SOLIDWORKS : Activation count exceeded

A dreaded message for any SOLIDWORKS user when activating their SOLIDWORKS licenses.

What does the message mean? How to avoid facing this issue? And how to resolve?

All will be covered in this blog post.

But first, what is License Activation?

Activation is a product licensing and registration process for SOLIDWORKS standalone (non-SolidNetWork License) licenses. Typically, if your product license is not activated, SOLIDWORKS tries to activate it when you start the product.

Starting with SOLIDWORKS 2022 and later, if you purchased a perpetual license of SOLIDWORKS, you must also reactivate the license once a year. A perpetual license never expires but needs to be reactivated. SOLIDWORKS prompts you to reactivate the perpetual license before the required reactivation date.

What does “Activation count exceeded” mean?

It means that the SOLIDWORKS license is activated on another “computer”.

What to do first?

• Find the computer that the license is activated on.
• If you wish to transfer the license to the new computer. You will need to deactivate the license first.

How to deactivate standalone licenses in SOLIDWORKS:

1. Go to Help(?)
2. Licenses
3. Deactivate…
4. Proceed through the activation wizard window.

However, if you are encountering this message on the same device/computer the license is activated on…

It could mean that your computer’s identifier has changed. Your computer identifier can be found in your product activation window (screenshot below).

This identifier (ID) is generated when you activate your SOLIDWORKS licenses on your computer machine.

E.g., I have a new license. I activate it for the first time on my computer. SOLIDWORKS generates a computer ID for me, e.g. A1B2C3456XYZ
My SOLIDWORKS license is now activated and tied to my computer ID “A1B2C3456XYZ”.

I will be able to deactivate my license if my computer ID currently matches the one generated when I first activated the license.

So, if you are encountering this message on the same computer the license is activated on…

Your computer identifier (ID) might have changed.

What is a computer identifier (ID)?

During license activation, the Activation Wizard generates a computer-ID automatically based on various hardware parameters. It is a hash code that uses information about the hard drive geometry and CPU family (such as the MAC Address, RAM, etc...).  Any changes of your computer hardware can potentially affect the computer ID.

Some possible reasons why your computer ID might change:

• Clean reformat of your computer hard disks
• Changes made to your computer hard disks
• Changes made to your computer motherboard
• Change of network card/ MAC address*
• Windows Operating system upgrade (e.g., Windows 10 to 11) or Re-install
• Windows update (might affect your MAC address*)

To avoid such a scenario, you should deactivate your standalone licenses before performing any of the above actions.

MAC address*

A MAC (Media Access Control) address is a unique ID assigned to every internet-connected machine that allows it to be identified when connected to a specific network. This use is common in most IEEE 802 networking technologies, including Ethernet, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth.

Changing your physical network card may cause your MAC address to be different.

How you can find your MAC address in Command Prompt:

• Type “ipconfig/all” in Command Prompt and press enter

For Wi-Fi: It is advisable to Turn Off “Use random hardware addresses”/all

1. Search for Wi-Fi in windows search
2. Turn off “Use random hardware addresses”

What if I have forgotten to deactivate my SOLIDWORKS license and currently facing “Activation count exceeded”??

If you have purchased your SOLIDWORKS licenses from SEACAD, you can drop an email to our technical support team at support@seacadtech.com or contact us at 6226 3784.

We will look into the matter and advise accordingly. A license disable request service may be provided.