Upgrade 7.x to 8.x and free license set to free trial and will not accept activation code

I upgraded from version 7.x to the current 8.1.x version on 26 Jan. Everything seems intact except the license. It says it is a 30 day trial good thru 25 Feb 2021. There was a deactivate button. First I requested via “lost my key” to assure key was still active for that email address. Then I click the deactivate button and got the activate button and put in the activation code. It appeared to take it but the license screen came back the same as before as a 30 day free trial. Any ideas?

Your process is exactly what is required, but it may be that the license server is temporarily off-line for some reason, or that your firewall is blocking the connection to the license server.

Can you completely disable any anti-virus/firewall or VPN application and try again?

I paused EST and then did the deactivate, reactivate sequence. Nothing changed. Still says trial license good through 2/25/2021.

If no new ideas, can I get a new activation code for that email address to try out? or what is the procedure when activation fails?

You can register a Free License using a different email address, and try that.

Is there any other options?

Registering a new license literally takes a few seconds, but if you don’t want to try another activation key as a test, you can write to eM Client and I am sure they will be able to change the key for you. Contact information is on the website. As a Free License user you do not have access to the company for support, but I am sure they will respond even if it takes weeks.