Cohesity licensing is the set of contracts and product terms under which Cohesity, Inc. licenses its data protection, file services and data security software. Since 2024-12-10 the portfolio has included the enterprise data protection business of Veritas, chiefly NetBackup, NetBackup appliances and the Alta data protection services, alongside Cohesity’s own DataProtect, SmartFiles, Helios and Gaia products.[8] The legal documents sit together at cohesity.com/agreements, with a separate index of product-specific terms for Cohesity and Veritas-heritage products.[6][7]
Three general documents apply. The General Terms and Conditions apply to all products and services (“Offerings”). The Software Terms of Use, which Cohesity also calls the EULA, apply to customer-managed software and Cohesity Platforms. The SaaS Terms of Service apply to hosted services. All three are version 2.2, dated 03.10.2026.[1][2][12] Read as month-first, this is 2026-03-10, which fits the “Last Updated March 2026” date on the Scope of License Terms.[3] Use rights are defined in two scope documents, the Scope of License Terms for software and the Scope of SaaS Offerings for services. Product-specific terms then add detail for NetBackup, NetBackup appliances, FortKnox for NetBackup, Alta SaaS Protection and other products.[3][5][7]
Cohesity normally sells through partners. Unless agreed otherwise in writing, customers receive quotes from a Cohesity Partner and place their Orders with that partner. Payment, tax and delivery terms are therefore between the customer and the partner and are not in the Agreement. An offer accepted in the AWS, Azure or Google Cloud marketplace is also a binding Order.[1] Catalog: Cohesity Partner ordering.
Editions
Cohesity publishes no price list. What can be licensed is defined by the product lines in its scope documents and product terms.
| Product line | Licensed as | Main metric | Deeper article |
|---|---|---|---|
| NetBackup (Capacity Edition) | Perpetual or subscription; NetBackup Enterprise subscription only | FETB or FETB Plus | NetBackup licensing |
| NetBackup Enterprise Virtual Client | Perpetual or subscription | CPU of protected hypervisor hosts | NetBackup licensing |
| NetBackup Traditional licences | Perpetual or subscription | Tiered Server, Tiered Client, Tape Drive | NetBackup licensing |
| DataProtect, Replica, SmartFiles, Archive (customer-managed) | Perpetual licence or subscription | Capacity-limited TB per cluster | DataProtect, SmartFiles and SaaS |
| Cohesity Data Cloud Core and Enterprise | Subscription bundle | Back-end TB usable on DataProtect or NetBackup | DataProtect, SmartFiles and SaaS |
| Gaia Self-Managed | Subscription | Nvidia GPU | DataProtect, SmartFiles and SaaS |
| DataProtect delivered as a Service (M365, Google Workspace and others) | SaaS subscription | User with pooled data allowance | DataProtect, SmartFiles and SaaS |
| FortKnox for NetBackup | SaaS subscription | Back-End Terabyte per month | DataProtect, SmartFiles and SaaS |
| Alta SaaS Protection | SaaS subscription | Per user per connector | DataProtect, SmartFiles and SaaS |
Backup Exec, InfoScale and Veritas’ Data Compliance business were not part of the Cohesity combination. The 2024 announcement placed them in a separate company, which it called “DataCo”.[14] Those products are covered under Arctera.
Metrics
Cohesity’s metrics are almost all capacity measures. They differ in what they count.
- NetBackup counts the protected source data in Front End Terabytes. The June 2026 definition measures the largest “Restorable aggregate full (or synthetic full) backup” of the data that NetBackup is used, or is capable of being used, to back up. Partial terabytes round up, and one terabyte is 1,024 GB.[4] FETB Plus weights the same measure by workload type.[4]
- Cohesity DataProtect, SmartFiles and the other customer-managed Software Services are “capacity-limited”, for example to an aggregate number of TBs on the SKU. That capacity may be used across any number of nodes in a single Cohesity cluster.[3]
- Cohesity Data Cloud bundles are licensed “on a back end, capacity-limited per-TB basis”. FortKnox for NetBackup charges per Back-End Terabyte per month, measured at the month’s peak.[3][10]
- SaaS backup of applications is licensed per User. Usage is the highest number of Users consuming the service at the same time during the measurement period, and each User brings a pooled data allowance.[5] Alta SaaS Protection, a Veritas-heritage service, also counts per user per connector, with a storage allocation for each user.[13]
Counting / floors
The General Terms prohibit creating or using “more copies, instances, capacity, or users than Entitled”. Non-compliance such as excess usage or capacity overruns must be remedied promptly by paying overages and ordering additional Entitlements.[1] Catalog: Use may not exceed Entitlements; Excess use is remediated by ordering.
Two current documents have no grace period for excess use. The Scope of SaaS Offerings says no grace period applies to Cohesity Gaia, and that unused Gaia Entitlements expire at the end of the Subscription Period.[5] The NetBackup terms limit Platform Base Limited Edition to environments of up to 250 FETB counted across all NetBackup domains.[4]
Licence types and what happens at expiry
The Scope of License Terms define the licence types for all Cohesity Software Offerings:[3]
- A license is perpetual “for the life of the Hardware on which it is originally installed” and cannot be moved to new hardware without Cohesity’s written permission. Entitlements bundled with DataPlatform licences count as licences and are not portable. Catalog: Perpetual licence is tied to the original hardware.
- A subscription lasts for the entitled months or years, can be moved freely to or from Cohesity-certified hardware, and includes both a licence and Support. Catalog: Subscriptions are portable across certified hardware.
The restore rights after a subscription ends differ by product:
| Product | Restore-only right after expiry | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Cohesity customer-managed Software on a Cohesity Platform | For the remaining life of that platform; no new backups; no global search | Scope of License Terms[3] |
| Other Cohesity customer-managed Software | At least 12 months | Scope of License Terms[3] |
| NetBackup subscription or term licence | Three months, restore only, without support (twelve months under the November 2025 terms) | NetBackup terms s.3.1[4] |
| Cohesity SaaS | 30-day Retrieval Period (7 days for evaluations) | SaaS Terms s.3.3[12] |
| FortKnox for NetBackup | Access ends immediately; data may be deleted after 30 days | FortKnox terms[10] |
Under the Global Renewal Policy, a customer whose Subscription Software lapses loses the right to use it. Reinstatement is at Cohesity’s discretion and requires paying for the lapsed period plus a 25% penalty fee.[9]
Virtualization & partitioning
There are two virtualization-specific rules. NetBackup Enterprise Virtual Client counts the CPUs of the protected hypervisor hosts, and only for the hypervisors the terms list.[4] Under FETB Plus, one unit covers 1.5 FETB of virtual or third-party cloud workloads, but only when usage data is sent to Cohesity every month.[4] Cohesity’s own Software Services are licensed by capacity and have no host-based meter. The General Terms, however, forbid using Offerings on any hardware, firmware, virtual or cloud environment that Cohesity has not certified.[1] Catalog: Only Cohesity-certified configurations.
Cloud / BYOL
The Scope of License Terms list public cloud and virtualized deployments as supported environments for DataProtect, Replica, SmartFiles and Archive.[3] NetBackup may run in the cloud environments Cohesity has pre-configured it for, and in container orchestrators. That use adds to on-premises use against the same licences, and the customer must secure the cloud provider’s cooperation with a Cohesity audit.[4] Catalog: Cloud and container use accumulates with on-premises use.
Licence keys and entitlement records
NetBackup licences are delivered as .slf files. An administrator adds them in the NetBackup web UI under Settings > License management, either from the Cohesity Entitlement Management System (VEMS) or from a downloaded file. Cohesity keeps every licence file it has issued on the VEMS License Keys page. Customers who bought through a partner obtain licence information from that partner.[11] A licence file can be applied more than once, but the customer may use only the FETB, or the servers, clients, agents and options, it has bought.[11] Catalog: NetBackup licences are .slf files from VEMS.
Programs
- Evaluations. The General Terms limit evaluations to 30 days unless agreed otherwise in writing.[1] The Evaluation Terms set 60 days where the quote states no period and forbid production use without written approval.[15] Catalog: Cohesity Evaluation.
- Cohesity Data Cloud. In the Core and Enterprise bundles, each TB entitles the customer to 1 TB of data protection with either DataProtect or NetBackup.[3] Catalog: Cohesity Data Cloud bundles.
- Renewals. Shelving, reinstatement and co-termination are set out in the Global Renewal Policy.[9] See General terms, audit and renewals.
Audit
The General Terms require the customer to give Cohesity or its auditors reasonable access to personnel, records and deployment information on at least 15 days’ written notice. Any shortfall must be cured by Order. If the non-compliance exceeds 5% in aggregate, the customer also reimburses the actual cost of the audit.[1] Catalog: Audit on 15 days’ notice; audit cost above 5% shortfall.
Out of scope
This article does not cover Cohesity hardware warranties, professional services, the Data Processing Addendum, or third-party offerings Cohesity resells under their own terms, such as Semperis and DSPM powered by Cyera. It gives no prices, because Cohesity publishes no price list. Backup Exec, InfoScale, Enterprise Vault and the other products that left with the separate company are covered under Arctera.