From inception, Odoo S.A (formerly OpenERP S.A) has released the core software as open source. Since the V9.0 release, the company has transitioned to an
open core model, which provides subscription-based proprietary
enterprise software and cloud-hosted
software as a service, in addition to the open source version. In 2013, the not-for-profit Odoo Community Association was formed to promote the widespread use of Odoo and to support the collaborative development of Odoo features. Odoo's extensible architecture allows a large number of freelancers and organizations to develop Odoo Apps or Modules and place them in the marketplace for sale or to be downloaded for free. The main Odoo components are the framework, about 30 core applications (also called official modules), and thousands of community modules. Odoo has been used as a component of university courses. A study on experimental learning suggested that Odoo (then known as OpenERP) provides a suitable alternative to proprietary systems to supplement teaching. Several books have been written about Odoo, some covering specific areas such as accounting or development.
Version support All major releases suffixed with .0 are LTS release as Odoo 19.0 release. The minor versions are
SaaS versions and not intended for
on-premises installations and are short term supported such as Odoo SaaS 18.4 release. The last three
long-term support versions (LTS) are supported in parallel. This means that when a new, fourth LTS version is released, the oldest version will reach the end of its useful life and will no longer be supported. As an example, 16.0 LTS was supported along with 17.0 LTS and 18.0 LTS, but 16.0 reached end of life in September 2025 in the same month as the 19.0 LTS release. == History ==