Best Password Managers

[Paul Wagenseil]

To fully protect yourself online, you need a password manager. We've used and tested seven top brands to determine the best one.

Best Password Managers : Read more

 

[Paul Wagenseil]

Archived comments are found here: http/www.tomsguide.com/forum/id-3366251/password-managers.html

 

[tslifkin]

Be aware that some of these tools do NOT store passwords on your device and so you CANNOT see them if you are not online. OK if you live at work or at home always connected. No so much if you travel or move around a lot. Keeper JUST CHANGED THEIR DESIGN. You can still see your passwords when not connected, but you CANNOT EDIT. so you cant add new data or do any editing if, for example, you are on long flight or a location without an inmediate link. This is a BAD THING and indicative of companies taking the easy way out to get your cash but reduce the meaningful feature sets! Just be careful!

 

[edwardmeijers]

Why is safe in cloud not compared?

 

[google02]

You are wrong to imply that 1Password is not available for Windows as of 2018. My hosting company uses 1Password internally. It should be included in your comparative review.

 

[merytsekhmet]

I had a premium account with LastPass for about 5 years. This week I unsubscribed after hearing they were killing off XMarks. I was particularly disgusted because the news was sent very shortly after they renewed the joint subscription. Happily though, I am far more satisfied with Dashlane and Eversynch so LastPass did me a favour in the end.

 

[jslezak57]

I purchased Dashlane only to find out that it doesn't have full functionality in MS Edge (default browser windows 10). It wanted to force me to use Chrome or IE. I tried to use the online chat, only to hear that "the software will improve with time". I requested a refund because when I purchase a software app, I want something fully functioning - not a "beta" that leaves me with partial functionality!

 

[merytsekhmet]

I purchased Dashlane only to find out that it doesn't have full functionality in MS Edge (default browser windows 10).

I refuse to use Edge even though it is among the bloatware that came with Windows 10. I use Firefox and Chrome and have had no problems.

 

[hokfujow]

I'm amazed that Lastpass is still getting such high ratings. Go on their forum and read the thread in troubleshooting about not saving passwords. Lastpass does not reliably save new passwords entered for web accounts. People create new accounts, use LP to generate a new password, and then discover that it wasn't saved and they have no idea what the password for their new account is. It's been happening to me more often than not. I'm not going to renew my premium account, and switching to something else.

 

[vsneers]

I'm amazed that Lastpass is still getting such high ratings. Go on their forum and read the thread in troubleshooting about not saving passwords. Lastpass does not reliably save new passwords entered for web accounts. People create new accounts, use LP to generate a new password, and then discover that it wasn't saved and they have no idea what the password for their new account is. It's been happening to me more often than not. I'm not going to renew my premium account, and switching to something else.

I 100% agree with this. I used LP for around 2 years with Chrome and found it would constantly not update any changed passwords in the vault properly and so seeing as I used LP to generate the password in the first place and it then didn't save it or saved a messed-up version of it that just contained a bunch of dots, I would end up generating a password, copying and pasting it to Notepad and then manually adding it to the vault at which point I thought what is the point of LP, I might as well do this myself and save me the money.

Plus a recent major security breach causing all my passwords and banking details to be hacked by someone and the lack of support from LP, was the last straw for me. If someone does try to access your account with them then they don't actually stop the person, they just send you an email or notification on your phone telling you but do nothing about it to block them. This happened to me overnight while I was in bed and unable to respond to the notifications and despite the hacker using an entirely different IP address and location (their IP address even said it was from IPVanish.com), they did nothing to block their access and due to the hacker having access to my email account, they were then able to request a password and login email reset from LastPass who duly obliged. I spent the next couple of days desperately trying to get in contact with LastPass as I was locked out of my own account and all they did was send me links to articles about either changing your password or if your email address was compromised, suggesting to just set up a new account and start again changing passwords. Meanwhile the hacker still had full access to my account!

As hokfujow says, their forum is full of people complaining about the service and they never seem to respond to the posts. I'm amazed how they still get to the top of most recommended password manager lists.

 

[redneck1st]

Mr Waenseil talks out of both sides of his mouth. He gives Roboform 5/5 then talks negatively about the program and all it's short comings. You cant have it both ways Paul. It's either a good product or it's not. It cant be both.

 

[henrikp]

I used LastPass for a while until I realized it routinely didn't save my generated passwords. The UX is ok, but buggy and crashes, and the app just isn't reliable. I won't be trusting it to handle anything of importance again.

After an incident where a generated password that (again) didn't save made me unable to reach some important files I needed, I contacted their customer support, and that's when it turned really bad. Their support is basically a channel that repeats "you may experience loss of data, as stated in our Terms of Use." Not something you want to hear from a password vault company! I've experienced some really bad customer service in my life (and some great, luckily), but the dialogue with LastPass convinced me that this is not a company I want to entrust my private passwords to.

I do realize that encrypting something without knowing 100% sure that the password was saved was careless on my part, and not something I will repeat, but then again, you use this software because it's supposed to be trustworthy. And it's just not.

I'd stay away from them. They're cheaper for a reason.

 

[lovingboth]

Why is LastPass rated 4/5 in its review, but 2.5/5 here?

 

[Karadjgne]

#1 password manager I own is a pad of paper that sits next to my monitor. Never fails to save passwords, is not visible online to anyone. It's only flaw is that it won't auto-populate passwords by username onscreen.

 

[unklepowers]

I'm always amazed that password app reviews like this one never mention Mobile Password Safe (https/pw.ex.to/login.php).

It's a completely FREE service for managing all your passwords, or any other data you want to always have private and secure access to (credit cards, bank accounts, DMV records, etc.) It is fully configurable and can store any kind of numerical and text data. And being a web app it is platform independent. You can access it from any device you can get online with. So no worries about importing or exporting your data if you switch between iOS and Android, or between Windows and Mac.

I've been using it since 2008 without a single glitch or any problem whatsoever. So bottom line: it's flexible, it's powerful, it's easy, it's convenient and it's FREE. And of course it's encrypted, so your data safe. Why you would spend any money on any of the apps mentioned in this article is a mystery.

 

[richardparisi]

In your review, you wrote: "Dashlane's killer feature remains its bulk password changer, which can reset hundreds of your passwords at once, saving you time and worry in the event of a major data breach." This is complete BS. I signed up for the service and when I ran the Password Changer, it was only able to auto update 5 of my 164 accounts. FIVE!

Yes, it's true they can do this with hundreds of sites. And if you happen to have accounts with the same "hundreds of sites" then great. But "hundreds" is a pretty paltry number compared to all the websites in the world. None of my banks or credit cards were on their list, no Google, no Netflix, no Amazon. But they did have 17 permutations of Zenfolio counted among their hundreds.

Do you actually test these products when you write a review? It's very disappointing to discover such a major inaccuracy. It makes me wonder what else is wrong.

 

[nate.h46]

Sooo I knew something here was weird. How could LastPass be a top pick with only 2.5, and no explanation about its weaknesses? Surely value alone isn't good enough to outweigh the downsides of a 2.5-graded app.

According to the ACTUAL review page, it's given a 4.5, NOT a 2.5. Click "Review" in the LastPass box above, or go to https/www.tomsguide.com/us/lastpass,review-3775.html. This is just some kind of weird error on the part of the author, I guess.

 

[C Mayo]

After becoming frustrated with RoboForm, I installed LastPass yesterday based on this review, and today their servers are unreachable. From Google search results, it looks like this is a common issue with LastPass, and the last thing I need is a password manager that only works when it wants to. Uninstalling now, guess I'll give Dashlane a try after all.

 

[jamesandjohn]

I am using Dashlane, Would like to have the option to add on separate items as I have my own VPN. Want a perpetual license option as well

 

[jamesandjohn]

Using DashLane. Not happy that they do not allow alternative VPNs. Would like it if they had base product with price for extras that are wanted. Also we can get perpetual buying license.