# Everything v12 | Upgrades, New Features, and MSCL License **URL:** \ **Category:** Help\ **Tags:** ai, license, v12\ **Created:** [May 11, 2026, 2:58pm UTC](https://community.directus.com/t/everything-v12-upgrades-new-features-and-mscl-license/2237 "2026-05-11T14:58:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 11
**Author:** ![jogchum](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex002/user_avatar/community.directus.com/jogchum/32/107_2.png) [@jogchum](https://community.directus.com/u/jogchum)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2026, 8:03pm UTC](https://community.directus.com/t/everything-v12-upgrades-new-features-and-mscl-license/2237/11 "2026-06-12T20:03:57Z")
I’ve been getting my hands on v12 more and more. I like the improvements made to a lot of (tiny things) 🥳. I am noticing though: I am less enthusiastic about the way the licensing is implemented currently. I think especially about the number of instances. I feel this was missed in earlier communication (or I just missed it). It’s more technical. A common flow for me is to dump a database and restore it (like from staging to dev or production to dev). I have a feeling this will bite with a possible instance count. Obviously I will not deactivate a license before I would do that. So what would happen once I restore a dump locally and boot up Directus? Additionally, on my local environment I sometimes adapt environment settings (like `PUBLIC_URL`) from production but other times I don’t. Some local environments might also have a license key loaded, some won’t. And as an extra thought: how would that even work on the same environment? Like restoring a backup of production? I’d rather ask and know this upfront because I am not willing to be caught off guard and suddenly unable to continue my work because of limits exceeded or other funky behavior 😅. This feeling also scares me because that is not how I used to feel about my projects using Directus. This part just feels different. I am not so sure yet 🤔. --- _[View the full topic](https://community.directus.com/t/everything-v12-upgrades-new-features-and-mscl-license/2237)._