When combined, the four licence elements form the six CC licences:

A rectangle circumscribing two circles next to each other: one slightly bigger with the letter CC and the second with a graphic of a man.
CC BY

Attribution lets others distribute, remix, tweak and build upon the work, even commercially, as long as it is credited to the original owner.

BY – Credit must be given to the creator

A rectangle circumscribing three circles next to each other: one slightly bigger with the letter CC, the second with a graphic of a man and the third with a line through over a $ sign.
CC BY NC

Attribution-NonCommercial lets others remix, tweak, and build upon the work non-commercially. Although the new works must acknowledge the original owner and be non-commercial, they don’t have to license their derivative works on the same terms.

BY – Credit must be given to the creator
NC – Only noncommercial uses of the work are permitted

A rectangle circumscribing two circles next to each other: one slightly bigger with the letter CC and the second with a C-shaped arrow pointing counter-clockwise.
BY SA

Attribution-ShareAlike lets others remix, tweak, and build upon the work, even for commercial purposes, as long as the original copyright owner is credited and the new creation is licensed under identical terms.
All new works will carry the same licence so that any derivatives will allow commercial use.

BY – Credit must be given to the creator
SA – Adaptations must be shared under the same terms

A rectangle circumscribing three circles next to each other: one slightly bigger with the letter CC, the second with a graphic of a man and the third with an equal “=” sign.
BY ND

Attribution-NoDerivs allows for commercial and non-commercial redistribution as long as it is passed along unchanged and in whole, with credit to the original copyright owner.

BY – Credit must be given to the creator
ND – No derivatives or adaptations of the work are permitted

A rectangle circumscribing four circles next to each other: one slightly bigger with the letter CC, the second with a graphic of a man, the third with a line through over a dollar “$” sign, and the fourth with a C-shaped arrow pointing counter-clockwise.
BY NC SA

Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike lets others remix, tweak, and build upon the work non-commercially, as long as the original owner is credited and the licence of the new creation is under identical terms.

BY – Credit must be given to the creator
NC – Only non-commercial uses of the work are permitted
SA – Adaptations must be shared under the same terms

A rectangle circumscribing four circles next to each other: one slightly bigger with the letter CC, the second with a graphic of a man, the third with a line through over a dollar “$” sign, and the fourth a with an equal “=” sign.
CC BY NC ND

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs is the most restrictive of the six licences, allowing others to download and share work, as long as they credit it to the original copyright owner; however, works cannot be changed in any way or used commercially.

BY – Credit must be given to the creator
NC – Only non-commercial uses of the work are permitted
No derivatives or adaptations of the work are permitted

In addition, CC also has two public domain tools, though they are not licences.

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Adapted from “About CC Licenses” © Creative Commons. Licensed under a CC BY 4.0 licence.

The author takes no responsibility for the content of this page, which is not intended as binding legal advice. The views are about copyright in the UK Higher Education sector context.