Beta Testing Agreement for pre-release software. Covers IP, feedback rights, confidentiality, as-is disclaimer and GA-launch termination. From £4.99.
A Beta Testing Agreement is the contract between a software provider and a tester given access to pre-release ('beta') software for evaluation and feedback before the product launches to general availability. It is not a sale, a perpetual licence or a subscription — it is a limited, revocable arrangement for unfinished software both parties expect to contain defects.
Any time you give people outside your business access to software that is not finished — a private beta, an early-access programme, a public beta or a pilot. The agreement protects what a founder most often loses without one: control of feedback (who owns the ideas testers send you), confidentiality of an unreleased product, and the ability to disclaim liability for software you have told everyone is incomplete.
A limited test licence and what testers may and may not do; ownership of feedback (a licence to use it, or an outright assignment); confidentiality of the beta and its features; an 'as is' disclaimer calibrated to whether the tester is a business (UCTA 1977) or a consumer (Consumer Rights Act 2015, which limits what can be excluded); data and telemetry handling under UK GDPR; a limitation of liability sized to a free or low-cost beta; and termination, including automatic termination at general-availability launch.
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