Community Edition

LyftData exposes two broad runtime states in the product UI:

Community: constrained surfaces and limits for evaluation, local development, and CI.
Licensed: production-oriented surfaces and limits based on signed license claims.

The LyftData 3.0 edition ladder is:

Community Edition: no license configured; one built-in Worker, at most 15 jobs, the local 250 GB/day rate limiter, and MCP included.
Community+: licensed and free, renewed annually; one built-in Worker only and all generally available self-managed features. The current offer is 1 TB/day, observed with no product rate limiter, and an admission-only ceiling of 7 active source connectors and 5 active destination connectors; the signed license is authoritative.
Standard Edition: paid; a committed daily volume allowance set in the signed license (the current Standard offer starts at 1 TB/day), with built-in and external Workers supported and no licensed Worker or connector ceiling.
Enterprise Edition: paid and negotiated; built-in and external Workers supported, with no licensed throughput, Worker, or connector ceiling.

Licensed editions also include the embedded AI runtime, the Operator agent (Preview), and Data Awareness (Preview). These need an AI provider account and separate per-feature consent.

Volume entitlements use decimal units: 1 GB is 10⁹ bytes and 1 TB is 10¹² bytes.

Community edition at a glance

Community Edition surfaces and limits are active for a never-licensed Community profile. Clearing or losing a configured entitlement does not automatically create that profile; use the supported recovery or replacement path.

No activation required – a never-licensed installation begins in the Community Edition profile.
One worker – the built-in worker is always available; external workers cannot be added or enrolled and the built-in worker cannot be removed.
15 job limit – job creation and cloning calls are capped at 15 total jobs (existing jobs can still be edited or redeployed).
Daily volume limit – processing is rate-limited to approximately 250 GB/day in Community Edition.
MCP included – the MCP server is part of the Community Edition feature set.
Feature gating – licensed-only connectors and capabilities remain disabled in Community Edition.
Core API availability – control-plane APIs remain available so dashboards and automation can operate in constrained mode.

The Community rate limiter and job maximum are boundaries of the unlicensed edition. Community+ removes those two limits, but remains built-in-worker-only; external Workers require a valid signed external-Worker entitlement. See Observe and assist.

Why community edition exists

Community Edition gives teams a frictionless way to explore LyftData and to run lower-scale automation locally:

Try the platform quickly – no keys or activation steps are needed before creating jobs and running them.
Local & CI usage – ideal for test suites, proofs of concept, or developer environments that only need the built-in worker.
Seamless migration – Community+ activation removes the Community rate limiter and job maximum without rebuilding existing jobs; external Workers require a valid signed external-Worker entitlement.

Feature comparison

Capability	Community Edition	Community+	Standard Edition	Enterprise Edition
License requirement	None	Licensed; no charge; renewed annually	Paid license	Paid, negotiated license
Worker entitlement	Built-in worker only	One built-in Worker; external Workers are not supported	Built-in and external Workers supported; no licensed Worker or connector ceiling	Built-in and external Workers supported; no licensed Worker or connector ceiling
Job count	At most 15 jobs	No job maximum	No job maximum	No job maximum
Daily volume	250 GB/day, applied by the local rate limiter	Current offer: 1 TB/day, observed with no rate limiter	Committed daily allowance in the signed license; current offer starts at 1 TB/day	No licensed throughput limit
MCP	Included	Included	Included	Included
Connector scope	3 active sources / 2 active destinations, admission-only; Community feature restrictions and MCP remain	Signed limit, admission-only; current offer 7 active sources / 5 active destinations (an 8th source or 6th destination is refused; running work is not stopped)	No licensed connector ceiling	No licensed connector ceiling
Other features	Licensed-only connectors/capabilities are disabled	All generally available self-managed features, plus the embedded AI runtime, the Operator agent (Preview), and Data Awareness (Preview)	All generally available self-managed features, plus the embedded AI runtime, the Operator agent (Preview), and Data Awareness (Preview)	All generally available self-managed features, plus the embedded AI runtime, the Operator agent (Preview), and Data Awareness (Preview)
Commercial posture	Local edition boundaries apply	Usage observed for evidence and true-up	Usage observed for evidence and true-up	Usage observed; no volume or Worker true-up condition

Hosted or managed services, professional services, and support packages are contracted separately and are not product-feature gates.

Operating in community edition

When a server is running in Community Edition you will see the following behaviours:

License and features views in the UI show Community surfaces.
Job creation requests return a descriptive error once the 15-job limit is reached.
Job cloning is also blocked once the job cap is reached.
Worker APIs reject attempts to add or enroll additional workers and refuse to remove the built-in worker.
Throughput is rate-limited against the Community daily-volume limit.

Community+ remains built-in-worker-only and still refuses, at admission, a state-expanding source or destination beyond its signed limit (an 8th source or 6th destination under the current offer); already-running work is not stopped, paused, or undeployed. Standard and Enterprise have no licensed connector ceiling.

For automation and health checks, prefer /api/features (license_status.edition and license_status.tier) plus /api/license/show details, rather than assuming “license configured” means unrestricted.

Reading `license_status`

Current builds report the following values. These are the API values in the shipping product; they have not yet been renamed to the v3 edition names.

license_status.edition: Community or Licensed. A valid Community+ key may still report edition=Community for wire compatibility; use tier and product_edition to distinguish it from unlicensed Community.
license_status.tier: FreeCommunity when no license is configured, CommunityPlus for a configured Community+ key, and Licensed for Standard/Enterprise. Older keys can also report the legacy tier values Free, Starter, Growth, or Enterprise.
license_status.product_edition: the v3 edition (community, community_plus, standard, enterprise) when the server can resolve it.

Treat license_status as an indicator and read /api/license/show for the entitlement actually in force. A key issued before the current edition ladder can still report a legacy tier value.

Activating a license

Moving out of Community Edition is straightforward:

Acquire a license key — start with free Community+ activation, or request a Standard or Enterprise key from LyftData. Community+ requires no charge and renews annually.
Activate the license in Settings → License or provide LYFTDATA_LICENSE at startup for automation.
Refresh – as soon as activation succeeds, Community Edition limits are lifted. Community+ removes the rate limiter and the 15-job maximum, and neither is re-enabled afterwards.
No reconfiguration required – jobs, history, and settings remain intact.

Monitoring & best practices

Detect edition explicitly – call GET /api/features and inspect license_status.edition plus license_status.tier instead of assuming license_configured=true means unrestricted.
Plan for limits – watch job counts and worker requirements; activate a license before hitting Community caps.
Observe volume – add alerts around daily volume consumption in Community Edition environments.
Document your activation process – because activation is seamless, most teams just need a runbook describing where the license key lives and who can apply it.

Community Edition is ideal for learning and early pipeline development. When you need to remove the rate limiter and the job maximum, activate free Community+. When you need external Workers, more than 1 TB/day, or a commercial procurement relationship, move to Standard Edition; Enterprise Edition is the negotiated edition with no licensed throughput or Worker limit.