Miniconda

Details

The project is provided under a custom “Miniconda End User License Agreement”, which appears to be a modified version of the BSD 3-Clause license with a fourth clause stating:

Miniconda® may not be used to access or allow third parties to access Anaconda package repositories if such use would circumvent paid licensing requirements or is otherwise restricted by the Anaconda Terms of Service.

This fourth clause heavily limits users’ freedom, as something as trivial as installing a package from one of the default channels is subject to Anaconda’s non-free Terms of Service. It is possible to obtain packages from other sources, thus avoiding having to abide by Anaconda’s ToS.

In any case, Miniconda cannot be considered open source as its source code is not publicly available. This was queried in May 2025 on the Anaconda Forum, but as of reviewing, this question didn’t get any answer.

While Miniconda itself is not specifically marketed as FOSS, the home page of Anaconda’s website, where both Anaconda and Miniconda are distributed, has phrases such as “Simplify, safeguard, and accelerate AI value with open source” and “We believe open source is the cornerstone of the next era of AI innovation”.

Miniconda is managed by Anaconda Inc., and appears to be funded by selling paid licenses for their Anaconda software.