22 Proven Open‑Source Business Models: Turning Code into Revenue

In recent years open source has become a hot global topic, with many projects receiving large investments or going public. While the code is publicly available under open‑source licenses, various commercial models enable these projects to generate revenue.

The author examined numerous papers and company materials and identified 22 common open‑source business models.

Core open source, non‑core closed source – The most common model where the core code is open while peripheral features are closed and sold. It includes four sub‑categories:

Hosting and integration – Cloud‑hosted versions of open‑source software (e.g., MongoDB Atlas, Elastic Cloud) charge for managed services, and hardware vendors bundle open‑source OSes with servers.

Software marketplace – Platforms with large user bases (e.g., Android, Firefox) earn revenue by taking a commission on third‑party apps or extensions.

Professional services – Companies provide support, consulting, and maintenance for open‑source software (e.g., Hortonworks, Red Hat).

Upgrade services – Users pay for official upgrade assistance to ensure data integrity and stability.

Code resale – Selling redistributed binaries of open‑source software.

Secondary licensing – Offering commercial licenses for open‑source code (e.g., BSD‑based macOS).

Identical binary sales with services – Selling the same open‑source binaries together with value‑added services.

Delayed open source – New versions remain closed while older versions are released as open source (e.g., MariaDB).

End‑of‑life open source – Software is open‑sourced after its commercial lifecycle ends.

Community‑driven services – Monetizing community activities, such as Google Summer of Code.

Traffic monetization – Leveraging user traffic of open‑source software to generate income (e.g., AdBlock Plus).

Paid certifications – Charging for official certifications on open‑source technologies.

Training and documentation sales – Selling courses and books related to open‑source tools (e.g., O'Reilly).

Community traffic revenue – Earning fees from the traffic attracted by popular open‑source projects.

Donations – Receiving financial contributions from companies or individuals (e.g., Mozilla Foundation, Vue creator).

Merchandise sales – Selling branded items such as T‑shirts or mugs.

Web3 to Developer – Emerging DAO‑based models that aim to reward contributors directly through blockchain mechanisms.

By compiling these models, the author created an open‑source project on Gitee to share the findings and invites the community to contribute via issues or pull requests.