Licensing

This section describes the feature list for both foundation infrastructure (Core) and Central NAC subscription (Pro) license.

Foundation capabilities are available to customers using various infrastructure (access points, gateways, switches) Central licenses in either Foundation or Advanced license tier. Premium capabilities will be available through an additional subscription license applied to HPE Aruba Networking Central NAC regardless of the infrastructure Central license levels.

Foundation Infrastructure License

The following table lists the foundation infrastructure (Core) license feature list that is different from what is available with subscription (Pro) license:

Table 1: Feature List for Foundation Infrastructure License for Central NAC

Feature List Highlight
Identity Source Create only one corporate identity provider for enterprise use (Okta, Entra ID, or Google Workspace)

Authentication Profiles

EAP

  • Select only one corporate identity provider

MPSK

  • Select only one corporate identity provider

MAB

  • Similar to subscription license
Authorization Policies

  • Create policies via pre-defined templates with pre-populated pre-conditions that cannot be edited

    • User Policy

    • Client Policy

  • Use only a subset of attributes while creating rules and enforcement profiles within a policy

    • Rule attributes can contain only client tags, client category, and user groups.

    • Enforcement profile can contain only Aruba user role, Allow and Deny actions, and Session Timeout.

Portal Customization

Override Profiles

  • Select only one language

Static Tags

  • Limit per MAC Address: 10 static tags

  • Limit per Tenant: 10 static tags

 

Central NAC Subscription License

In addition to all the functionality available under the foundation infrastructure (Core) license, upgrades to the HPE Aruba Networking Central NAC subscription (Pro) will enable the following feature list:

Table 2: Feature List for Subscription License for Central NAC

Feature List Highlight
Identity Source

Create multiple corporate identity providers (IdP) for enterprise use (Okta, Entra ID, or Google Workspace) of same or different IdP type.

Authentication Profiles

EAP

  • Supports Bring Your Own Certificates (BYOC)

  • Select multiple identity providers
Authorization Policies

  • Ability to create customized Authorization Policies using the full list of conditions

  • Select multiple identity providers

  • Use all attributes in the document while creating rules and enforcement profiles within a policy

Portal Customization

Override Profiles

  • Select multiple languages

Static Tags

  • Limit per MAC Address: 10 static tags

  • Limit per Tenant: 400 static tags

 

Subscription License

With the new HPE Aruba Networking Central NAC subscription license, users can access additional functionalities which are not available as part of the foundation infrastructure license. Users will be able to configure and use all Classic Central subscription features with the new subscription license.

To add the Central NAC service subscription, perform the following steps:

  1. Log in to the HPE GreenLake Cloud.

  2. Navigate to the Quick Links panel and click Service Subscriptions.

    All service subscriptions are listed in this page.

  3. Click Add Service Subscription.

  4. In the Add Service Subscription page, enter the subscription key and click Add.

    The subscription is added.

  5. Click Next.

  6. In the Review Add Service Subscription page, click Finish.

    The subscriptions are added to the inventory.

  7. Click Close or click the View Audit Log to view the progress updates.

License Status Notification

Based on the status of the subscription license, a license notification is displayed in the Central NAC configuration page.

Active License

  • Users with a valid subscription license can access the Central NAC configuration page without any license-related alerts.

Expired License

  • A notification about the license expiration is displayed in the Central NAC configuration page for users with an expired license.

Grace Period Notification

  • Users with an expired subscription license enter a 30-day grace period.

  • During this period, a notification is displayed on the Central NAC configuration page, indicating that the subscription license has lapsed on a specific date.

  • This notification serves as a reminder to renew the license before the grace period ends to avoid service disruption.

  • The subscription‑lapsed notice, which appears during the grace period, can be dismissed by the user. However, this dismissal is temporary and remains in effect only until the end of the current day. The notice will automatically reappear the following day if the subscription remains in a lapsed state.

  • The subscription‑error notice, which is displayed after the grace period has ended, can be dismissed by the user. Once dismissed, the notice is permanently suppressed and will not reappear unless the subscription state changes, or the user performs an action that explicitly requires it to be shown again.