diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index be540985c83..f101599d854 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -40,7 +40,7 @@ $(TOOLS_DIR)/stringer: $(TOOLS_MOD_DIR)/go.mod $(TOOLS_MOD_DIR)/go.sum $(TOOLS_M
 	cd $(TOOLS_MOD_DIR) && \
 	go build -o $(TOOLS_DIR)/stringer golang.org/x/tools/cmd/stringer
 
-precommit: generate build lint test
+precommit: license-check generate build lint test
 
 .PHONY: test-with-coverage
 test-with-coverage:
@@ -145,5 +145,16 @@ lint: $(TOOLS_DIR)/golangci-lint $(TOOLS_DIR)/misspell
 	    go mod tidy); \
 	done
 
+.PHONY: generate
 generate: $(TOOLS_DIR)/stringer
 	PATH="$(TOOLS_DIR):$${PATH}" go generate ./...
+
+.PHONY: license-check
+license-check:
+	@licRes=$$(for f in $$(find . -type f \( -iname '*.go' -o -iname '*.sh' \) ! -path './vendor/*' ! -path './exporters/otlp/internal/opentelemetry-proto/*') ; do \
+	           awk '/Copyright The OpenTelemetry Authors|generated|GENERATED/ && NR<=3 { found=1; next } END { if (!found) print FILENAME }' $$f; \
+	   done); \
+	   if [ -n "$${licRes}" ]; then \
+	           echo "license header checking failed:"; echo "$${licRes}"; \
+	           exit 1; \
+	   fi
diff --git a/doc.go b/doc.go
index 122f50f1577..6c55ff6a2b6 100644
--- a/doc.go
+++ b/doc.go
@@ -1,3 +1,17 @@
+// Copyright The OpenTelemetry Authors
+//
+// Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+// you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+// You may obtain a copy of the License at
+//
+//     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+//
+// Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+// distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+// WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+// See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+// limitations under the License.
+
 // This package provides all of its functionality through its
 // submodules. The submodules in the exporters directory provide
 // implementations for trace and metric exporters for third-party
diff --git a/exporters/metric/datadog/datadog.go b/exporters/metric/datadog/datadog.go
index fd442324916..4391fe5a6fc 100644
--- a/exporters/metric/datadog/datadog.go
+++ b/exporters/metric/datadog/datadog.go
@@ -1,3 +1,17 @@
+// Copyright The OpenTelemetry Authors
+//
+// Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+// you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+// You may obtain a copy of the License at
+//
+//     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+//
+// Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+// distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+// WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+// See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+// limitations under the License.
+
 package datadog
 
 import (
diff --git a/exporters/metric/datadog/example_test.go b/exporters/metric/datadog/example_test.go
index 8b00e4cf841..c04dcc7e609 100644
--- a/exporters/metric/datadog/example_test.go
+++ b/exporters/metric/datadog/example_test.go
@@ -1,3 +1,17 @@
+// Copyright The OpenTelemetry Authors
+//
+// Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+// you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+// You may obtain a copy of the License at
+//
+//     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+//
+// Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+// distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+// WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+// See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+// limitations under the License.
+
 package datadog_test
 
 import (
diff --git a/instrumentation/github.com/bradfitz/gomemcache/status.go b/instrumentation/github.com/bradfitz/gomemcache/status.go
index 0f4fa59545f..0933b236a4a 100644
--- a/instrumentation/github.com/bradfitz/gomemcache/status.go
+++ b/instrumentation/github.com/bradfitz/gomemcache/status.go
@@ -1,3 +1,17 @@
+// Copyright The OpenTelemetry Authors
+//
+// Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+// you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+// You may obtain a copy of the License at
+//
+//     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+//
+// Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+// distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+// WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+// See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+// limitations under the License.
+
 package gomemcache
 
 import (
diff --git a/instrumentation/runtime/doc.go b/instrumentation/runtime/doc.go
index f534cf9e104..4020b865989 100644
--- a/instrumentation/runtime/doc.go
+++ b/instrumentation/runtime/doc.go
@@ -1,3 +1,17 @@
+// Copyright The OpenTelemetry Authors
+//
+// Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+// you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+// You may obtain a copy of the License at
+//
+//     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+//
+// Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+// distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+// WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+// See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+// limitations under the License.
+
 // package runtime implements the work-in-progress conventional runtime metrics specified by OpenTelemetry.
 //
 // The metrics produced are:
diff --git a/tools/tools.go b/tools/tools.go
index 6c4e08c445e..f449e286803 100644
--- a/tools/tools.go
+++ b/tools/tools.go
@@ -1,3 +1,17 @@
+// Copyright The OpenTelemetry Authors
+//
+// Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+// you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+// You may obtain a copy of the License at
+//
+//     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+//
+// Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+// distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+// WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+// See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+// limitations under the License.
+
 // +build tools
 
 package tools