Copyright terms — how to calculate them precisely
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Two core rules, a little-known 25-year fallback, and the rule that terms end at 24:00 on 31 December — which rounds every calculation up to the end of the year.
This is the most misreported area online, partly because the real rules are more complex than the "50 years" everyone remembers.
Moral rights: indefinite
The rights to title the work, to attribution and to integrity last indefinitely. Only the right of publication has a term, calculated with the economic rights.
Economic rights: two rules
Rule 1 — cinematographic, photographic, applied-art and anonymous works:
75 years from first publication. But if the work is still unpublished 25 years after fixation, the term becomes 100 years from fixation.
That 25-year fallback is rarely mentioned yet decides the outcome for works that sat in a drawer for decades — posthumous manuscripts, unreleased films, archive photography.
Rule 2 — all other works:
The author's life plus 50 years after the year of death. For joint works the term runs from the death of the last surviving co-author. For anonymous works, once the author becomes known, Rule 2 applies instead.
The rounding rule everyone misses
A term ends at 24:00 on 31 December of its final year. The specific date within the year is irrelevant — only the year counts. An author who died on 2 January 2000 and one who died on 30 December 2000 have works expiring at the same moment: 24:00 on 31 December 2050, entering the public domain on 1 January 2051.
You can run your own cases through the term calculator.
Three common errors
"Anything older than 50 years is out of copyright." No — for ordinary works the 50 years runs from the author's death, not from creation. A 1960 book by an author who died in 2010 is protected until the end of 2060.
"Public domain means anything goes." No — moral rights survive indefinitely. Attribution and integrity still apply.
"Photographs always get 75 years." True under Article 27(2)(a), but mind the fallback: never published within 25 years of fixation and it becomes 100 years from fixation.
Related rights: 50 years, three starting points
Performances run 50 years from the year following fixation; recordings 50 years from the year following publication, or fixation if unpublished; broadcasts 50 years from the year following transmission. The same 31 December rule applies.