Licenses

Your Invicti Platform license determines how many targets you can set up for scanning. The total number of targets permitted is a combination of purchased FQDN targets and allowed target variations. This document explains the nuances of how licensing works in Invicti Platform.

FQDN targets vs. variations

Every Invicti Platform license has an allocated number of FQDN (Fully Qualified Domain Name) targets based on your purchase. In addition to the FQDN target allocation, each license allows for a limited number of target variations. The maximum number of variations permitted is five times the license-based FQDN target limit.

A variation is when a target has the same FQDN but a different URL. If www.example.com is the FQDN target, then www.example.com/111 is a variation. These two URLs would count as 1 (FQDN) target against your license allocation and 1 variation against the total target variation limit.

Illustrative example

• Your Invicti Platform license has an allocation of 5 targets
• You create two FQDN targets: www.example.com and www.test.com. This uses two targets from your license allocation.
• In addition to those two targets, you can create up to four variations on those targets, for example:

• www.example.com/1
• www.example.com/2
• www.example.com/3
• www.example.com/4    
• www.test.com/1
• www.test.com/2
• www.test.com/3
• www.test.com/4  

• Alternatively, you could have 6 variations on www.example.com and 2 variations on www.test.com, or some other split of variations between the targets.

The important point to note is that the total upper limit on the number of variations applies across all your targets as a whole allocation.

Understanding FQDN Usage and Retention in Invicti

Fully Qualified Domain Names (FQDNs) are a key component of Invicti's licensing model. Each unique FQDN scanned counts against your licensed target allocation. This document explains:

• Why do deleted targets not free up FQDNs
• How long are FQDNs retained
• Differences between POC and full license behavior
• Recommendations for managing FQDNs
  

Why are FQDNs not freed upon deletion?

When you delete a target from your Invicti portal, the associated FQDN is not immediately released back into your license pool. This is intentional and governed by the licensing policy, which is designed to:

• Prevent license circumvention by repeatedly deleting and re-adding targets to bypass target limits
  
• Ensure predictable usage and billing over the subscription period
  

Key points:

• FQDNs are retained until the end of your subscription period (i.e., license anniversary)
  
• Deleting a target only removes it from your dashboard—it does not reset license usage
  
• Targets (FQDNs) are tracked even after deletion
  

License Behavior Differences

Full (Commercial) License

• You are allocated a fixed number of FQDNs per year (e.g., 10 FQDNs for a 10-target license)
  
• You can exceed the allocation temporarily (up to ~120% of quota), but overuse is monitored and flagged
  
• Retired FQDNs are freed only at subscription renewal
  
• UI may not reflect exact usage due to retention of deleted targets (e.g., showing 3/10 instead of 10/10 if 7 were deleted)
  

POC (Proof of Concept) License

• Hard limits are enforced: exceeding FQDN quota results in a blocking error
  
• No grace allowance beyond your quota
  
• If you receive a “Max FQDNs reached” error, this is expected behavior under a POC license
  

Exceptions for Demo or Testing

Demo targets or internal QA environments (e.g., temporary subdomains) may need flexibility. If your organization requires exceptions:

• Contact support and request adjustments for demo targets
  
• In some cases, your POC license can be swapped for a Full license to remove hard FQDN limits
  

Best Practices

• Plan FQDN usage across environments (dev, staging, prod) to avoid hitting limits prematurely
  
• Tag and document test/demo targets for internal tracking
  
• Use target editing rather than deletion/re-creation to preserve your license allocation
  
• Request FQDN resets during renewal if prior targets are no longer in use