Cisco Meraki licensing explained: the three models and what changed

How is Cisco Meraki licensed?

Every Meraki device needs its own licence — that part is per-device. What has changed is how those licences are counted, billed and renewed. Meraki now has three licensing models, and the one you use depends on when and how your organisation was set up.

If you last bought Meraki a few years ago, the model has moved on. Here is the current state.

What are the three licensing models?

• Subscription Licensing— Cisco’s current strategic model.
• Co-Termination (Co-Term) — the default for new organisations since September 2023. Every licence shares one expiry date.
• Per-Device Licensing (PDL) — the older model, now being phased out. It is no longer available to new customers.

The headline: per-device licensing is on the way out. New organisations land on Co-Termination, and Subscription is the direction of travel.

Which model will I be on?

A new organisation set up since September 2023 defaults to Co-Termination. Subscription Licensing is Cisco’s strategic model going forward. Per-Device Licensing is closed to new customers, and existing PDL organisations are being moved off it. If you are not sure which model your dashboard uses, we will check before quoting a renewal.

Enterprise, Advanced Security or Secure SD-WAN Plus?

MX security appliances have three licensing tiers, each building on the last:

• Enterprise — core cloud management: the dashboard, configuration and monitoring.
• Advanced Security — adds security on MX: IDS/IPS, advanced malware protection and content filtering.
• Secure SD-WAN Plus — the top tier, adding advanced SD-WAN capabilities on top of Advanced Security.

One important rule: the MX licensing edition is uniform across your organisation. You cannot run some MX appliances on Enterprise and others on Advanced Security in the same org — they all sit on the same tier.

What terms are available?

1, 3, 5, 7 or 10 years. Under Co-Termination we align every licence to a single expiry date, which is easier to manage and easier to budget than a scatter of renewal dates across a fleet.

What happens if a Meraki licence is not renewed?

If a Meraki licence is not renewed, the device goes out of compliance. Per Cisco’s documentation it loses cloud management and can stop passing traffic after the grace period. There is no “runs on regardless” safety net — so always renew before expiry.

The bottom line: Meraki licences are per device, but the model has moved to Co-Termination and Subscription — per-device licensing is closing. MX tiers are Enterprise, Advanced Security and Secure SD-WAN Plus, uniform across the org. Renew before expiry — an unrenewed device can stop passing traffic.