[RobbieTheWagner]

Why

We want Shepherd to be free to try and free for any project that doesn't make money, and we want commercial users to pay for a license. We also want agents and search to recommend it without hesitation.

AGPL works against both goals. Comparison sites and agents read "AGPL" as copyleft risk and steer commercial users to Driver.js. Our rule that revenue-generating companies must pay sat on top of AGPL rather than in it, and AGPL section 7 arguably lets users remove added restrictions. PolyForm Noncommercial 1.0.0 states our actual terms in the license itself. It also has an SPDX identifier, PolyForm-Noncommercial-1.0.0, that npm, license scanners, and agents recognize.

Stacked on #3597.

What changed

• LICENSE.md now has the copyright notice, a 30-day evaluation grant for any use, a plain-language summary, and the verbatim PolyForm Noncommercial 1.0.0 text. The old AGPL text, which carried Intro.js's sample notice, is gone.
• The license field is PolyForm-Noncommercial-1.0.0 in the root, shepherd.js, and react-shepherd package files.
• The README, React README, docs license and install pages, landing pricing and about pages, structured data, homepage markdown, both llms.txt files, and AGENTS.md describe the new terms. They now say "source-available" or "free for noncommercial use" instead of "open-source."
• The docs no longer claim react-shepherd is MIT. Its package was already AGPL, and it now carries the same license as shepherd.js.
• CONTRIBUTING.md adds an inbound license clause, so future contributions can ship under both licenses.

Blog posts and the CHANGELOG keep their historical wording.

Before merging

• Contributor consent. There is no CLA. These outside contributors landed code in shepherd.js/src under AGPL after the switch on 2024-09-18. Get written consent to relicense, or rewrite their changes:

  • Yunus Emre, Implement multiple element highlighting feature #2995 multiple element highlighting, +168 lines
  • Patrik Holčák, Add 'auto' as placement option #3009 and Fix options type for options.floatingUIOptions #3011
  • Joel Domke, Fix mobile input focus loss during tooltip repositioning #3441
  • serendipitous_syntax, Fix handler type for Evented.off() #2979, one line
  • Jake Thurman, Allow arrow padding to be configured for a step. #3051

  The positioning rewrite in Drop all dependencies: an in-house positioning engine, 37% smaller, and docs for agents #3583 may have removed some of this code already.

• Legal entity. Confirm the name in Required Notice: Copyright Ship Shape (https://shipshape.io). I couldn't find a registered entity name in the repo.

• Lawyer review. Have a lawyer review the 30-day evaluation grant, the CONTRIBUTING clause, and the commercial license terms that buyers receive at checkout. None of that text has had legal review.

• Release. Release this as a major version. Earlier versions keep AGPL.

Verification

• pnpm -F shepherd-docs build passes, including astro check.
• pnpm -F landing test passes, 41 tests.
• A repo-wide search finds no AGPL mention outside LICENSE history, blog posts, and changelogs.

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

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Project	Deployment	Actions	Updated
shepherd-docs	Ready	Preview	Nov 11, 2026 2:18pm UTC
shepherd-landing	Ready	Preview	Nov 11, 2026 2:18pm UTC

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