How to activate Boris FX Suite — install, activate, and check every tool is licensed

Activation trouble often starts before the first click: a host application left open, a tool that does not run on your operating system, or a network that blocks the connection. Have these ready first.

• Your host application, installed and closed. After Effects, Premiere Pro, DaVinci Resolve, Avid Media Composer, Nuke, Final Cut Pro or VEGAS Pro — whichever you edit in, in the version you plan to keep using. Close it before you install plug-ins and reopen it afterwards.
• A supported operating system. Boris FX says the Suite’s products run on macOS and Windows, with Linux support for some products only. The details that catch people out are just below.
• An administrator account on the computer, because installing software normally asks for one.
• A working internet connection. Boris FX’s standard activation needs one. For a computer that has to stay offline, Boris FX also documents an offline method, covered further down; we tell you whether it applies to your licence.
• The activation instructions we send on WhatsApp once your payment is confirmed, including which activation method applies to your order. The Boris FX Hub asks you to sign in with, or create, a free Boris FX account, so read our message before you create one.

The operating system matters more with the Suite than with a single plug-in, because its 11 products do not all run in the same places. From Boris FX’s current product and support pages:

• Sequoia, Samplitude and Music Studio, the three audio workstations, are Windows only and not available for macOS. On a Mac that is expected; it is not a fault with your licence.
• Continuum does not support Linux. Its current specification table lists Windows 11, and macOS 12 through 15 plus macOS 26. Inside Final Cut Pro or Apple Motion it needs macOS 13.4 or later.
• Optics runs on macOS 12 or later and on Windows 10 or 11, with no Linux version.
• Sapphire, Mocha Pro, Silhouette and SynthEyes also run on Linux, where the Boris FX Hub is not available and licensing goes through the Boris FX License Tool instead.

Requirements change with each release, so check the current system requirements for each tool on borisfx.com before you install on an older machine. If you are unsure whether your computer qualifies, send us its model and operating system version on WhatsApp before you order, not after.

Said plainly: ROSH™ Company Labs is an independent brand, not a registered company. It is not affiliated with, authorised by, sponsored by or endorsed by Boris FX. No tax invoice is issued, and every purchase is made at your own risk. The help described in this guide comes from us, on WhatsApp, with replies within 24 hours; it is not Boris FX support.

Boris FX’s model is simple: you download one free app, the Boris FX Hub, and install and license the individual products from inside it. The Hub exists for macOS and Windows, and Boris FX uses it for downloading, installing, licensing and trialling its software.

1. Download the Boris FX Hub from borisfx.com. Do not use an installer from a file-sharing site or a chat group, even if it looks identical, because you cannot see what has been changed inside it.
2. Install the Hub, open it, and sign in with the Boris FX account our message tells you to use, or create a free one if that is what it says.
3. Choose the products to install. Start with the tools you will use this week rather than all 11 at once: a smaller first install is quicker to check and easier to troubleshoot.
4. Let each installation finish before you open a host application.
5. Restart the computer if an installer asks you to.

Not sure which tools you need? What each tool in Boris FX Suite does goes through them one by one: Sapphire and Continuum for effects, Mocha Pro and Silhouette for tracking, roto and clean-up, SynthEyes for 3D camera tracking, Optics for photos, Particle Illusion Pro for particles and CrumplePop for audio repair.

Boris FX also publishes installers on its downloads page, sorted by product, host and operating system, with older versions on a separate legacy downloads page. If the Hub works on your computer, start there. The exception is an older host: if your version of a host application is not supported by the newest release of a tool, ask us before installing an older version, so we can check it against what you received.

On Linux there is no Hub. Boris FX’s route there is to download the Linux packages from its downloads page and license them with the Boris FX License Tool. Only some of the Suite’s tools run on Linux, so check the list above first.

One warning about the Hub: the same app offers free trials of every Suite product, and no payment details are needed to start one. Before you buy, that is useful, because you can test a tool on your own footage and your own machine. After you buy, make sure you are activating the licence rather than starting a trial, because a trial behaves differently and the difference is not always visible on the first day.

If you have not ordered yet, running a trial first is the most honest way to decide whether Boris FX Suite is worth it for the work you actually do.

Boris FX documents three licence mechanisms: node-locked, floating and login. Floating licences are for machines on an organisation’s local network, so this guide covers the other two. No path is guaranteed in advance: we tell you in the WhatsApp chat which one applies to your order before you touch anything. For an activation key, Boris FX documents activation in the Hub or in the product’s own licence tool over an internet connection, plus an offline route for computers that cannot go online.

If you received an activation key

In Boris FX’s standard flow for a node-locked licence, the key arrives by email. If yours is a key, it is delivered digitally once your payment is confirmed, and we tell you on WhatsApp how to use it. Then:

1. Close every host application.
2. Open the Boris FX Hub and sign in.
3. Select the product you are activating and open its “...” menu.
4. Follow the prompts and paste the activation key when asked. Copy it in one piece, with no space before or after it.
5. Keep the computer online until the prompts finish.
6. If our message lists more than one product to activate, repeat for each product it names.

Boris FX documents a second place to paste the same key: the licence tool inside the product itself. If the Hub route fails on your machine, try that next; if you still need help, tell us which of the two you used.

If you received a login licence

Boris FX documents login licensing as an option you switch on in the Hub. Open the Hub’s gear menu, choose the option Boris FX calls “Use Login License”, and follow the prompts with your host applications closed. If a prompt asks for something our message did not mention, stop there and send us a screenshot.

If the computer has to stay offline

If the computer you work on cannot go online, Boris FX documents an offline activation that uses a second, connected computer. Ask us first whether it suits your licence; the steps Boris FX describes are:

1. On the offline computer, create an activation request file.
2. Copy that file to a computer with internet access, for example on a USB drive.
3. In a browser on the connected computer, upload the request file to Boris FX’s offline activation page.
4. Copy the activation file you get back to the offline computer and load it there.

Keep that USB drive handy. Boris FX documents deactivation as needing an internet connection, so moving a licence off an offline machine later takes planning; ask us before you try. On Linux, where the Hub does not run, Boris FX’s licensing tool is the Boris FX License Tool.

Two rules for any method. Paste keys and passwords only into the Boris FX Hub, the product’s own licence tool or borisfx.com, never into a website someone sends you a link to. And if anyone asks you to disable your antivirus or replace program files to “unlock” a tool, stop: none of Boris FX’s documented activation methods involve that.

A tool that appears in your effects list is installed. That alone does not prove it is licensed, because Boris FX trials run inside the same host applications. Spend a few minutes on the checks below before a tool goes anywhere near a client deadline.

• Sapphire and Continuum: render a few seconds. Apply any effect to a clip and render or export a short section. A red X over the image means that tool is still running as a trial or unlicensed. Sapphire has one more sign: once its trial period has ended, it renders black frames until it is licensed.
• Mocha Pro, Silhouette and Optics: do not trust a clean render yet. Boris FX documents their trials as fully functional for 14 days, so during the first two weeks a clean result cannot tell a licence from a trial. Instead, make sure the activation steps from our message finished without an error, and keep a screenshot of the last step. If you are unsure whether a tool is licensed or still on its trial, send that screenshot to us on WhatsApp and we check it with you.
• Mocha inside After Effects: check the name. After Effects ships with Mocha AE, a free, lighter version of Mocha’s planar tracking and masking, and it is not the Mocha Pro in your Suite. If you cannot find modules such as Remove, Insert, Stabilize or Lens, you are most likely in Mocha AE, or in the Mocha tracking built into a Sapphire or Continuum effect, rather than Mocha Pro. The difference is set out in Mocha Pro vs the After Effects tracker.
• SynthEyes: try to save. Without a licence, SynthEyes runs as a demo with no time limit, but saving is disabled, exports stop at the first 10 frames plus the last frame, and input is limited to 4K. If saving works and a full export goes through, the demo limits are gone.
• CrumplePop: listen properly. Its trial output carries an audio watermark, so play a processed clip through from start to finish on headphones rather than skimming it.
• Particle Illusion Pro: import a background. The standalone runs without a licence for personal, non-commercial use, but importing a background needs a licence, and so does commercial work. That makes background import a quick test.

When the checks pass, write two things in the WhatsApp chat: the date you activated and which tools you tested. It takes a minute, and it makes any later question about the licence faster to answer.

A new laptop, a repaired desktop, a fresh Windows install: sooner or later a licence has to move. What follows is Boris FX’s own documented policy for a standard node-locked licence. It describes how Boris FX’s system works and is not a promise about how many computers the licence you buy from us covers. Before you move anything, tell us on WhatsApp what you are replacing, and we confirm the right path for your delivery.

• Boris FX says a standard node-locked licence can be active on one computer at a time. The software itself may be installed on more than one computer; it is the activation that moves.
• To move it, deactivate on the old computer, then activate on the new one. Deactivation needs an internet connection.
• Where you deactivate depends on the tool. Boris FX’s examples: Continuum through the License button in Effect Controls, the Mocha standalone through its Help menu, Optics through Help, then License, Sapphire through the deactivate option in its uninstaller, and Silhouette on a Mac through its deactivation item in the Applications folder.
• If the old computer is gone — stolen, dead or already wiped — Boris FX documents a reset from the borisfx.com account that holds the licence, limited to once a month per account. Whether that reset is something you do or something we arrange depends on how your licence was delivered, so ask first.

The practical rule: deactivate before you format a drive, sell or give away a computer, or hand it in for repair. Under Boris FX’s documented rule for a standard node-locked licence, a freelancer who edits on a desktop in Rabat and on a laptop during shoots in Marrakech would deactivate on one before activating on the other, every time. If you work that way, tell us before you order, and we explain what applies to your licence.

Activation trouble usually shows up in one of four ways. Work through the one that matches what you see. If it does not clear, send us a screenshot, your operating system and your host version on WhatsApp.

Boris FX plug-ins not showing in your host

If a tool does not appear at all, look at the installation and the host before the licence.

• The host was open during installation. Quit it completely and reopen it; on Windows, check it is not still running in the background.
• The tool does not support that host. Each product has its own host list: Continuum lists Final Cut Pro and Apple Motion, while Sapphire’s list does not include them. Optics installs as a plug-in for photo applications such as Photoshop and Lightroom; video editing applications are not on its host list.
• Your host version is newer or older than the tool supports. Compare your exact version with the supported-hosts page for that product on borisfx.com.
• You are on Linux with a tool that has no Linux version, such as Continuum or Optics.

Activation errors

• No connection, or a network that filters it. Standard activation needs internet. Try another connection, such as a phone hotspot, or ask us whether Boris FX’s offline activation applies to your licence.
• The key was pasted with extra characters. Copy it again as one block, or type it by hand, with no space before or after.
• The licence is still active on another computer. Under Boris FX’s one-computer-at-a-time rule for node-locked licences, deactivate it there first, or ask us about the account reset if that computer is gone.
• The Hub is signed in to a different Boris FX account from the one our message names. Check which account is signed in before you try again.
• The error names something else. Send us its exact wording or a screenshot. As a general tip, avoid reinstalling again and again or deleting licence files by hand in the meantime, because that can make the problem harder to trace.

Trial marks or watermarks in your output

If your output carries a mark, the tool that produced it is running as a trial or unlicensed, even if you activated something else. Boris FX documents these signs:

• A red X over the image from Sapphire or Continuum.
• Black frames from Sapphire after its 30-day trial has ended.
• Mocha Pro back in its Learning Edition after the 14-day trial, with watermarked renders and exports limited to 10 frames.
• SynthEyes refusing to save, with exports cut to the first 10 frames plus the last.
• An audio watermark in CrumplePop output.

Before you reinstall anything, activate the tool that shows the mark with the method from our message, then quit and reopen the host. As a general tip, render again from scratch instead of reusing an old preview, which may have been made before activation.

GPU or host-version mismatch

Crashes, very slow renders, or a tool that runs on one computer but not on another are worth checking against the graphics card and the host version before you suspect the licence. Boris FX’s published requirements show where the load sits:

• Silhouette asks for 4 GB of graphics memory or more, and 8 GB for its machine-learning nodes.
• SynthEyes asks for 8 GB of RAM at minimum, with 16 GB recommended, and on Windows and Linux for 8 GB of video memory, with 16 GB recommended for its machine-learning plug-ins.
• Sapphire can fall back to rendering on the CPU when no GPU is available.
• The machine-learning tools in Mocha Pro and Optics have their own graphics requirements; check them on each product’s requirements page before you rely on them for a deadline.

Some general tips, not Boris FX instructions: update your graphics driver from the card maker’s own site, and confirm your host version against the product’s supported-hosts page. If a machine-learning tool is the only one that fails, compare your graphics card with that tool’s own requirements first. On a laptop with two graphics chips, make sure the host application runs on the dedicated one.

The licence you buy from ROSH™ Company Labs covers one year. Nothing renews by itself on our side: renewal is manual, and it is arranged on WhatsApp before the end date.

What the tools do after that date is not something we will guess at. Boris FX’s licence agreement says that when a licence ends, you must stop using the software, and that is the rule to plan around. Do not leave a client project built on Boris FX effects unfinished on the last day of the term and expect to render it the following week.

A sensible routine: ask us in the chat for the end date of your term, and set a reminder on your phone for about two weeks before it. Message us then, even if you have not decided whether to continue. An agency in Casablanca with deliveries booked into the next month needs that answer earlier than someone who edits for pleasure.

To continue, you order another year the same way as the first: on WhatsApp, paying with a local method agreed in the chat. Boris FX Suite is currently 999 MAD · 1 Year, and the price page explains what 999 MAD covers. We then tell you whether anything needs to be entered again on your computer and help you with it, as we did the first time.

If you decide not to renew, tell us, and stop using the tools when the term ends, as Boris FX’s licence agreement requires.