LISREL (LInear Structural RELations) is one of the oldest and most respected programs for Structural Equation Modeling. If you are debating whether to pursue a license, here are its key strengths:

Between 2014 and 2021, SSI offered a LISREL Student Edition (sometimes called LISREL Educational) for free or very low cost. As of December 2021, this version was still available through certain university repositories, but with severe restrictions:

For a small classroom exercise, this might suffice. But it cannot handle real research datasets.

How to check in December 2021: Visit the Scientific Software International website or contact their support to see if a time-limited student version is still offered. Many universities had transitioned to LISREL 11 or 12 by then, dropping the old version 9 student edition.

If you want to use LISREL legally for a project:

This is the only "free download" endorsed by the developer. And it works perfectly for a short-term project.

| Software | License | SEM Capabilities | Ease of Use | |----------|---------|----------------|--------------| | R (lavaan package) | GPL | Full SEM, CFA, missing data, mixture models | Scripting, steep learning curve | | JASP | GPL | SEM module, intuitive GUI | Very easy | | Jamovi (SEMLj) | GPL | CFA, SEM, path analysis | Easy, GUI-based | | OpenMx (R package) | GPL | Advanced SEM, twin modeling | Moderate to hard |

R with lavaan is the most powerful free alternative. By December 2021, lavaan had over 1.5 million downloads and matched nearly all LISREL 9 features.

You may see references to "LISREL 12" online.

| Risk Type | Consequence | |-----------|-------------| | Legal | Fines up to $150,000 per willful infringement (US Copyright Act) | | Academic | Retraction of published papers using unlicensed software | | Security | Keyloggers, ransomware, identity theft | | Technical | No updates, no support, crashes, corrupted outputs | | Ethical | Violates developer rights; harms future software innovation |