Troubleshooting Expired License Issues

Last updated: June 25, 2026

Overview

When a Coder license expires, it can cause significant disruptions to your deployment without clear visibility to end users. This article explains how to identify expired license issues and the steps to resolve them.

Symptoms of an Expired License

An expired license does not display errors or warnings to end users. However, it causes several critical issues:

Authentication and Access Issues

These issues can show up if you're on OSS license or your license has expired:

  • OIDC/OAuth2 limitations: Authentication is restricted to only ONE provider
  • Login problems: Users may experience intermittent or complete login failures
  • Token generation issues: Authentication tokens may fail to generate properly

 

Workspace Functionality Issues

  • Multi-instance deployments: Workspaces will not function properly if running multiple `coderd` instances
  • Intermittent workspace access: Only portions of workspaces may work, and only sporadically
  • Agent connectivity problems: Severely limited access to workspace agents

 

Identifying License Expiration

 

Admin-Only Visibility


⚠️ Important: License expiration warnings are only visible to Admin accounts in the UI. Regular users will not see any license-related messages.

 

Detection Methods

 

Method 1: Command Line Check


Run the following command to check license status:

coder licenses list

Example output:

ID UUID EXPIRES AT UPLOADED AT FEATURES
1 c73a2e78-8e71-4bf6-8371-e5de3ba5d7b9 2026-02-05T17:00:00Z 2025-01-22T11:20:21Z all features

 

Method 2: Admin Dashboard

  1. Log in as an Admin user
  2. Navigate to the license page in the dashboard
  3. Check for license alerts or warnings
  4. Look for the license banner (reference: [LicenseBannerView.tsx]())

 

Documentation Requirements

 

When reporting license issues, please provide:

  • Screenshots of admin license alerts/banners OR
  • Output from `coder licenses list` command AND
  • Description of specific user-reported issues (login failures, workspace problems, etc.)

 

Requesting a New License

 

Who Can Generate Licenses?

  • Customer Success Management (CSM) Team
  • Via Slack: Post in the `#licenses` channel (subject to availability)
  • Licenses are generated using Nexus (access-restricted internal tool)

 

How to Request

  1. Contact your CSM representative (if you're the customer)
  2. Or post in the `#licenses` Slack channel (if you're guest or Coder Staff):
    - Evidence of license expiration (screenshots or command output)
    - Customer details
    - Urgency level

Known Limitations

Logging Issues

  • License expiration events are not comprehensively logged
  • Removed; `Options.logger` is not configured for license/entitlements modules
  • End users receive no notification of license-related problems
  • This is `by design` to avoid flooding standard users with messages about their license.

 

Design Considerations

  • Verbose license warnings were reduced due to previous customer complaints about 30-day advance expiration notices
  • This creates a trade-off between user awareness and notification fatigue

 

Prevention

 

Monitoring Recommendations

  • Regularly check license expiration dates via `coder licenses list` OR
  • Set up calendar reminders for license renewal 30-60 days before expiration
  • Ensure admin accounts periodically log in to check for system alerts

 

Best Practices

  • Maintain admin access for license monitoring
  • Document license renewal processes
  • Establish communication channels with CSM team for proactive renewals

 

Related Resources

  • [Coder License Management Documentation] in the Docs. Also methods to request a temporary license.
  • Internal: License code references can be found in `license.go`

 


Need immediate assistance? Contact your Customer Success Manager or post in `#licenses` with your license status output and customer details.