When you post anything on Patreon — videos, posts, images, or other creative work — you give Patreon a permanent, free license to use, modify, and distribute it for their business purposes, including promotion.
Creators posting content on Patreon grant the platform a permanent, royalty-free license to reproduce and promote their work — including for advertising — which survives account deletion and may conflict with exclusive licensing arrangements creators have with publishers, studios, or other platforms.
Cross-platform context
See how other platforms handle Broad Intellectual Property License to Patreon and similar clauses.
Compare across platforms →The license is described as perpetual and irrevocable, meaning Patreon can continue using your content even after you delete it or close your account, which is unusual and potentially adverse to creators who retain copyright in their work.
REGULATORY FRAMEWORK: This provision engages copyright law under 17 U.S.C. §101 et seq. (U.S. Copyright Act) — the license is structured as a non-exclusive sublicensable grant, which must be assessed against the creator's underlying ownership rights. For EU creators, GDPR Article 6 lawful basis analysis is required for any processing of personal data embedded in content (e.g., images containing personal data). The EU Digital Single Market Directive (2019/790) on platform liability for user-uploaded content is also relevant for EU operations.
Compliance intelligence locked
Regulatory citations, enforcement risk, and due diligence action items.
Watcher: regulatory citations. Professional: full compliance memo.