User Guide Cancel

Recover shared device licenses

Search
Enterprise

Enterprise

Admin Console
  1. Adobe Enterprise & Teams: Administration guide
  2. Plan your deployment
    1. Basic concepts
      1. Licensing
      2. Identity
      3. User management
      4. App deployment
      5. Admin Console overview
      6. Admin roles
    2. Deployment Guides
      1. Named User deployment guide
      2. SDL deployment guide
      3. Deploy Adobe Acrobat 
    3. Deploy Creative Cloud for education
      1. Deployment home
      2. K-12 Onboarding Wizard
      3. Simple setup
      4. Syncing Users
      5. Roster Sync K-12 (US)
      6. Key licensing concepts
      7. Deployment options
      8. Quick tips
      9. Approve Adobe apps in Google Admin Console
      10. Enable Adobe Express in Google Classroom
      11. Integration with Canvas LMS
      12. Integration with Blackboard Learn
      13. Configuring SSO for District Portals and LMSs
      14. Add users through Roster Sync
      15. Kivuto FAQ
      16. Primary and Secondary institution eligibility guidelines
  3. Set up your organization
    1. Identity types | Overview
    2. Set up identity | Overview
    3. Set up organization with Enterprise ID
    4. Setup Azure AD federation and sync
      1. Set up SSO with Microsoft via Azure OIDC
      2. Add Azure Sync to your directory
      3. Role sync for Education
      4. Azure Connector FAQ
    5. Set up Google Federation and sync
      1. Set up SSO with Google Federation
      2. Add Google Sync to your directory
      3. Google federation FAQ
    6. Set up organization with Microsoft ADFS
    7. Set up organization for District Portals and LMS
    8. Set up organization with other Identity providers
      1. Create a directory
      2. Verify ownership of a domain
      3. Add domains to directories
    9. SSO common questions and troubleshooting
      1. SSO Common questions
      2. SSO Troubleshooting
      3. Education common questions
  4. Manage your organization setup
    1. Manage existing domains and directories
    2. Enable automatic account creation
    3. Set up organization via directory trust
    4. Migrate to a new authentication provider 
    5. Asset settings
    6. Authentication settings
    7. Privacy and security contacts
    8. Console settings
    9. Manage encryption  
  5. Manage users
    1. Overview
    2. Administrative roles
    3. User management strategies
      1. Manage users individually   
      2. Manage multiple users (Bulk CSV)
      3. User Sync tool (UST)
      4. Microsoft Azure Sync
      5. Google Federation Sync
    4. Assign licenses to a Teams user
    5. In-app user management for teams
      1. Manage your team in Adobe Express
      2. Manage your team in Adobe Acrobat
    6. Add users with matching email domains
    7. Change user's identity type
    8. Manage user groups
    9. Manage directory users
    10. Manage developers
    11. Migrate existing users to the Adobe Admin Console
    12. Migrate user management to the Adobe Admin Console
  6. Manage products and entitlements
    1. Manage products and product profiles
      1. Manage products
      2. Buy products and licenses
      3. Manage product profiles for enterprise users
      4. Manage automatic assignment rules
      5. Entitle users to train Firefly custom models
      6. Review product requests
      7. Manage self-service policies
      8. Manage app integrations
      9. Manage product permissions in the Admin Console  
      10. Enable/disable services for a product profile
      11. Single App | Creative Cloud for enterprise
      12. Optional services
    2. Manage Shared Device licenses
      1. What's new
      2. Deployment guide
      3. Create packages
      4. Recover licenses
      5. Manage profiles
      6. Licensing toolkit
      7. Shared Device Licensing FAQ
  7. Get started with Global Admin Console
    1. Adopt global administration
    2. Select your organization
    3. Manage organization hierarchy
    4. Manage product profiles
    5. Manage administrators
    6. Manage user groups
    7. Update organization policies
    8. Manage policy templates
    9. Allocate products to child organizations
    10. Execute pending jobs
    11. Explore insights
    12. Export or import organization structure
  8. Manage storage and assets
    1. Storage
      1. Manage enterprise storage
      2. Adobe Creative Cloud: Update to storage
      3. Manage Adobe storage
    2. Asset migration
      1. Automated Asset Migration
      2. Automated Asset Migration FAQ  
      3. Manage transferred assets
    3. Reclaim assets from a user
    4. Student asset migration | EDU only
      1. Automatic student asset migration
      2. Migrate your assets
  9. Manage services
    1. Adobe Stock
      1. Adobe Stock credit packs for teams
      2. Adobe Stock for enterprise
      3. Use Adobe Stock for enterprise
      4. Adobe Stock License Approval
    2. Custom fonts
    3. Adobe Asset Link
      1. Overview
      2. Create user group
      3. Configure Adobe Experience Manager Assets
      4. Configure and install Adobe Asset Link
      5. Manage assets
      6. Adobe Asset Link for XD
    4. Adobe Acrobat Sign
      1. Set up Adobe Acrobat Sign for enterprise or teams
      2. Adobe Acrobat Sign - Team feature Administrator
      3. Manage Adobe Acrobat Sign on the Admin Console
    5. Creative Cloud for enterprise - free membership
      1. Overview
  10. Deploy apps and updates
    1. Overview
      1. Deploy and deliver apps and updates
      2. Plan to deploy
      3. Prepare to deploy
    2. Create packages
      1. Package apps via the Admin Console
      2. Create Named User Licensing Packages
      3. Manage pre-generated packages
        1. Manage Adobe templates
        2. Manage Single-app packages
      4. Manage packages
      5. Manage device licenses
      6. Serial number licensing
    3. Customize packages
      1. Customize the Creative Cloud desktop app
      2. Include extensions in your package
    4. Deploy Packages 
      1. Deploy packages
      2. Deploy Adobe packages using Microsoft Intune
      3. Deploy Adobe packages with SCCM
      4. Deploy Adobe packages with ARD
      5. Install products in the Exceptions folder
      6. Uninstall Creative Cloud products
      7. Use Adobe provisioning toolkit enterprise edition
    5. Manage updates
      1. Change management for Adobe enterprise and teams customers
      2. Deploy updates
    6. Adobe Update Server Setup Tool (AUSST)
      1. AUSST Overview
      2. Set up the internal update server
      3. Maintain the internal update server
      4. Common use cases of AUSST   
      5. Troubleshoot the internal update server
    7. Adobe Remote Update Manager (RUM)
      1. Release notes
      2. Use Adobe Remote Update Manager
    8. Troubleshoot
      1. Troubleshoot Creative Cloud apps installation and uninstallation errors
      2. Query client machines to check if a package is deployed
  11. Manage your Teams account
    1. Overview
    2. Update payment details
    3. Manage invoices
    4. Change contract owner
    5. Change your plan
    6. Change reseller
    7. Cancel your plan
    8. Purchase Request compliance
  12. Renewals
    1. Teams membership: Renewals
    2. Enterprise in VIP: Renewals and compliance
  13. Manage contracts
    1. Automated expiration stages for ETLA contracts
    2. Switching contract types within an existing Adobe Admin Console
    3. Value Incentive Plan (VIP) in China
    4. VIP Select help
  14. Reports & logs
    1. Audit Log
    2. Assignment reports
    3. Content Logs
  15. Get help
    1. Contact Adobe Customer Care
    2. Support options for teams accounts
    3. Support options for enterprise accounts
    4. Support options for Experience Cloud

When you deploy shared device licenses, you consume the licenses your organization has purchased in the agreement with Adobe. As you deploy these licenses, the count of consumed licenses is indicated on the Products page of the Admin Console.

To recover a license from an inoperable machine, you'll need to reset the licenses of all machines of that product profile. However, to recover the license from the machine to which you have access, you can deactivate the license on that machine itself.

Reset licenses mapped to a product profile

Caution:

The following procedure resets the licenses of all machines in a product profile. Adobe recommends that you save any unsaved work on all machines in this profile. Also, if any long running processes are running on any of the machines in this profile, ensure that you either stop these processes or let them complete before proceeding.

If you need to recover a license from an inoperable machine, use the following procedure to reset the licenses of all machines of that product profile:

  1. Sign in to the Admin Console.

  2. On the Products page, select the product and then the product profile for which you want to recover licenses.

  3. Select Recover Licenses.

  4. To confirm, select Recover on the Are you sure you want to recover license dialog box.

All machines mapped to this profile are reset. However, when users sign in to  Adobe's app on any of these machines, the machines are immediately licensed again. For example, if a product profile is mapped to 10 machines and you want to retire two of these machines, use the procedure above to recover the licenses from all 10 machines. When users sign in to  Adobe apps on the other eight machines, these will be immediately licensed again. And you'll have two licenses you can use on another two machines.

Deactivate licenses

If you need to recover licenses from machines to which you have access, you can deactivate the licenses on those machines using the Shared Device Licensing toolkit.

A machine can be activated with a single shared device license. Also, you may install multiple shared device licenses on a single machine. You can choose to deactivate all the licenses on a machine or only deactivate a single license on that machine.

Download and run licensing toolkit

The procedures described in this document require you to execute commands using the Shared Device Licensing toolkit.

First, you'll need to download the Adobe Licensing Toolkit from the following location based on the client machine OS:

  • macOS: Download the adobe-licensing-toolkit.dmg and mount the file.
  • Windows: Download the zip file and extract the adobe-licensing-toolkit.exe.

How to use the toolkit

Since the toolkit is a command-line utility, you'll need to use the Windows command prompt or the macOS terminal to use it.

If you're unsure of how to execute commands from the Windows command prompt or the macOS terminal, follow these steps:

  1. Open the Windows command prompt.

    Press the Start button on your keyboard, type Command prompt and press Enter.

  2. From Windows Explorer, drag-and-drop the adobe-licensing-toolkit.exe file (downloaded above) to the Windows command prompt.

The command prompt now displays the toolkit filename. (It may also display the full folder path of the file).

The commands described below require you to enter arguments to the toolkit.

For example, to deactivate shared device licenses, after you drag-and-drop the file on the prompt, type --deactivate (give a space between the filename and --deactivate) and press Enter.:

  1. Open the macOS terminal.

  2. From the macOS Finder, drag-and-drop the adobe-licensing-toolkit file (from location to which you mounted the file above) to the macOS terminal.

The command prompt now displays the toolkit filename. (It may also display the full folder path of the file).

The commands described below require you to enter arguments to the toolkit.

For example, to deactivate shared device licenses, after you drag-and-drop the file on the prompt, type --deactivate (give a space between the filename and --deactivate) and press Enter.:

Deactivate all licenses

On a single shared device, you may have activated multiple licenses. For example, the same device may require different app installations for different groups of students. So, to deactivate all licenses on a device, run the following command with admin privileges:

Windows

adobe-licensing-toolkit.exe --deactivate

Short form:

adobe-licensing-toolkit.exe -t

macOS

sudo ./adobe-licensing-toolkit --deactivate

Short form:

sudo ./adobe-licensing-toolkit -t

For help on how to run the above commands, see How to use the toolkit.

Deactivate single license

You can also choose to deactivate only specific licenses on a machine. To do this, you will need the NpdId, a unique identifier of the license that you want to remove.

Get license NpdId

To get NpdId for the shared device license packages on a device, run the following command with admin privileges:

Windows

adobe-licensing-toolkit.exe --licenseInformation

Short form:

adobe-licensing-toolkit.exe -l

macOS

sudo ./adobe-licensing-toolkit --licenseInformation

Short form:

sudo ./adobe-licensing-toolkit -l

For help on how to run the above commands, see How to use the toolkit.

When you run the above command, you will see the following (sample) output:

Adobe Licensing Toolkit (0.1.5.57) 
License Details 
  
NpdId          : MWVjZGNlMzMtZGU2Yi00ZmNlLTkzZTktY2MxMjBhZmFiZjg1 
AppId          : Photoshop1 
DeploymentMode : NAMED_USER_EDUCATION_LAB 
CacheExpiry    : 03/06/19 20:01:56 India Standard Time 
LicenseId      : 511F26523959D15EBD9B 
LicenseExpiry  : 03/06/21 20:01:56 India Standard Time 
  
NpdId          : YjZiOGU0ZTItYTkxNy00NTFlLWFkOTItZTljNTc2M2U2OTgx 
AppId          : Animate1 
DeploymentMode : NAMED_USER_EDUCATION_LAB 
CacheExpiry    : 03/06/19 20:01:56 India Standard Time 
LicenseId      : 511F26523959D15EBD9B 
LicenseExpiry  : 03/06/21 20:01:56 India Standard Time 
Operation Successfully Completed

From the output (see above sample), you need the NpdId for the shared device license that you want to deactivate.

Deactivate specific licenses

Now use the NPIDs from the previous command, to deactivate the required license:

Windows

adobe-licensing-toolkit.exe --deactivate --npdId <NpdId from -licenseInformation command above>

Short form:

adobe-licensing-toolkit.exe -t -n <NpdId from -licenseInformation command above>

macOS

sudo ./adobe-licensing-toolkit --deactivate --npdId <NpdId from -licenseInformation command above>

Short form:

sudo ./adobe-licensing-toolkit -t -n <NpdId from -licenseInformation command above>

For help on how to run the above commands, see How to use the toolkit.

 Adobe

Get help faster and easier

New user?

Quick links

View all your plans Manage your plans
View quick links
Hide quick links

Legal Notices    |    Online Privacy Policy