Trend Micro licensing covers the business security portfolio that Trend Micro Incorporated now sells under the TrendAI brand: the Trend Vision One platform (endpoint, server and workload, email, network, cloud, identity and exposure-management packages), the older Apex One, Deep Security and Trend Cloud One products, the Worry-Free line for small businesses, and TippingPoint network appliances. Commercial use of every Trend product is governed by the Global Products Agreement (GPA), which states that different terms apply to products for personal, home or consumer use.[1] The GPA does not fix a single unit of measure. It grants use “for the Capacity”, which it defines as the use rights, usage capacity or Credits purchased “based upon the applicable licensing measurement as described in the Certificate”, so the metric is set product by product in the Certificate and the Documentation.[1] This article summarises the estate; the articles listed under See also cover each construct in more depth.
Editions
Trend Micro has no single edition ladder. Its products fall into four licensing families.
| Family | How it is licensed | Detail article |
|---|---|---|
| Trend Vision One | Prepaid TrendAI Flex (credits) licence; each package has a monthly and annual credit requirement per endpoint, user, GB, node, account or throughput band | Trend Vision One credits |
| Apex One, Apex Central, Deep Security (on-premises) | Seats on an Activation Code, perpetual or subscription, with Paid Maintenance | Apex One, Deep Security and Cloud One licensing |
| Trend Cloud One | Pay-as-you-go protection-hours and other hourly dimensions through AWS Marketplace, or an annual subscription | same |
| Worry-Free Business Security and Services | Seats on an Activation Code with a yearly Maintenance Agreement; Services now managed from Vision One | Worry-Free and Activation Codes |
| TippingPoint | Hardware appliance plus TippingPoint Operating System under Hardware Terms | this article |
The business is in transition. Starting in January 2026, all Vision One licences moved to a credits model and the TrendAI Flex (credits) licence became the only Vision One licence available for purchase; existing Vision One licences convert to credits automatically.[5] At the same time many older products have announced End-of-Sale dates. The supported-products list records Apex One as a Service at End-of-Sale on 2025-12-31 with End-of-Life on 2027-12-31, Cloud One Workload Security at End-of-Sale on 2025-12-13 with End-of-Life on 2027-12-31, Cloud One Endpoint Security at End-of-Sale on 2025-10-01, and Cloud One File Storage Security and Cloud One Sentry at End-of-Life on 2026-12-31.[7] The same list shows the Smart Protection Complete and Smart Protection for Endpoints suites at End-of-Sale on 2025-12-31, with no End-of-Life for the suites themselves.[7]
Metrics
The vendor metrics recorded in the catalog are:
- Credit (TrendAI Flex): the GPA calls Credits “the universal licensing unit for obtaining access to Products made available on the Trend Vision One platform”.[1]
- Package units priced in credits: Endpoint, User, GB of data, 500 Mbps of monitored throughput, Assessed cloud account, Protected Kubernetes node and 500,000 scans. For example, Endpoint Security Core requires 3.75 credits per endpoint per month (45 per year) and Email and Collaboration Security Core 2.08 credits per user per month (25 per year).[6]
- Seat (Activation Code licence): Apex Central reports for each managed product “The number of seats the Activation Code allows”.[10]
- Protection-hour for Cloud One Workload Security, priced from USD 0.007 per instance-hour (Essentials) to USD 0.047 (Extra-large and Data Center).[8]
- Capacity: the contractual quantity on the Certificate against which all use is measured.[1]
Counting / floors
Capacity and true-up
The GPA makes exceeding Capacity a payment event rather than a hard stop. If the Company exceeds the Capacity it must promptly purchase an additional quantity to true-up and pay excess use fees at the rates in the Quote or Private Offer; failure to remediate is a material breach (rule).[1] For credits, the GPA warns that it “is possible to exceed its Capacity (including where Capacity is measured in Credits) during a Subscription Period”, and Vision One lets the balance go negative rather than blocking use.[1][4] A software asset manager therefore has to reconcile consumption against the Certificate continuously; the product will not enforce the limit.
Use rights
Use is limited to Internal Business Use in accordance with the Documentation. The Company may let its Affiliates, its Contractors and BYOL hosted environments use Products for its Internal Business Use at no additional fee, but may not resell, sublicense or rent Products or use them to provide services to third parties, including as a service bureau or on a time-share basis (rule).[1] The contract terms are covered in Trend Micro Global Products Agreement.
Term, perpetual licences and maintenance
The GPA distinguishes a Subscription Period (a limited period “such as per host hour, month, or year”) from a Perpetual Period. Subscription Software and Cloud Services include Maintenance for the whole Subscription Period; Perpetual Period Software includes Maintenance only for one year from Delivery, after which Maintenance is ordered in minimum one-year increments (rule).[1] Maintenance consists of Updates and Support; Updates become part of existing licensed copies and do not increase Capacity.[2] Trend will not renew Maintenance beyond an End-of-Life period (rule).[2]
Activation and licence records
On-premises and legacy products are activated with an Activation Code. A Registration Key registers the product and yields the Activation Code; without an Activation Code the product installs but its update and scanning features are disabled, and Activation Codes stay valid as long as licence and maintenance are renewed (rule).[9] Vision One replaces the Customer Licensing Portal for products linked to it: its License Information app lists each licence with its units, credit conversion, start and expiration dates, and registers new Activation Codes or Registration Keys.[12]
Expiry
Expiry behaviour differs by delivery model. In Vision One, a SaaS licence has a 30-day grace period and a 30-day lock period before data is purged, while on-premises licences have a grace period after which updates stop (rule).[12] Unused credits expire at the end of the Subscription Period (rule).[1]
Audit
Trend can verify use through technical means and ask for a system-generated usage report within 30 days, requires records to be kept for two years after expiry, and may run an audit by an internationally recognised audit firm once per calendar year on 20 days’ written notice. If unlicensed or excess use is more than 10% of licensed use, the Company reimburses Trend’s reasonable audit costs (rule, rule).[1]
Virtualization & partitioning
Trend does not publish a host-based or hypervisor-level counting alternative in the GPA. Vision One Endpoint Security counts endpoints by agent activity: only endpoints with active and long-lived agents require credits, and an endpoint is long-lived if more than seven days separate its first and latest status reports (rule).[13] Short-lived virtual desktops and autoscaled instances that disappear within seven days and stop reporting do not keep consuming credits, but long-lived virtual machines count like physical endpoints. Cloud One Workload Security billed virtual machines per protection-hour and charged computers not under a cloud connector, or in a vCenter account, at the highest Data Center rate regardless of size (rule).[8] Container Security is counted per protected Kubernetes node or Amazon ECS instance, with serverless pods and tasks counted separately.[6]
Cloud / BYOL
The GPA recognises three routes to purchase: directly from Trend, through a Reseller, or through a Marketplace Provider acting as seller of record.[1] The licence grant covers installation on equipment “owned, controlled, or operated by or on behalf of Company including BYOL”.[1] Credits can be bought from a sales representative or from AWS Marketplace or Microsoft Marketplace.[4] For any marketplace order, whatever the customer’s location, the contracting entity is Trend Micro Incorporated under New York law; direct and reseller orders use the regional entity named in the Contracting Entity and Governing Law Schedule (rule).[3]
Programs
- TrendAI Flex (credits) license: the prepaid credit subscription for Vision One.[4]
- Paid Maintenance: Updates and Support under the Maintenance Terms, which take precedence over the GPA where they conflict.[2]
- Marketplace Private Offer: a marketplace pricing and usage model that prevails over the GPA where they conflict.[1]
- Trend Cloud One pay-as-you-go and annual subscription: the two Cloud One billing methods.[8]
- Test Products: evaluations and proofs of concept for non-production use only (rule).[1]
TippingPoint
TippingPoint appliances are Hardware under the GPA and the TippingPoint Hardware Terms, which apply to the TippingPoint Hardware and the TippingPoint Operating System. The Hardware Terms set a 90-day warranty for the operating system and a hardware warranty of one year for purchases before 2026-07-01 or five years for purchases on or after that date. Unlike Software licences, Hardware may be transferred to a bona fide purchaser, who can enforce the remaining warranty (rule).[11]
Out of scope
Consumer and home products are licensed under separate consumer terms and are not covered here.[1] Premium support (PSP) and Professional Services are expressly outside the GPA and are provided under separate agreements.[1] Trend publishes no public list price for Vision One credits or Apex One seats; prices are set in the Quote or Private Offer. Customers in Japan use a separate agreement, because the GPA version cited here is “Global (excluding Japan)” except for AWS Marketplace purchases in Japan.[1]