Which Bible translations are public domain?

If you've ever wanted to quote the Bible in a book, a song, an app, or a sermon slide deck, you've met the question: which translations can I actually use without permission? The answer matters — most modern translations are copyrighted, with strict quotation limits.

Public-domain translations have no such limits. Anyone may read, copy, print, publish, and adapt them, for any purpose, forever. Here are the main ones.

Public domain in English

King James Version (1611) — the classic. Note that in the United Kingdom the Crown holds certain printing rights, but everywhere else it is fully public domain.

American Standard Version (1901) — extremely literal; the ancestor of several modern translations.

Young's Literal Translation (1862/1898) — hyper-literal, preserving original tenses.

World English Bible (WEB) — a modern public-domain revision of the ASV.

Berean Standard Bible (BSB) — the standout: a fully modern translation dedicated to the public domain (CC0) in 2023. This is BibleDawn's flagship text.

Public domain in other languages

Spanish: Reina-Valera 1909 (the classic lineage from 1569). Portuguese: the historic Almeida translations. French: Ostervald (1744 line). German: Lutherbibel 1912. Russian: the Synodal translation of 1876. Italian: Giovanni Diodati 1649.

These are the texts that power BibleDawn's Spanish, Portuguese, French, German, Russian, and Italian editions — which is exactly why we can offer them freely.

What is NOT public domain

Most translations published after the 1920s are copyrighted: NIV, ESV, NLT, NASB, CSB, NKJV, and many others. Using them beyond short quotations requires permission or a license from the publisher.

That's not a criticism — translation is costly scholarly work. But it explains why truly free Bible platforms build on public-domain texts. See our sources and licensing page for exactly what we use and why.