R is released under the
GNU General Public License (GPL) version 2. If
you have any questions regarding the legality of using R in any
particular situation you should bring it up with your legal counsel. We
are in no position to offer legal advice.
It is the opinion of the R Core Team that one can use R for commercial
purposes (e.g., in business or in consulting). The GPL, like
all Open Source licenses, permits all and any use of the package. It
only restricts distribution of R or of other programs containing code
from R. This is made clear in clause 6 (“No Discrimination Against
Fields of Endeavor”) of the
Open Source Definition: