The free tiers that withhold a clean file
On four rows the visible limit on free output is a mark rather than a written exclusion. On some of them the licence is not tiered at all, which produces a position readers find hard to hold: permitted, and not publishable as delivered. As of 2026-09-12.
| Vendor | What the free tier carries | What paying removes |
|---|---|---|
| HeyGen | A watermark on exports from the Free plan | The mark, from the paid tier upward |
| Higgsfield | A watermark, with commercial rights already granted | The mark, not the permission |
| Hailuo AI | A watermark for unpaid downloads | The mark, and the ownership disclaimer's condition |
| Synthesia | The vendor's logo until the first paid tier | The logo, and not the avatar restriction |
Inclusion rule. Vendors whose free tier is limited by a visible mark rather than by a written exclusion. A free tier that carries both is recorded with the written exclusions instead. Order. By what else the same purchase moves, from nothing to a second condition.
1A mark is a commercial fact without being a licence fact
Most paid placements will not carry a supplier's logo, so a mark decides whether a clip is usable in practice. That makes it worth recording and worth keeping in a different column from a permission.
The two get conflated because free tiers often change both at once. Where they do not, a reader trained on the common case draws the wrong conclusion in whichever direction the row differs.
2Permitted and unpublishable is a real position
Where a grant names no plan and the mark is tiered, a free user is inside the permission and cannot ship the file as delivered. Nothing on either page says whether a marked export may run commercially.
One vendor goes further and notes that publishing marked output in a commercial context may not be appropriate, which is advice about presentation rather than a prohibition. The word appropriate is doing advisory work.
3What one purchase moves on each row
On two of them, only the mark. On one, the mark and the condition attached to an ownership disclaimer, which means the invoice is doing two jobs. On the fourth, the mark and nothing else, because the restriction that matters is keyed to the presenter.
A buyer comparing entry prices across these rows is comparing what a clean file costs, not what permission costs, and only the register's other column says which is which.
- Free tierThe pricing page lists a Free plan at $0 a month and puts watermark removal on Creator at $29 and abovewatermark rather than licence
- Free tierPaid plans include watermark-free downloads, and publishing watermarked output in a commercial context is described as possibly not appropriatea mark rather than a licence
- Free tierVideo downloads include a watermark for unpaid users, and Standard subscribers and higher-tier users can download without onewatermark line
- Free tierA Basic plan is listed at $0 a month, and removal of the Synthesia logo is listed from the $29 Starter planplan cards as read
4From the making side
Alongside the terms behind “Marks, not licences”, SceneMixer's guides describe the work itself this way:
You can recomposite with different end-card text, and in step-by-step mode you can reshoot individual segments. The finished file can also be downloaded and shared with a link.
SceneMixer, How to Make an Ad from One Photo — “Can I change the ad after it is finished?” (read 2026-10-13)
A dish photo is cleaned into a product shot and the ad is built around it.
SceneMixer, An AI Ad for a Restaurant, a Café or a Dish — “Will the dish look like my dish?” (read 2026-10-13)
5Sources
Each row quotes a plan card or a terms page, gathered on commercial use and read 2026-09-12. The test a sentence has to pass before it counts as a licence statement is set out on the reading page. Nothing here is legal advice. Nearby: Where the grid stops, Named platforms, Written exclusions.