Short answer: every Meraki device needs its own license, and the hardware stops being useful without one. One access point license lists at $200.70 a year, and resellers sell it for about $115. An MX68CW security appliance runs about $266 a year on Enterprise and about $532 on Advanced Security. Longer terms cost less per year. The bigger risk at renewal is the co-term date, which bills your whole network at once.
This page is for IT and finance leads who already run Meraki and want to know if the renewal number is fair. It covers what licenses cost, why the quote often lands as one large bill, what happens if you let it lapse, and the three moves you have at renewal time. Cisco does not publish a price list to the public, so the prices below come from a named reseller and are dated.
Cisco sells Meraki hardware and licenses separately (Meraki licensing FAQ).
Three things move the quote more than the list price does.
Prices from Hummingbird Networks, a Meraki reseller, checked on October 19, 2026. Reseller prices move often. Your partner's quote can be higher or lower. Use these as a sanity check, not a quote.
| License | Reseller price | Cost per year |
|---|---|---|
| Access point, 1 year (LIC-ENT-1YR) | About $115 (list $200.70) | About $115 |
| Access point, 3 years (LIC-ENT-3YR) | $258.89 (list $451.58) | About $86 |
| Access point, 5 years (LIC-ENT-5YR) | $431.49 | About $86 |
| MX68CW Enterprise, 1 year | $265.79 | About $266 |
| MX68CW Enterprise, 5 years | $886.79 | About $177 |
| MX68CW Advanced Security, 1 year | $532.11 | About $532 |
| MX68CW Advanced Security, 5 years | $1,774.98 | About $355 |
Sources: LIC-ENT-1YR, LIC-ENT-3YR, LIC-ENT-5YR and MX68CW licenses. Cost per year is our arithmetic. Two patterns hold across the list. A five-year term cuts the yearly cost by about a quarter to a third. Advanced Security costs about twice Enterprise on the same appliance.
Most Meraki networks run on co-termination licensing. Every license in the organization ends on the same day. Cisco calculates that date from a weighted average of the licenses you bought, and recalculates it each time you claim a license or a device (Meraki licensing overview).
Cisco's own example: 10 access points on one-year licenses, then 6 more added four months in. The new licenses do not start a fresh year. Their value is spread across all 16 devices and pushes the shared end date out by about 1.5 months (Meraki).
Because every device shares one end date, the renewal covers the whole estate in a single order. Sites added at different times all come due together. A network that grew bit by bit gets one bill sized for all of it.
The renewal is built from what is claimed in the dashboard. Access points pulled off the wall years ago can still be on the count. Ask your partner for the device list behind the quote and remove anything you no longer run.
An organization out of license gets a 30-day grace period. After that, Cisco says devices "will cease to pass client traffic." Admins can only reach the license and device status pages until it is fixed (Meraki).
On Cisco's newer subscription licensing, networks also get 30 days. After that the devices keep forwarding traffic, but you lose configuration, monitoring, dashboard firmware updates and Meraki support (Meraki).
After a co-term license expires, the License Info page offers a one-time "Request grace period reset." It buys time, not licenses. You still have to buy and apply them. Plan the decision well before the end date.
Reseller prices on the same license sit well below list, as the table shows. Get competing quotes on the same device list and term. Price a longer term too, since it lowers the yearly cost if you plan to keep the gear.
Remove retired devices before the quote is built. Check whether every site needs Advanced Security, since the MX edition applies to every MX in the organization (Meraki). Check end-of-life dates before you license old gear for five more years.
Renewal is the cheapest moment to leave, because you are not paying twice. Compare Meraki against other platforms, or against a fully managed NaaS subscription that bundles hardware, licensing and operations. See Cisco Meraki alternatives.
One more decision sits inside renewal. Cisco now steers organizations toward subscription licensing. A co-term organization can opt in through a partner, but a subscription organization cannot go back (Meraki licensing FAQ). Ask for both models priced before you choose.
| Cisco Meraki | Other options | |
|---|---|---|
| Recurring license | Per device, every term | Varies: UniFi and HPE Instant On have no license fees; Fortinet sells security bundles per firewall |
| If the license lapses | Co-term devices stop passing client traffic | A FortiGate keeps firewalling without updates |
| Hardware | You buy and refresh it | You buy it, or a NaaS provider includes it in a monthly fee |
| Who runs it | Your team or a partner | Your team, a partner, or the NaaS provider |
We do not print a price for the alternatives here, because it depends on your device count and sites. The comparisons spell out each model: Meraki vs UniFi, Meraki vs Fortinet, Meraki vs HPE Aruba and Meter vs Cisco Meraki. The pricing tool gives a starting NaaS estimate.
A Meraki renewal is rarely about the price of one license. It is the whole estate, on one date, in one order. Clean the device list first. Pick the MX edition you need. Get more than one quote and price a longer term. Then put a real alternative next to it, because renewal is when switching costs the least. A NaaSAdvisor advisor can do that side by side for free.
If the hardware is aging, check Meraki MX end-of-life dates and Cisco access point end-of-life dates before you renew. The NaaS evaluation checklist covers the rest.
Still deciding? See the Cisco Meraki guide, the NaaS pricing guide, or estimate your price with the calculator.
Independent advisors compare your renewal quote with other platforms and managed options, at no cost to you.