Commercial use, platform by platform

The general shape in 2026

All major paid tiers covered on this site — OpenAI's Sora API, Google's Veo via Vertex, Runway's paid plans, Kling's memberships, Seedance via Volcengine — permit commercial use of your generated output, subject to each vendor's content policies. The commercial line usually sits between free and paid: free tiers often restrict commercial use, watermark output, or both (Runway's free plan being the textbook case).

The five things to actually verify

• Your tier, not the product: rights differ between free, subscription and API access to the same model.
• Watermark status — commercial rights with a watermark is a right you can't use. The map.
• Third-party resellers: discounted unofficial API access typically carries different (or unclear) licensing than official channels — a real risk for client work.
• Disclosure rules: separate from ownership, platforms and ad networks increasingly require labeling synthetic media, especially realistic humans and political/ad content.
• People and brands in output: generating a real person's likeness or a trademark creates liability no vendor license cures.

This page is orientation, not legal advice — for client contracts and anything broadcast, read the current terms of your actual tier (they change) and let a professional confirm the edge cases.