"FreeDOS aims to be a complete, free, 100% MS-DOS compatible operating system."

FreeDOS provides a freely distributable DOS system. It can be used to create boot disks for a variety of purposes; including running DOS games (such as ones that do not work (well) with modern operating systems), updating the computer (e.g. BIOS upgrades), to run a commercial application, embedded usage, etc. Most traditional DOS utility programs are available, though some may still have bugs or lack support for some features [not all our utilities support FAT32 and only a few support LongFileNames yet].

Please be aware of the license terms of all FreeDOS programs you distribute; most are licensed under the the GNU General Public License (GPL), so you must make available the source of the version you distribute! However, you can bundle GPL programs with closed source programs if you wish. Modifications of GPL licensed programs must be open source, though.

FreeDOS has been in development (under the guidance of Jim Hall, except for a brief period) since 1994 and is a reasonbly mature and stable DOS environment (note: individual components may be in various stages of development and hence less stable than others), however we are always looking for additional help. We always need people to test programs on various hardware, documentation for many items could be improved, and if you can program, well there is plenty still left to do.

The FreeDOS community is made up of people all over the world. Each person contributes for their own reasons, but generally because we like or still use DOS. No one is under obligation to provide you with any particular changes, though we are friendly bunch and if asked nicely will try our best to help. If you need commercial support, you may wish to send a note to the freedos-devel mailing list or try http://www.findopensourcesupport.com/.

FreeDOS is a trademark of Jim Hall.
It was claimed as a trademark to prevent its possible abuse or misuse. The name FreeDOS may be used by the FreeDOS community to refer to programs that are part of the FreeDOS operating system, or to associate their programs with FreeDOS.