While Visual Studio Code's source code is FOSS, the official builds are [proprietary software.](https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/issues/60#issuecomment-161792005) There are FOSS alternatives that create FOSS builds of Visual Studio Code.
This is evidenced by [a comment made by a Microsoft developer](https://web.archive.org/web/20200621195204/https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/issues/60#issuecomment-161792005):
> When we [Microsoft] build Visual Studio Code, we do exactly this. We clone the vscode repository, we lay down a customized product.json that has Microsoft specific functionality (telemetry, gallery, logo, etc.), and then produce a build that we release under our license.
>
> When you clone and build from the vscode repo, none of these endpoints are configured in the default product.json. Therefore, you generate a “clean” build, without the Microsoft customizations, which is by default licensed under the MIT license.
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## VSCodium
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@@ -19,3 +25,11 @@ Binary releases of VS Code without MS branding / telemetry / licensing.