Move Licenses

Mar 26, 2023

Learn how to move your Waves licenses between different devices.
Waves Central offers two simple ways to move your licenses:

Via a USB Flash Drive

The easiest way to move your Waves licenses between multiple computers is to activate them on a USB flash drive. Once that's done, you will be able to run your Waves plugins on any computer to which the USB flash drive is connected, as long as the software for those Waves plugins is installed on that computer.

  1. Launch Waves Central.
    Windows: via the desktop shortcut or Start Menu > All Programs > Waves.

    Mac: Applications > Waves Central.
  2. Log into Waves Central using your Waves account information.
  3. Connect a USB flash drive to the computer that’s running Waves Central. For both macOS and Windows compatibility, your USB flash drive must be exFAT-formatted. For more information, click here.
  4. Select the Licenses tab.
  5. Select Connected Devices and expand the license list. This is a list of the licenses located on this device.
  6. Choose the licenses you want to move.
  7. Select the USB flash drive as the target drive.
  8. Click Activate.

Your Waves licenses are now activated to your USB flash drive. You can now connect it to any computer and use Waves products installed on that computer.

Deactivation / Activation on a Different Device

Step #1 – On the Studio A computer

  1. Launch Waves Central.
    Windows: via the desktop shortcut or Start Menu > All Programs > Waves.
    Mac: Applications > Waves Central.
  2. Log into Waves Central using your Waves account information.
  3. Select the Licenses tab.
  4. Select Connected Devices. Use the arrow at the right to expand Studio A’s list.
  5. Choose the license/s you want to deactivate.
  6. Select Deactivate.
  7. Click the Deactivate button.

Step #2 - On the Studio B computer

  1. Launch Waves Central and log in using your Waves account information.
  2. Select the Licenses page.
  3. Select Not Activated at the top of the page. Use the arrow on the right to expand the list.
  4. Choose the licenses you wish to activate. Selected licenses will appear in the list on the right.
  5. Choose the target device for the activated license – Studio B.
  6. Click the Activate button.

Your Waves licenses are now activated on the computer in Studio B.

Important Note:
If the computer to which you have moved your license/s is used by multiple users (e.g. in a commercial studio, school system, rental system, etc.), we highly recommend running Waves Central’s Version Organizer after moving licenses, to make sure your license version/s and the installed software version/s are aligned.

  1. Quit all audio apps.
  2. Launch the Waves Central application on the system where your licenses are activated:
    Windows: via the desktop shortcut or Start Menu > All Programs > Waves Central.
    Mac: Applications > Waves Central.
  3. Log into Waves Central.
  4. Go to the Settings tab.
  5. Under Maintenance, locate the Version Organizer and click Run to its right.
  6. In the next window, click Run again.
  7. On Mac, you will be prompted to enter your administrator password.
  8. Waves Central will now organize your plugins by version and license.
  9. Once the process is complete, click OK.

The Version Organizer will correlate the plugin software installed on your system to the licenses you have activated.

Important note:
The instructions in this article require access to the computer on which the licenses are currently activated. If you no longer have access to that computer, please refer to this article.

In case you need further assistance, please Contact Tech Support.