Documenso: free credits and offers

Hosted Free plan (5 documents per month) high confidence

Hosted Free tier: 5 documents per month, up to 10 recipients per document, and 3 direct templates (docs plan-limits table). The pricing page says 'Free forever', 'Access Forever' and 'No credit card required'. There is no trial and no credit grant. No region limit is listed. Paid comparison (not free): Individual $25/mo or $300 billed yearly (unlimited documents, API for personal use only); Teams $40/mo or $480 billed yearly (5 users included, $8/mo per extra user, API for automation); Platform $250/mo or $3,000 billed yearly (unlimited documents and users, unlimited API).

Eligibility

Anyone who signs up. No .edu, student, startup, funding, company-age or region rule appears on the pricing or docs pages, so students and startups get the same terms as everyone else.

How to claim

1) Open https://documenso.com/pricing and click Get started under Free (the docs give documen.so/free as the sign-up link). 2) Enter name, email and password, or sign in with Google. 3) Verify the email address. 4) Send documents. No card is requested and nothing is applied for.

Expiry

No end date is stated; the pricing page says 'Free forever'. All plans fall under the Fair-Use-Policy linked from the pricing page; the policy text could not be retrieved.

Gotchas

The 5-document monthly cap is the binding limit. A startup that sends more must pay; the cheapest hosted step up is Individual at $300 per year. The 10-recipient cap is current; the Sep 2023 free-tier announcement had promised unlimited recipients. The Individual API is 'for personal use' only, so company automation needs Teams or Platform. A June 2024 blog said free accounts may keep using the API for non-signing actions; this was not re-verified for 2026. Free is not a trial: there are no credits, and no paid-plan trial is listed.

Source

documenso.com

Self-hosted Community Edition (free AGPL-3.0 code) high confidence

Official self-hosted page: the Community Edition is 'Free Forever', with no usage caps, community-only software support, no enterprise functionality, and no infrastructure help. Its stated purpose is 'Testing, Evaluation, Internal POCs'. The code is AGPL-3.0 (github.com/documenso/documenso). The paid Business Edition was announced 2026-01-30 on the official blog; it is a yearly 'Fixed Yearly License' with no published price, labelled 'Serious Production Use', and adds enterprise functionality and support. Enterprise is priced on request.

Eligibility

Anyone. Open-source license with no startup, student, funding or region rule. No edition-level discount is listed for startups, students or nonprofits.

How to claim

1) Get the source from https://github.com/documenso/documenso (AGPL-3.0). 2) Deploy it on your own infrastructure using the Docker setup, with Postgres and SMTP mail that you run yourself. 3) There is no sign-up, payment or approval step.

Expiry

None; listed as 'Free Forever'.

Gotchas

Sources conflict on production use. The English self-hosted page labels the Community Edition for testing and internal POCs, while the Spanish pricing page (documenso.com/es/pricing) says it can be self-hosted 'para uso privado y comercial' (private and commercial use) with some enterprise limits. Confirm before running the Community Edition in production. Self-hosting means you run Postgres, SMTP, TLS certificates, backups and upgrades, and no edition includes infrastructure support. AGPL-3.0 applies: if you modify the code and users interact with it over a network, you must offer them your modified source. A third-party article estimates $20-50 per month for hosting; this is unverified.

Source

documenso.com

Staging demo environment (free sandbox for evaluating paid features) medium confidence

A demo (staging) environment has the same features as production and is meant for development and testing. You can choose a paid plan there and pay with a test card. It is a sandbox, not a credit or a trial, and its accounts and data are separate from production.

Eligibility

Anyone can create an account there; it is intended for developers evaluating the platform. No startup or student rule is stated.

How to claim

1) Open the staging environment linked from the Documenso demo-environment docs. 2) Create a new account there; a production account cannot be used. 3) Choose a plan and enter the test card 4242 4242 4242 4242 with any future expiry date and CVV 123.

Expiry

Not stated in the docs.

Gotchas

The test card and staging billing work only on staging; nothing carries over to production and no credits are granted. Use it to evaluate features, not for live signing.

Source

docs.documenso.com

StartupPerks listing: 'Free forever' for early-stage startups (third-party) low confidence

Third-party aggregator entry (StartupPerks) labelled 'Free forever' for Documenso (open source eSign). The value it describes is the free self-hosted open-source edition. No Documenso-run startup program was found: documenso.com/startup/ and /startups return 404, and the official pricing page lists no startup offer. The listing says it is an independent comparison and is not endorsed by the programs it lists.

Eligibility

Per the listing: idea, pre-seed or seed stage; no funding or accelerator required; global; a company email on your own website domain (not a personal address). Not verified against Documenso.

How to claim

Per the listing: self-host the open-source version from GitHub. Documenso documents no application or approval step for this.

Expiry

Listed as 'Ongoing' with no end date. The listing says terms can change.

Gotchas

The benefit is the same free self-host as the Community Edition, which has no enterprise features and no infrastructure support, so it adds nothing beyond that offer. The listing was added 2026-08-18 and marked 'as of Oct 7, 2026'. Confirm with Documenso before relying on it.

Source

startupperks.co

Low confidence: verify before claiming.