Buying and your key

The free trial

Sopycat is free to try for 14 days. The trial has every recording, editing and PDF feature, the same as an Individual key; the Office plan's team features need an Office key (see Office plan features). You do not need an account or a card to start it: download Sopycat, install it and start working.

Manuals you save during the trial (as a PDF, a Word document, a web page or a text file) carry a small Made with Sopycat mark in the bottom right corner. Once you enter a key, what you save from then on has no mark.

Use the trial to check that Sopycat suits the programs and PDFs you work with. It runs on Windows 10 or 11, 64-bit. See Install, update and uninstall.

Buying a key

Choose a plan on the pricing page and pay. The store is run by Lemon Squeezy, which handles the payment, sales tax and receipts for us. Your key arrives by email straight away. Keep that email, so you have the key to hand when you set up another computer.

There are two kinds of plan:

• Individual. A key for one person, active on one computer at a time.
• Office. One key for the whole office, active on one computer for each person you pay for. You can buy it for one person or a whole office, up to 1,000 people. Office adds onboarding, reading confirmations, the Records page and regulated-office mode. See Office plan features.

Entering your key

Copy the key from the receipt email. In Sopycat, open Settings: Plan & License is the first page. Paste the key into the box and choose Activate. You can also choose Enter key on the banner Sopycat shows near the end of the trial. Activating needs an internet connection.

You can enter a key during the trial or after it ends. Nothing in your library changes when you do. Settings then shows your plan and who bought it.

Settings › Plan & License

If Sopycat shows a message when you activate, see Your key and plan in Fixing problems.

How many computers a key covers

An Individual key is active on one computer at a time. More exactly, it is active for one Windows sign-in on one computer. Renaming the computer does not change that: the key keeps working. To use Sopycat on a different computer, move the key, as below. An Individual key is for one person, so two or more people need an Office plan.

An Office plan comes with one key for the whole office. It is active on one computer for each person you pay for: bought for 5 people, it works on 5 computers at once. Everyone enters the same key on their own computer. If all of its computers are taken, Sopycat says so: release one that no longer needs it, or add people to your plan. Everyone can also point their Sopycat at the same shared library folder. See Share a library with your office.

Moving your key to another computer

1. On the computer you are leaving, open Settings › Plan & License and choose Release this computer. This needs an internet connection. The key is freed straight away.
2. On the new computer, enter the key as above.

If the key is still active on another computer, Sopycat says so when you try to activate it. If that computer is broken, gone or was reset before you released it, write to [email protected] and we free the key for you.

Entering a new key on a computer releases the key that was there before, so you do not need to release it first.

Managing your plan

Choose Manage your plan in Settings › Plan & License. It opens My Orders at Lemon Squeezy in your browser. Sign in there with the email address you bought with. In My Orders you can:

• cancel your plan
• change the card you pay with
• see and download your receipts
• find your key again

You can also go to app.lemonsqueezy.com/my-orders directly.

Canceling

Cancel in My Orders, as above. You are not charged again. Your plan stays active until the end of the period you paid for. After that Sopycat becomes read-only, as described in When a trial or plan ends. Nothing in your library is deleted.

Moving from Individual to Office

1. Buy the Office plan on the pricing page, for the number of people you need.
2. On your computer, open Settings › Plan & License, paste your new Office key and choose Activate. It replaces your Individual key.
3. Everyone else enters the same Office key on their own computer.
4. Cancel your Individual plan in My Orders, so it does not renew.

When a trial or plan ends

Nothing is deleted. Your manuals, PDFs and other documents stay in your library folder, which is ordinary files on your PC. Sopycat becomes read-only:

• You can still open and read every manual and PDF, and search the library.
• You can still pin, label and sort documents into folders.
• Recording, editing, importing and exporting wait until you enter a key. Sopycat tells you why when you try.
• Enter a key and everything works again, with nothing to restore.

This is the same when the trial ends, when a canceled plan reaches the end of its paid period, and when a plan is refunded. Sopycat reminds you in the last three days of the trial, with a line at the top of the window. Because the library is plain files, you can also keep backups of it and read the PDFs in any other PDF reader. See Backups and Recently deleted.

Office plan features

Four things need an Office key, during the trial too:

• the Onboarding page: roles, plans, sending manuals to read or do, and the Learn Sopycat tutorials (see Onboarding)
• asking staff to confirm they have read a manual (reading confirmations)
• the Records page, with Follow along completions, confirmations and the CSV export
• regulated-office mode

Everything else works the same on an Individual key and in the trial. These are marked Office plan in Sopycat's menus, and if you open one without an Office key, Sopycat says This is an Office plan feature and offers the Office plan. See Moving from Individual to Office.

Checking the key, and working offline

Sopycat checks your key with Lemon Squeezy when you enter it, then every 3 days. Nothing is checked during the trial. Each check sends the key and an anonymous ID for this computer, such as "Sopycat PC 7F3A21". The ID is made from the Windows installation, never from the computer's name or your Windows user name. Lemon Squeezy also sees your IP address. Nothing about your documents is sent.

You do not need to be online to work. Offline, a key keeps working for 14 days after the last check. After that, Sopycat opens read-only until it can check again: connect to the internet and choose Check now in Settings › Plan & License. Nothing is lost in the meantime.

If a plan is canceled or refunded, the next check after it ends makes Sopycat read-only, as above. What else goes online, and when, is on What stays on your PC.

Adding people later

Someone new joins the office? Write to [email protected] from the email address you bought with and say how many people to add. We add them to your plan, and your key then works on that many more computers. You can also buy a second Office plan for them on the pricing page: it comes with its own key and its own invoice.

When someone leaves, choose Release this computer in Settings › Plan & License on their PC, so their place on the key is free for the next person.

Lost your key?

It is in the receipt email. You can also find it in My Orders at app.lemonsqueezy.com/my-orders: sign in with the email address you bought with.

Refunds

You can have a full refund within 30 days of your first payment, no questions asked. Renewals are not refunded, but you can cancel any time before the next renewal and you will not be charged again. Lemon Squeezy, our store, processes refunds. To ask for one, write to [email protected].

Questions about buying

For anything about a plan, a key or a refund, write to [email protected]. Say which email address you bought with, so we can find your key.