FortiGate 6001F model licensing

The FortiGate 6001F model includes a total of ten FPCs, by default three of them are active. To increase throughput you can purchase subscription or perpetual licenses for each of the additional seven FPCs for a total of ten.

• A subscription license provides access to one or more FPCs for the term of the subscription. Subscription licenses are managed by FortiGuard.

• A perpetual license provides permanent access to one or more FPCs. Perpetual licenses are managed by applying a license key.

Subscription and perpetual licenses can be purchased from Fortinet. The package you get when you purchase the license includes instructions for applying the license to your FortiGate from the Fortinet Support website.

Applying your FortiGate 6001F FPC subscription license

To apply your FortiGate 6001F FPC subscription license, you must register your FortiGate 6001F and purchase a FPC subscription license for it. From the Fortinet Support website you can apply the FPC perpetual license to the FortiGate 6001F.

The subscription license will then be applied to the registered FortiGate 6001F through FortiGuard. It can take some time for the subscription license to be applied. From the FortiGate 6001F, you can enter the command execute update-now to start a FortiGuard update instead of waiting for the next scheduled update.

Activating your FortiGate 6001F FPC perpetual license

To activate your FortiGate 6001F FPC perpetual license, you must register your FortiGate 6001F and purchase a FPC perpetual license for it. From the Fortinet Support website you can apply the FPC perpetual license to the FortiGate 6001F and obtain your FPC perpetual license activation code or license key.

You can use the following command to apply your FPC perpetual license activation code or license key to activate FPCs for your FortiGate 6001F:

execute upd-perpetual-license <license-key>

After you enter this command, the FortiGate 6001F restarts and the licensed FPCs will be available.

Verifying your FortiGate 6001F FPC subscription and perpetual licenses

You can use the diagnose load-balance status command or the Cluster Status dashboard widget to view the number of FPCs that are available. These methods don't include any information about subscription or perpetual licenses, but they will show you how many FPCs are available, including the licensed FPCs.

You can enter the get system status command to see the number of FPCs licensed by your perpetual license and by your subscription license. In the following example, the FortiGate 6001F has a perpetual license for two FPCs and a subscription license for three FPCs.

get system status
.
.     
.
FPC perpetual/subscription license: 2/3

You can also enter the following command to check the number of FPCs that you have subscription licenses for and the license expiration date. The following output shows a subscription license for three FPCs and that the license expires on June 26, 2025.

diagnose load-balance fpc-license
==========================================================================
MBD SN: <sn>
subscription-license : 3
subscription-license: Thu Jun 26 2025

What to expect when your subscription license expires

When the subscription license expires, the licensed FPCs are powered down and the output of the diagnose load-balance fpc-license command changes to the following:

diagnose load-balance fpc-license
==========================================================================
MBD SN: <sn> 
subscription-license : 0
subscription-expiration: Expired

There is a one hour grace period between the time the license expires and when the FPCs are shut down. If you run the diagnose load-balance fpc-license command during that hour grace period, the FPCs shut down immediately.