Cloud Licensing for Avid Sibelius is now available
Introducing Avid Cloud Licensing, our new licensing system for Sibelius that gives you a simple process for activating and moving a license from one computer to another. Simply run Sibelius, click Activate, and be taken through a few simple steps to activate Sibelius on your computer. Open Sibelius on another computer and do the same steps to move your license to this computer. You don't need to do anything to deactivate Sibelius on your first computer as this is all taken care of for you automatically. You can even use Sibelius offline for up to seven days and your license will automatically reconnect when you're back online.
You can always stay up to date and monitor your license usage in the new License Management page in Avid Link or from directly in your account:
https://my.avid.com/products/managedevices
This helps you keep track of your licenses and gives you the flexibility to deactivate the cloud licenses remotely from any device—even from your phone.
If you need to go offline for a longer period of time or need a more permanent, second license, you can do this with a special option when activating Sibelius (see below). To move this type of license to another computer, you must first deactivate it from the License page in Avid Link.
Problems Cloud Licensing Is Solving
Gone are the days when you’d need to contact the support team to reset your license seat count. With Cloud Licensing, you no longer need to worry where your licenses are, or if you’ve activated too many times. If you need Sibelius, run it, click Activate, log in, and start working on your music.
The new licensing is more robust than the previous system in which problems ranged from getting caught short during installation onto a new computer or while cloning your old computer, or having a license unsuccessfully update while renewing a subscription on the website.
Cloud licensing is quick to activate, so what used to take several clicks and over a minute to activate now only takes a few seconds with a couple of clicks.
How Many Seats
Sibelius comes with two seats, enabling users the ability to install on a desktop and a laptop—and they’re shared across the new and legacy licensing systems so that you have one flexible seat (allowing you to put Sibelius on any computer you need to), and one offline activation.
How To Activate
1. Run Sibelius
2. Log in to Avid Link
3. Sibelius will automatically start
During activation you’ll be prompted to log into Avid Link to verify your account and features. This will automatically utilize the cloud license.
If you already have Sibelius activated on another computer, you will be given an extra step to confirm that you want to use the license on this machine. Simply confirm this message to use the license here:
Need To Go Offline?
The new cloud licenses last for 7 days, allowing you to confidently work offline for days at a time. However, when your computer is online, Avid Link will sync your license entitlement again and give you another 7 days. It will continue to do this every day it’s online. This means once you’re activated, you never need to reactivate as long as you’re online, as you’ll be given a rolling 7-day license. (Note to techies: You don’t need any special ports or open in your firewall as this goes through port 443).
If you need to go offline for longer than a week or don’t want the flexibility of moving the license, there’s a special option in the License page in Avid Link. When activating Sibelius, and before clicking Use License in Avid Link, choose the option: TAKE OFFLINE. This will take longer to activate and will put a persistent license on your computer. (Note: If you have a subscription license, this will last until the next billing period. If you have a perpetual license, the license will never expire.)
Multiseat Licenses
For now, Cloud Licensing is only available for individual users, as you need to log into Avid Link to pick up the software entitlements. Since schools operate with a single account across multiple users and computers, it’s not suitable for staff and teachers to hand out the account credentials to log in. We are actively working on a solution for you that we hope will be available sometime in 2022, so watch this space!
Getting Support
We have a plethora of knowledge base articles and an excellent team of support personnel available to help you get up and running. Here are a few handy links:
License renewal help - covering all the common troubleshooting steps to get you back up and running
Contact the support team
Sam Butler
As director of audio software at Avid, and a keen musician, Sam works with all the departments in Avid to produce the future of the Pro Tools and Sibelius products and solutions.