The following chart from the Creative Commons is a guide to ensure that adaptations comply with the licences’ terms.

The left-hand column identifies the licence of the original work to use in the adaptation.

By looking across the table, it shows the available licences for the new creation.

The table is titled "Adapter's licence chart" and details the compatibility of different licences for adapting works based on their original licence. It helps determine which licences are compatible for adapting works, ensuring proper usage and adherence to licensing terms. The table is organised with the "Status of original work" listed in the leftmost column and the "Adapter's licence" types listed across the top row. The intersections of these rows and columns are colour-coded to indicate compatibility: green cells represent permissible combinations, yellow cells represent permissible combinations with some restrictions, and grey cells represent combinations that are not allowed. Colour-coded details: for Public Domain as original work, all adapter licences are green; for By Attribution as original work, it is green for BY, BY-NC, BY-NC-ND, BY-NC-SA, BY-SA, BY-ND and yellow for PD; for By Attribution NonCommercial as original work, it is green for BY-NC, BY-NC-ND, BY-NC-SA and yellow for BY-NC, BY-ND, BY-SA, PD; for By Attribution NonCommercial-NoDerivs as original work, it is grey for all adapter licences; for By Attribution NonCommercial-ShareAlike as original work, it is green for BY-NC-SA only and grey for all other adapter licences; for By Attribution NoDerivs as original work, it is grey for all adapter licences; for By Attribution ShareAlike as original work, it is green for BY-SA only and grey is grey for all adapter licences.

CC does not recommend using a licence if the corresponding box is yellow, although doing so is technically permitted by the licence terms.
The grey boxes indicate those licences that one may not use as an adapter’s licence.

Examples:

  • If one adapts a BY-NC work, the BY-NC will do for the adaptation.
  • If one adapts a BY work, either BY or BY-NC will do for the adaptation.
  • Work licensed with BY-SA or BY-NC-SA must have the same licence applied for the adaptation.

Another type of licence compatibility relates to licences when remixing more than one pre-existing work.

The chart helps users understand which Creative Commons licenses can be used together when mixing or reusing content under different licensing terms. The leftmost column lists different types of Creative Commons licenses, and the top row lists the same licenses. The intersections of these rows and columns indicate whether a specific combination of licenses is compatible, where each cell in the grid either has a checkmark (signifying that the combination of licenses is compatible) or a black "X (indicating that the combination of licenses is incompatible). In particular, Public Domain and CC BY (Attribution) are compatible with all but those with a NoDerivs element; CC BY-SA (Attribution-ShareAlike) is compatible with all but those with NonCommercial and NoDerivs elements; CC BY-NC (Attribution-NonCommercial) and CC BY-NC-SA (Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike) are compatible with all but CC BY-SA (Attribution-ShareAlike) and those with a NoDerivs element; CC BY-ND Attribution-NoDerivs and CC BY-NC-ND Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs are incompatible with any.

Find on the left column a licence of the works and match it with the one on the top to discover a licence that may apply to a second work:

  • A ‘tick’ at the intersection means that works under those two licences can be remixed.
  • An ‘X’ usually means the works may not be remixed.

When deciding on a licence to use for the adaptation, it is better to choose the more restrictive of the two licences on the works that are getting combined, to ease reuse for downstream users.

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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.