shows the version you are running.