Article

Why We Moved to ELv2 (And What It Means for Our Community)

Michel Tricot

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August 22, 2025

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2 min

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At Airbyte, everything we do starts from one principle: data movement should be open and accessible to everyone.

That’s why we’ve always embraced open source. Our connectors, our platform, our products: they’re all built in the open, with contributions from thousands of community members worldwide.

Recently, we made a change that sparked some conversation: moving our connectors from the MIT license to Elastic License v2 (ELv2). I want to explain why.

Why the Change?

The short answer: to protect the work of our community.

We saw competitors taking the freely available work of contributors, your work, and reselling it as a managed service, without giving back. That doesn’t serve the community, and it doesn’t align with our mission.

ELv2 still gives you enormous freedom:

You can use the Airbyte platform and connectors however you like.

You can run them in production, modify them, and share improvements.

You can embed them in your internal workflows and systems.

The only thing ELv2 restricts is taking Airbyte’s connectors and platform, packaging them up, and reselling them as a managed service under another name. Like many other companies, we need to defend ourselves from being Jeff’d by larger businesses with more resources who don’t value our commitment to the open source community.

That protection ensures we can continue investing in open source, while safeguarding the contributions that make Airbyte what it is.

Our Commitment to Openness

Airbyte will always be free to use for anyone building data pipelines. We’re still building the open standard for data movement:

A unified framework for connectors
A vibrant community where contributions matter
A platform that grows stronger the more people use it

We believe in openness not just because it’s the right thing to do, but because it’s the best way to solve the hardest data problems while safeguarding data sovereignty.

Looking Ahead

This licensing shift doesn’t change our mission. If anything, it strengthens it.

We’re doubling down on:

Making data integration faster and easier for every data engineer

Ensuring data remains within your control, powering AI securely

Building tools that last, because they’re built together

We’re grateful to every contributor, every user, and every company that’s joined us on this journey. Airbyte is what it is today because of you.

With ELv2, we can keep building: openly, sustainably, and together.

— Michel

FAQs

Q: Isn't this just another case of "open source rug pull" where a company builds on community contributions then restricts access?

A: No. The code remains open, and you can still use, modify, and run Airbyte in production exactly as before. The only restriction is against taking our platform and reselling it as a competing managed service. Individual users, companies using Airbyte internally, and even consultants implementing Airbyte for clients are completely unaffected.

Q: How is ELv2 different from "true" open source licenses like MIT?

A: ELv2 is source-available rather than open source by OSI definition. The key difference is the restriction on offering the software as a managed service. For 99% of users, there's no practical difference - you still get full access to code, can modify it, deploy it, and contribute back. The restriction only affects companies wanting to compete directly with Airbyte using code built by Airbyte and our community.

Q: What happens to contributions I made under the MIT license?

A: Past contributions remain under their original license terms. However, going forward, contributions will be under ELv2. This protects your contributions from being monetized by competitors who don't contribute back to the community. Your work is still freely available to everyone except those trying to build a competing commercial service.

Q: Is this move purely about protecting revenue, disguised as "protecting the community"?

A: Protecting sustainable revenue and protecting the community are aligned goals. Without revenue, we can't employ engineers who maintain core infrastructure, review contributions, and build features the community needs. The license change ensures those who profit from Airbyte also contribute to its sustainability.

Q: What guarantees do we have that Airbyte will remain "free to use for anyone building data pipelines"?

A: Beyond this public commitment, the ELv2 license itself guarantees your right to use the software. More pragmatically, Airbyte's success depends on widespread adoption. We have come this far because of the community using and improving the open platform.

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