Can MakeMKV be used without online activation?

[Kizar]

If I purchase a perpetual license and MakeMKV later goes out of business, will I still be able to activate and use the software, or does activation depend on an online service?

I am asking because I have owned licenses for other programs in the past that became completely useless after their activation servers were shut down.

For this reason, I no longer purchase software licenses that require permanent access to an online activation service.

[jemima]

Should be possible. But be sure to also keep a copy of the files it downloads (_private_data.tar).
If you want to be sure, try it out on a test system which is offline =)

But *if* upstream would ever stop, you woudn't get new UHDs... and at least not new BDs for which older keys would have been revoked.

[AstralWanderer]

For this reason, I no longer purchase software licenses that require permanent access to an online activation service.

Sensible choice. MakeMKV just uses a serial key with no online verification, though it isn't possible to purchase keys at the moment.

The one situation where MakeMKV would need online access is to acquire keys for new (UHD) discs - see the Fixing Volume Key is Unknown thread. It is possible to download this data manually (via another PC, say) as noted in the Offline operations thread, and as long as you keep a copy of MakeMKV's "_private_data.tar" file, you should always maintain access to previously decrypted disks.

Even if MakeMKV stops development, it should still be possible to get updated keys as noted in the linked threads - the only showstopper would be new versions of AACS, which seems less likely now that the emphasis has moved to video streaming.