---
title: "Quickstart: licensing"
sidebar_label: Licensing
description: "Issue a runtime license in a project, download ClikaRT from the platform, and run a licensed prompt on your machine in six steps."
---

Time to first licensed run: about 6 minutes, plus the download. [Runtime licenses](../../concepts/runtime-licenses.mdx) explains the credential and [Download the ClikaRT SDK](../../how-to/download-the-clikart-sdk.md) the archive; this page is the short form.

1. **Issue.** In the project, **Licenses**, **Issue License**, **Online** (the machine can reach the platform), keep the default entitlements, **Issue license**. Copy the `CLIKA1-` text from the result. Press the button once; a double click issues two.
2. **Download.** Profile menu, **Download ClikaRT**, your platform, **Command line only**, CUDA by your driver (none without an NVIDIA GPU), **Download**; or `clika-cli runtime-sdk download linux-amd64-cli ./clikart` with a key that carries `runtime_sdk:download`.
3. **Verify and extract.** Copy the SHA-256 from the dialog, check it, then extract:

```bash
echo "<sha256 you copied>  <archive>" | sha256sum -c
```

```bash
tar -xf <archive>
```

   A Python build is a zip: `unzip` it, then `pip install` the wheels.

4. **License the runtime.** For this shell:

```bash
export CLIKA_RT_LICENSE='<the CLIKA1- text>'
```

   or once for your account, which prints the kind and the project:

```bash
./bin/clikart-license-init '<the CLIKA1- text>'
```

5. **Run.**

```bash
./bin/clikart-cli HuggingFaceTB/SmolLM2-135M-Instruct prompt "Hello"
```

   A licensed run prints the answer and nothing about the license. A refused one names the cause (`no ClikaRT license is configured`, `LICENSE_STATE_BLOCKED` after a revocation, `ENTITLEMENT_DENIED` when the license does not permit this machine, `PHONE_HOME_STALLED` when an Online license cannot reach the platform); [License the runtime](/clikart/how-to/license-the-runtime) is the contract.

6. **Watch it stop.** Revoke the license on the Licenses page (type the project's name). A running `serve` is refused at its next check with the platform, within about five minutes, as `LICENSE_STATE_BLOCKED: runtime key revoked`; a short prompt that starts and ends between two checks can still complete. An Offline bundle keeps working until it expires.

Limits you may meet: your plan caps the active Offline bundles across the organization (the refusal names the limit); every license's expiry is bounded by the plan's end; an API key cannot issue, rotate or revoke, so the CLI and an assistant read licenses and do not mint them.