Cursor Pack Licensing, Plain English: CC0, CC BY, and Commercial Use

Custom cursor packs are usually distributed under one of three license families. Knowing which one applies to your favorite pack is the difference between “use it on stream” and “get a takedown notice in your inbox.”

CC0 (Public Domain Dedication)

The author waives all rights. Use the cursor anywhere — personal desktop, livestream, paid product, commercial game — with no attribution required. Most OpenGameArt cursor sets are CC0.

CC BY 4.0 (Attribution)

Use the cursor anywhere, including commercially, but you must credit the original author. Stream overlays should add a line in the panel (“Cursor: Pack Name by Author”). Commercial games should include the credit in their attributions screen.

CC BY-SA 4.0 (Attribution + ShareAlike)

Same as CC BY, plus any derivative work you distribute (a remixed pack, a new color variant) must also be released under CC BY-SA. This is the family GPL falls into and is the most common pitfall: redistributing a re-skinned version of a CC BY-SA pack under a more restrictive license is not allowed.

Bespoke / proprietary licenses

Some authors release cursor packs under custom terms — “free for personal use, ask for commercial.” These are perfectly valid; just take the extra two minutes to read them. CursorCraft surfaces the license string on every pack page so you do not have to dig.

Practical examples

Personal desktop, no stream: any license is fine.
Twitch / YouTube stream: CC0 is unrestricted; CC BY needs a credit; bespoke licenses vary.
Commercial game UI: only CC0 and explicit-commercial CC BY licenses are safe without a custom agreement.
Selling a re-skin of someone else’s pack: almost never allowed; default to “no.”