Manage your license through the command line

To use Unity, you need an activated license. For Unity Pro licenses, you need to get a serial key. For a Unity Personal license, you don’t need a serial key.

The primary license activation method for Unity Pro and Unity Personal is the Unity Hub. For information about activating a Unity Industry license, refer to the Unity Support article, How to activate or return a Unity Industry license.

The following information covers an alternate method to Unity Hub for activating and returning a license for Unity Pro, by using the command line. You might consider this method in situations such as:

• You have internet access, but you use Unity in headless mode (without a GUI) for automated tasks, such as builds and tests.
• You have internet access, but you’re unable or unwilling to install the Unity Hub.

Note: The following command line procedures work only for Unity Pro licenses. The following procedures don’t apply to Unity Personal, which doesn’t have serial keys. The only way to activate and return a license for Unity Personal is to log in and log out of Unity Hub, respectively.

If you don’t know your Unity license information, speak to the Owner of your license. Owners can assign a seat to you via the Organization, or you can contact Unity Customer Service.

Activate a license from the command line

Before activating your Unity license by using the command line, make sure that the license file folder exists. Refer to Unity license file location in License troubleshooting. Also make sure that you have write permission to this folder.

macOS

Enter the following command into the Terminal to launch Unity and activate your license:

<unity-command-location> -quit -batchmode -serial SB-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX -username 'name@example.com' -password 'XXXXXXXXXXXXX'

Replace <unity-command-location> with the full path to your Unity Editor application, concatenated with /Contents/MacOS/Unity. For example, if you installed a 2022.2.0b4 Editor to the default location, <unity-command-location> is:

/Applications/Unity/Hub/Editor/2022.2.0b4/Unity.app/Contents/MacOS/Unity

macOS example

/Applications/Unity/Hub/Editor/2022.2.0b4/Unity.app/Contents/MacOS/Unity -quit -batchmode -serial SB-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX -username 'name@example.com' -password 'XXXXXXXXXXXXX'

Tip: If you use continuous integration (CI) tools like Jenkins to activate via the command line, add the -nographics flag to prevent a WindowServer error.

Windows

Enter the following command into the Command Prompt to launch Unity and activate your license:

"<editor-installation-location>" -batchmode -username name@example.com -password XXXXXXXXXXXXX -serial E3-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX -quit

Replace <editor-installation-location> with the full path to your Editor application. For example, if you installed a 2022.2.0b4 Editor to the default location, <editor-installation-location> is:

C:\Program Files\Unity\Hub\Editor\2022.2.0b4\Editor\Unity.exe

Windows example

"C:\Program Files\Unity\Hub\Editor\2022.2.0b4\Editor\Unity.exe" -batchmode -username name@example.com -password XXXXXXXXXXXXX -serial E3-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX -quit

Next steps and troubleshooting

Wait several seconds after running this command to give Unity enough time to communicate with the license server. If activation fails, you can open the Editor.log for information. For any activation errors, check Activation issues to find a solution for your issue.

Returning the license through the command line

macOS

Enter the following command into the Terminal to return the license:

<unity-command-location> -quit -batchmode -returnlicense -username 'name@example.com' -password 'XXXXXXXXXXXXX'

Replace <unity-command-location> with the full path to your Editor application, concatenated with /Contents/MacOS/Unity. For example, if you installed a 2022.2.0b4 Editor to the default location, <unity-command-location> is:

/Applications/Unity/Hub/Editor/2022.2.0b4/Unity.app/Contents/MacOS/Unity

macOS example

/Applications/Unity/Hub/Editor/2022.2.0b4/Unity.app/Contents/MacOS/Unity -quit -batchmode -returnlicense -username 'name@example.com' -password 'XXXXXXXXXXXXX'

Windows

Enter the following into the Command Prompt to return the license

"<editor-installation-location>" -quit -batchmode -returnlicense -username name@example.com -password XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Replace <editor-installation-location> with the full path to your Editor application. For example, if you installed a 2022.2.0b4 Editor to the default location, <editor-installation-location> is:

C:\Program Files\Unity\Hub\Editor\2022.2.0b4\Editor\Unity.exe

Windows example

"C:\Program Files\Unity\Hub\Editor\2022.2.0b4\Editor\Unity.exe" -quit -batchmode -returnlicense -username name@example.com -password XXXXXXXXXXXXX

Next steps and troubleshooting

Wait a few seconds after running this command to give Unity enough time to communicate with the license server. You can use the Hub to confirm that you returned your license by opening the Preferences menu () and selecting Licenses. If you experience issues, refer Troubleshooting.

Additional resources

• License activation methods