How SC Sentinel licensing works

A breakdown of the free tier, license activation, what a paid license unlocks, and how seat-based plans work for teams.

Cover Image for How SC Sentinel licensing works

Note: This is mock/placeholder content for demonstration purposes.

SC Sentinel uses a license key model with a free tier that never expires. The split is deliberate: the free tier is genuinely useful for evaluation, and the paid license unlocks the security context that makes SC Sentinel worth running in production.

The free tier

Any request to a SC Sentinel endpoint without an activated license gets a valid MCP response — specifically a hello endpoint that confirms the server is reachable and a health endpoint that reports server status. Both are real MCP responses; neither requires a license key.

This is useful for verifying your client configuration, testing firewall rules on self-hosted deployments, or evaluating whether MCP-based security context is the right approach before buying anything.

The free tier is rate-limited to a modest request allowance. It just doesn't return security context.

Activating a license

License keys are issued from the SC Sentinel dashboard after purchase, and the license activates on your account server-side. The endpoint verifies it against the license service on each request, so there's no separate activation step to perform.

Activation happens automatically when you complete checkout — for both the hosted endpoint and self-hosted deployments. There's nothing to run by hand; the same endpoint URL and token start returning security context once the license is active.

Keys don't expire on a fixed date; they're tied to your subscription. Cancel the subscription and the key deactivates at the end of the billing period.

What a paid license unlocks

With an active license, every MCP request returns the full security context response:

  • Your configured rules (built-in OWASP-derived rules plus any custom rules you've defined in the dashboard)
  • Per-framework guidance matched to the project context your assistant provides
  • Explicit pattern prohibitions your team has flagged

The response is structured JSON that MCP-compatible assistants parse natively. You don't need to post-process it.

Seat-based plans

Licensing is per seat, where a seat is one developer actively using an SC Sentinel-connected assistant. The dashboard tracks active seats based on request activity over the trailing 30 days; a developer who hasn't made a request in 30 days doesn't count against your seat total.

Plans currently available:

  • Starter — up to 5 seats, flat monthly or annual pricing
  • Pro — up to 50 seats, flat monthly or annual pricing
  • Enterprise — unlimited seats, custom pricing, includes SLA and self-hosted deployment support

Each plan is a flat price, not per-seat billing. You can adjust seats from the billing settings at any time.

Questions

The license model is intentionally simple. If something about it doesn't fit your team's procurement requirements — volume discounts, purchase orders, multi-year terms — reach out via the contact form and we'll sort it out.