Users grant Coursera a worldwide, royalty-free, sublicensable license to use, copy, reproduce, adapt, modify, publish, transmit, display, and distribute any content they submit to the platform across current and future media formats, including making that content available to third-party partners for syndication or distribution. This license applies to all user-submitted content including forum posts, assignment submissions, and course reviews.
This analysis describes what Coursera's agreement states, permits, or reserves. It does not constitute a legal determination about enforceability. Regulatory applicability and practical outcomes may vary by jurisdiction, enforcement context, and individual circumstances. Read our methodology
This provision grants Coursera broad rights over user-submitted content without financial compensation to users, including the right to sublicense content to third-party partners for distribution or syndication purposes. Institutional users should assess whether employee or student-generated content submitted through Coursera deployments falls within this license scope and whether it conflicts with institutional intellectual property policies.
The updated terms remove the explicit guarantee that Coursera provides a 7-day free trial for subscriptions. The revised language states that 'certain subscriptions may come with a free trial period' without specifying a default duration or which subscriptions include trials. This creates operational uncertainty for users: trial availability and length are no longer stated in the main terms but are now delegated entirely to individual checkout pages. Users evaluating whether a subscription includes a trial must now visit the specific product page rather than relying on the standard terms.
View change record →Provision renamed and reworded to remove ownership clarification language while adding explicit rights to 'provide, promote, and improve the Services' and expand availability rights.
View full change record →Under this clause, any content a user submits to Coursera, including forum contributions, assignment work, and reviews, is licensed to Coursera on a royalty-free basis with sublicensing rights to third-party partners. The agreement does not provide for compensation to users when their submitted content is used or distributed.
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"By submitting Content through our Services, you grant Coursera a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free license (with the right to sublicense) to use, copy, reproduce, process, adapt, modify, publish, transmit, display and distribute such Content in any and all media or distribution methods (now known or later developed). You agree that this license includes the right for Coursera to provide, promote, and improve the Services and to make Content submitted to or through the Services available to other companies, organizations or individuals who partner with Coursera for the syndication, broadcast, distribution or publication of such Content on other media and services.— Excerpt from Coursera's Coursera Terms of Use
REGULATORY LANDSCAPE: The breadth of this content license may require evaluation under GDPR Article 6 lawful basis requirements for EU/EEA users, as sublicensing personal data-containing content to third parties may constitute a new processing purpose requiring separate legal basis. The FTC Act's prohibition on unfair or deceptive practices is relevant if the scope of this license is not clearly disclosed at the point of content submission. GOVERNANCE EXPOSURE: Medium. The sublicensing right and the inclusion of future distribution methods creates operational uncertainty for institutional deployers regarding how student or employee-generated content may be used. The provision does not specify retention periods for the license after account closure, which may create ongoing obligations. JURISDICTION FLAGS: EU/EEA users may have GDPR-based grounds to challenge the scope of this license if personal data is embedded in submitted content and sublicensed to third parties without a separately identified lawful basis. California users may have CCPA-based rights to know about downstream sharing of their content. CONTRACT AND VENDOR IMPLICATIONS: Institutional procurement teams should assess whether this content license is addressed or carved out in any enterprise or campus agreement with Coursera, and whether faculty, employee, or student intellectual property rights are preserved under institutional IP policies. The sublicensing right to unspecified third-party partners may warrant vendor disclosure requests. COMPLIANCE CONSIDERATIONS: Compliance teams should map which categories of user-submitted content are in scope for this license, assess whether institutional IP assignment policies conflict with this grant, and review whether any separate data processing agreement with Coursera addresses the treatment of personal data embedded in user content.
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This provision grants Coursera broad rights over user-submitted content without financial compensation to users, including the right to sublicense content to third-party partners for distribution or syndication purposes. Institutional users should assess whether employee or student-generated content submitted through Coursera deployments falls within this license scope and whether it conflicts with institutional intellectual property policies.
Under this clause, any content a user submits to Coursera, including forum contributions, assignment work, and reviews, is licensed to Coursera on a royalty-free basis with sublicensing rights to third-party partners. The agreement does not provide for compensation to users when their submitted content is used or distributed.
ConductAtlas has identified this type of provision across 34 platforms. See the full comparison.
No. ConductAtlas is an independent monitoring service. We are not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Coursera.