{"id":114,"date":"2025-12-18T18:41:41","date_gmt":"2025-12-18T23:41:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/openscholarship\/chapter\/what-are-the-different-types-of-creative-commons-licenses\/"},"modified":"2026-02-12T14:01:55","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T19:01:55","slug":"what-are-the-different-types-of-creative-commons-licenses","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.bccampus.ca\/openscholarship\/chapter\/what-are-the-different-types-of-creative-commons-licenses\/","title":{"raw":"What Are the Different Types of Creative Commons Licenses?","rendered":"What Are the Different Types of Creative Commons Licenses?"},"content":{"raw":"This short video provides a useful overview of CC licenses and how they can be used to provide different kinds of permissions or restrictions on reuse of works.\r\n\r\nhttps:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=AeTlXtEOplA\r\n\r\nThere are six different types of Creative Commons licenses<\/a>. These licenses are designed so that creators have options to provide restrictions on how they want their work to be used. They are made up of four license elements.\r\n

Four license elements<\/h2>\r\nEach CC license is made up of one or more of four license elements: Attribution (BY), Share Alike (SA), NonComercial (NC) and No Derivatives (ND).\r\n

Attribution (BY)<\/h3>\r\n\"\"\r\n

Attribution (BY)<\/h3>\r\n\u201cBY\u201d refers to attribution. This means in order to use the work, you must attribute the author of the work. All of the Creative Commons licenses require this condition (CC0<\/a> does not, but according to the CC FAQs<\/a> is it not a \u201clicense\u201d).\r\n\r\nShare Alike (SA)\r\n\r\nShare Alike means that if you create an adaptation of a work that has this license, the adaptation must be licensed under the same or a compatible license. See the Creative Commons page on compatible licenses<\/a> to learn more.\r\n

NonCommercial (NC)<\/h3>\r\nNC means that the work may only be used for non-commercial purpose. In NC licenses, non-commercial is defined as \u201c<\/em>not primarily intended for or directed towards commercial advantage or monetary compensation\u201d (see, e.g., CC BY-NC 4.0<\/a>). What matters here is the use to which the work is being put, not the user: one has to consider whether the use is for a commercial purpose, not whether the user is a commercial entity. A for-profit company could possibly use a work licensed CC BY-NC in a non-commercial way. In addition, using the work in a tuition-based educational course may still be considered a non-commercial use. The definition of \u201cnon-commercial\u201d in these licenses is somewhat vague, and while some uses are clearly commercial and others clearly not, some may be in more of a grey zone. Find more information on how Creative Commons interprets non-commercial use<\/a> on the CC Wiki.\r\n

Non Derivatives (ND)<\/h3>\r\nND means that you cannot share an adaptation of the work, though you could use and share it in its original form. An example of an adaptation of an image would be changing its colour, blurring it, or adding another image on top of it. An example of an adaptation of a written work would be translating it to a different language. The points below, adapted from section 3.3 of the Creative Commons Certificate for Educators and Librarians<\/a>, provide more details on what is and is not considered an adaptation:\r\n