License Key Files in Telerik and Kendo UI Products 2025 Update

Starting with Q1 2025, all users of Telerik and Kendo UI need a valid license key file in new and existing projects. Learn more.

A few years ago, we introduced a licensing mechanism for our JavaScript products. With Q1 2025, we are expanding the same straightforward and flexible licensing mechanism to the rest of the products in the Progress Telerik and Kendo UI portfolio.

Our mission has always been to drive the utmost productivity for developers, enabling them to build high-quality, modern and engaging applications without unnecessary friction. At the same time, organizations need efficient ways to manage their software licensing and compliance.

Until now, licensing key files (LKF) were required only in Kendo UI products and were available only as manual download and installation. With today’s Q1 2025 release, we are introducing an improved streamlined licensing mechanism that supports both trial and license holders for all Telerik and Kendo UI libraries and tools.

Our goal is to provide a unified approach to licensing across the portfolio, allowing teams to focus on innovation while maintaining compliance with ease. We believe that this change better serves the evolving needs of developers and organizations and will enable us to further improve the license management experience we provide. Stay tuned!

What Is Changing?

Starting with Q1 2025, all users of the Telerik and Kendo UI components and tools will need to apply a valid license key file to both new and existing projects. The update of the licensing mechanism helps you modernize the way you integrate Telerik and Kendo UI products in your projects.

How to Add a License Key

Each of the products in the portfolio has a dedicated documentation article describing in detail how to license it. These links are listed in the table below. Here are the two main approaches.

For a manual installation or upgrade, the new licensing model follows these simple steps:

1. Obtain a license key – After downloading a trial, purchasing or renewing your license for Telerik and Kendo UI products, you will be able to obtain a license key file from Your Account dashboard.
2. Add the key to your project – Place the license key file in your project directory.
3. Automatic validation – The Telerik products will automatically detect the key file and validate it, enabling full functionality without requiring manual activation. For Kendo UI products, you need to perform an npx activation command as described in the documentation.

To simplify the process, we have also automated this step in our web installers, Control Panel tool, Visual Studio and Visual Studio Code extensions. If you are installing or upgrading through these tools, they will automatically download your personal developer license and store the license key in your home directory, making it available for all projects that you develop on the machine. This way, you won’t need to bother about the licensing part as it will be automatically resolved.

Which Products Need a License Key File?

The current Q1 2025 release introduces the license key file mechanism for the following products:

• Telerik UI for Blazor
• Telerik UI for ASP.NET Core
• Telerik UI for ASP.NET MVC
• Telerik UI for ASP.NET AJAX
• Telerik UI for WinForms
• Telerik UI for WPF
• Telerik UI for .NET MAUI
• Telerik UI for Xamarin
• Telerik UI for WinUI
• Telerik Reporting
• Telerik Report Server
• Telerik JustMock
• Telerik Document Processing

For all Kendo UI products, this licensing mechanism has been in place since 2023, and now it will only require an update of the license key file when adopting new release versions. This includes:

• KendoReact
• Kendo UI for jQuery
• Kendo UI for Angular
• Kendo UI for Vue

When Does the Change Take Effect?

The licensing update is effective starting on February 12, 2025 along with the Telerik and Kendo UI Q1 2025 release.

Support and Resources

We understand that licensing changes may raise questions, and we are here to support you every step of the way. For additional information on the topic, we have a dedicated licensing FAQ page and, as always, the team is ready to assist through our technical support system.