Explainer
Software companies often use either Terms of Service or a Master Subscription Agreement to govern customer relationships. Both are contracts — the difference is how they are accepted and when they are used.
Both structures can govern the same software product. The difference is mostly about how the agreement is formed.
Many SaaS products use Terms of Service that users accept when creating an account, purchasing a subscription, or clicking “I agree.”
This structure works well for products with:
Customers accept the agreement electronically, which forms the contract governing access to the software.
Some customers — particularly larger organizations — require a signed contract before they can purchase software.
In those cases, software vendors often use a Master Subscription Agreement (MSA).
The MSA establishes the legal framework for the relationship, including topics like:
Once the MSA is in place, individual purchases are usually documented using Order Forms.
An Order Form typically contains the commercial details of the deal, such as:
The Order Form incorporates the MSA and applies it to a specific subscription.
For a deeper explanation, see:
Many software companies support both approaches:
This allows the same product to be sold through different sales motions without redesigning the legal framework each time.
If every signed contract is negotiated from scratch, companies often end up maintaining dozens of slightly different agreement versions.
This increases legal overhead and makes contract management more complex over time.
Some teams instead adopt a standardized legal framework and allow only commercial details to vary between customers.
Baseline Terms provides a ready-to-use SaaS contract bundle that includes:
The bundle also includes a short guide explaining how the documents work together.