Help / Troubleshooting
I paid but the app says Free, or the trial ended early
Your status line reads Free, or something you do not recognise, when you expected Pro or Lifetime. Or your trial ran out early. There is a short list of reasons, and none touch your music.
The short answer
Whatever the cause, your whole library keeps playing, uncapped, forever. Playback is never gated in Vesari Stylus, and every cause below is reversible: only the premium extras pause.
Start with the status line: Settings, the About tab, the License group. It names most states outright: Active, Trial with the days left, Free, a licence issue with the grace left, or a licence covering an earlier version. Two causes below have no label yet and read as Unknown status; tell those apart by the strip along the bottom, which either says premium features are paused (cause 5) or offers Start free trial (cause 3).
1. The key was never activated on this machine
Much the most common cause. Paying gets you a key; entering it turns this install into your tier, and Activating your licence walks through it.
Paste your key into the Activate field and press Activate License. The app checks it with our activation server, so you need to be online for that moment, after which the status reads Active. Two things it may say instead:
- "Invalid license key format." Paste the key whole from your purchase email, with no stray spaces.
- "License key not found or already used on too many machines." A key covers a limited number of machines; cause 2 covers getting a slot back.
2. The machine identity changed
Your licence is bound to this computer through an identifier Windows creates when it is installed. Reinstall or reset Windows, or move to a new PC, and that identifier is new: the licence no longer matches and the app falls back to Free, never below it.
Enter the same key on the new install and your tier comes back. One catch: the app cannot tell this is the same computer, so the new install counts as another machine against your key, and wiping the old one does not free its slot. If activation says the key is already used on too many machines, email [email protected] with your order details to free the old slot.
3. The trial ended sooner than 30 days
Your trial start is recorded on our server and mirrored on this machine; when those records disagree, the earliest wins. That explains most short trials:
- You installed the app here before. A reinstall, or clearing the app's data, does not buy a second trial: the original start still counts, so the countdown resumes where it was.
- This PC's clock jumped forward. The countdown measures against the furthest-ahead time this machine has ever reported, so a fast clock burns days real time did not; setting it back does not win them back.
- A brand new machine that has never been online gets no trial started locally. It sits on Free and offers Start free trial: connect once and press it.
A trial that ends lands on permanent Free. Your free trial sets out what you keep.
4. A licence was revoked after a refund or chargeback
An activated app re-confirms with our licence server roughly once a week. If that check reports the licence as refunded, charged back, or disputed, premium stops at once and the app returns to Free, your library still playing in full. Revocations for other reasons, such as a key being reissued, carry a 30 day grace window in which everything keeps working.
If this is a surprise, or you have since re-purchased, email [email protected]: once the licence reads live again, your tier returns. Billing, taxes & refunds covers refunds.
5. The re-check could not get through
Nothing is wrong with your purchase here. A paid licence needs a successful check with our licence server every 30 days. If none lands in that time premium pauses, and the strip along the bottom says so: the licence could not be re-verified, and your library and playback are unaffected. A banner counts down the last 7 days first, so it is never a silent surprise.
Being offline is the usual reason but not the only one: our licence server having a bad day, or a firewall blocking that address, looks identical from here. Either way, get the app online and leave it running: it retries by itself, first within a couple of minutes and at the slowest every half hour, and premium returns as soon as a check succeeds. Re-entering your key also works.
6. The key covers an earlier version
A paid key is tied to the major version it was bought for. If yours covers an earlier one, the app does not call it invalid: it runs as Free and the status line says so, pointing at the upgrade rather than another activation. Upgrades, new versions & no subscription explains how that works.
If none of this fits
For payment, key, or activation questions, email [email protected] with your order confirmation. If the app itself is misbehaving, say the status flipping while you are plainly online, Report a Bug in Settings attaches the logs; Is this a bug? How to report it explains what helps.