This manager also checks the strength of all of your passwords and monitors all of your accounts for security breaches. The one-click password change feature is handy and a convenient way to replace weak and vulnerable passwords.
Stop trying to come up with clever, cryptic passwords that you struggle to keep in your head. With a secure and easy-to-use password manager, you can manage your login credentials across all your devices, keeping your passwords safe and automatically filling in forms and syncing your data across Windows, MacOS, Android phones and iPhones and iPads.
Simply, a password manager is an encrypted digital vault that stores the login information you use to access websites, apps and other services. Besides keeping your credentials and sensitive data safe, a password manager can generate unique, strong passwords to ensure you aren't reusing your them across your services. Withalltherecentnewsofsecuritybreaches and identity theft, using unique passwords can go a long way to ensuring if one site gets hacked, your stolen password can't be used on other sites.
SplashID Desktop Edition is a new password management tool for Mac OS X and Windows.
Check out the best Mac password managers for your home, family, and small business.
This manager also checks the strength of all of your passwords and monitors all of your accounts for security breaches. The one-click password change feature is handy and a convenient way to replace weak and vulnerable passwords.
Once you create a master password for LastPass, you’ve made the only password you’ll need to unlock all your other secure data—usernames and passwords, credit card numbers, secure notes (including attachments, such as images and PDFs), contact information, software licenses, and so on.
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And with a manager, you don't have to remember the various pieces of login information, such as credit-card information or shipping addresses. With just one master password -- or in some cases a PIN or even your fingerprint -- you can autofill a form or password field. Some also feature online storage and an encrypted vault for storing documents. Drm removal for mac.
All our best password manager picks come in free versions, which usually lets you securely store passwords for one device (although our pick for best free manager can be used across multiple devices). Our picks also feature subscription options that let you sync your log-in information across all your devices, share credentials with trusted family and friends and get access to secure online storage. And if transparency is important to you, several of our picks are open-source projects. We also look at what a password manager is and the basics of how to use one.
Note that these services are independently chosen by our editors. CNET may get a share of the revenue if you buy anything featured on our site.
Sarah Tew/CNET
Offers free version
Base price beyond free: $36 per year
Works with: Windows, MacOS, Linux, Android iPhone and iPad. Browser extensions for Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer, Edge and Opera.
Some of our other picks have a free option, but most lock you to just one device if you don't pay up. The free version of LastPass stands out by giving you the ability to store passwords, user log-in info and credentials and sync all of it wherever you want -- across desktop, mobile and browsers.
You can also share a login item with another person. For $36 a year, you can purchase the Premium version to share passwords, log-ins, memberships and other items with trusted emergency contacts, multifactor authentication through YubiKey and fingerprint and 1GB of encrypted storage.
And with a $48 annual subscription, you can sign up for the Families plan that gives you six individual accounts, shared folders and a dashboard interface for managing the accounts and keeping an eye on your account's security.
Jason Cipriani/CNET
Offers trial version
Base price: $35.88 per year
Works with: Windows, MacOS, Linux, Chrome OS, Android, iPhone and iPad. Browser extensions for Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge and Opera.
If you're looking for a trusted password manager app to keep your log-in information private and secure, 1Password is up to the task, letting you access your accounts and services with one master password. It's available for Windows, MacOS, Android, iOS, Linux and Chrome OS.
The nicely designed manager lacks a free version, but you can try for free for 30 days before signing up. An individual subscription runs $36 a year, and comes with 1GB of document storage and optional two-factor authentication for additional protection. A travel mode lets you remove your 1Password sensitive data from your device when you travel and then restore it with one click when you return.
On Macs, you can use Touch ID to unlock 1Password, and on iOS devices, you can use Face ID too. For $60 a year, you can cover a family of five, sharing passwords, credit cards and anything else among the group. Each person gets their own vault, and it's easy to control who you share information with and what they can do with it.
You can also create separate guest accounts to share Wi-Fi connection passwords, for example, or home alarm codes with guests.
Other free and paid options worth considering
Both LastPass and 1Password are solid, affordable password keepers, and in a straw poll of CNET staffers, they were about neck-and-neck in use -- though the latter may include some taking advantage of the 1Password for Journalism initiative that offers free service to us hacks. But if you find neither of our two recommended password managers works quite how you want, a handful of other apps are worth considering. These all have free versions available.
Bitwarden
Offers free version
Base price beyond free: $10 per year
Works with: Windows, MacOS, Linux, Android, iPhone and iPad. Browser extensions for Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge, Opera, Vivaldi, Brave and Tor Browser.
Bitwarden is a lean, open-source software password manager that can store and autofill your passwords across your devices and popular browsers -- including Brave and Tor -- for free. It lacks some of the bells and whistles of our picks, but for $10 a year, you can add 1GB of encrypted file storage.
Dashlane
Offers limited free version (50 passwords on one device)
Base price beyond free: $59.88 per year
Works with: Windows, MacOS, Android, iPhone and iPad. Browser extensions for Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer, Edge and Opera.
Dashlane provides a simple and secure way to manage your passwords and keep other log-in information stored. Just for managing passwords, we like it as much as our picks, but the free version limits you to one device and 50 passwords, and the Premium subscription is $60 a year, more than similar plans from 1Password and LastPass.
Keeper
Offers limited free version (unlimited passwords on one device)
Base price beyond free: $25.49 per year (usually $29.99)
Works with: Windows, MacOS, Linux, Android, iPhone and iPad. Browser extensions for Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer, Edge and Opera.
Keeper is another password service than helps you manage login info on Windows, MacOS, Android and iOS devices. A free version gives you unlimited passwords on one device. The step-up version costs $25 to $30 a year and lets you sync passwords across all your devices. For $60 a year, you can get 10 GB of secure file storage.
KeePassXC
It's free
Works with: Windows, MacOS, Linux, Chrome OS, Android, iPhone and iPad, BlackBerry, Windows Phone and Palm OS. Access via the web plus popular browser extensions. (Except for the official Windows version, KeePass for other platforms are unofficial ports.)
KeePass, another open-source software, started on Windows and has been ported over using the same code base to other platforms, including MacOS, Android and iOS. On the plus side, it's totally free and endorsed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation. On the other side, it's really for advanced users only: It takes a bit of fiddling to get all the independently built versions of KeePass to work together.
Password Manager Basics
Still need more info on what password managers are, and why they're better than the alternatives? Read on.
How does a password manager work?
To get started, a password manager will record the username and password you use when you first sign in to a website or service. Then the next time you use visit the site, it will autofill forms with your stored user login information. For those websites and services that don't handle automatic filling, a manager lets you copy the password to paste into the password field.
If you're stuck picking a good password, the manager can generate a strong password for you and watch that you aren't reusing any across services. And if you use more than one device, you want a manager that is available across all your devices and browsers, so you can access your passwords and login information -- including credit-card and shipping information -- from anywhere through the manager app or its browser extension. Some provide secure storage so you can store other items too, such as documents, say an electronic copy of your passport or will.
Take note: Many password managers keep the master password you use to unlock the manager locally and not on a remote server. Or if it's on a server, it's encrypted and not readable by the company.
This ensures your account stays secure in case of a data breach. It also means that if you forget your master password, there may not be a way to recover your account through the company. Because of that, a few password managers offer DIY kits to help you recover your account on your own. Worse case scenario, you start over with a new account and manually reset your passwords at each specific destination site and account and start again.
What makes for a secure password?
A good password should be a long string of capital and lowercase letters, numbers, punctuation and other nonalphanumeric characters -- something that's difficult for others to guess, but a snap for a password manager to keep track of. And despite what you may have heard, once you select a good password, you don't really need to change it periodically.
Can I use a web browser to manage my passwords and login information?
You can certainly use Chrome, Safari or Firefox to manage your passwords, addresses and other login data. You can even set up a master password to unlock your credentials within a browser. And while using an online browser's password tool is certainly better than not using a password keeper at all, you can't access your passwords and other login info outside of the browser, the browser isn't much help in generating strong passwords and you can't share login info with others you trust.
What about iCloud Keychain?
Through iCloud Keychain, you can access your Safari website usernames and passwords, credit card information and Wi-Fi network information from your Mac and iOS devices. It's great if you live in Apple's world. But if you venture outside and have a Windows or Android device or use the Chrome or Firefox browser, iCloud Keychain comes up short.
David Gewirtz contributed to this story.
Originally published Feb. 16, 2018. Update, Aug. 8, 2019: This story is frequently updated to reflect new picks, pricing and changes in the market.
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HomeSoftwareFreewareFree Mac Password Manager To Secure Password Info
Password manager application is a security password management software that provides virtual vault to store your login password information pertaining to email, application or other confidential stuff. This password manager application can help to remember various passwords being used in daily life. Meanwhile, a far easier and more convenient way of keeping your passwords both safe and secure is to use a password storage utility, which can be accessed with a single master password.
Over here, we will explain some of best password manager for mac, which allows create and maintain a secure, encrypted database of all your passwords on Mac OSX platform. Some of the password program for Mac are lightweight application and portable. Besides that, The password managers on below list have a variety of benefits that will make your computing life easier and more secure:
Encrypting passwords and data using Advanced Encryption Standard (AES)
Automatically and securely logging into websites as you’re surfing
Browser auto-fill for your personal info, so you can make quick work of shopping or registration
Helping you generate customizable, secure passwords so they’re not easily cracked
Backing up and restoring your passwords so you aren’t up a creek if something happens to your machine
Mac Password Manager list:
Passlook – Mac Password Manager freeware
Passlock mac password manager doesn’t have killer look or elegant interface, but it’s easy to use and allows you encrypted password within few steps. When you launch mac password manager tool, a small interface with search box and buttons labelled Find, Add New, and Help. You can store any details such as website or application name, username, password, description and website address (if any) on Passlook.
All entered password will automatically copied to Windows clipboard, letting you instantly paste it into the required location, should you need to. There also an “Export All Passwords” options on Passlook mac password manager that allows you copies the entire password database to clipboard, allowing you to paste the data in a text editor.
Besides that, the application also allows to specify a master password to lock PassLook, so no one but can only accesses the passwords database. To specify the master password, simply click ‘Lock Program’ from the File menu. There are also hotkeys available for all these functions.
Plus more, you can set custom security question and answer to help you reset the master password in case you forget in the future.
PassLook is a portable application that works on Windows and Mac OS X. The Password manager also can run on Windows 8 Pro, 64-bit.
Download PassLook – Mac Password Manager Freeware
LastPass – Universal Password manager for Mobile, Desktop and Web Browser.
The main goal of LastPass password manager is allowing you remember one master password and knowing the rest of password information. The best part of LastPass is all your password data is securely synchronized across all devices giving you access to it anywhere at anytime.
On operating, LastPass Password Manager also has a form filler that automates password entering and form filling. It also supports password generation, site sharing and site logging. Meanwhile, they also offer a couple of different methods (such as an onscreen keyboard for password entry) to protect against keyloggers. Plus more, you can even import and export data, and securely share your login credentials with others and create secure notes.
Cost: Free. A Premium version is offered for $1 per month and includes mobile version, among many other features
Lastpass Supported Platform
Mobile OS: Apple iOS, Blackberry, Windows Mobile, Windows Phone, Android, WebOS, Symbian
Operating System: Windows, Linux and Mac OS
Web Browser: Safari, Opera, Firefox, Internet Explorer and Google Chrome
Visit LastPass – Universal Password Manager
KeePassX – Open source Mac password manager
KeePass is a free mac password manager that managing your passwords in a secure way on Mac. All you need remember one single master password or select the key file to unlock the whole password database. All passwords will be stored on database, which encrypted using 256bits secure encryption algorithms known as AES and Twofish.
Meanwhile, KeePassX has the ability to import passwords from PwManager (*.pwm) and KWallet (*.xml) files and allows you to export your passwords as text files.
Plus more, KeePass also support Windows and Linux besides of Mac platform
Visit KeepassX
Free Password Manager Mac
Pastor – Simple Free Mac Password manager
Pastor is a simple password management solution that doesn’t contain many features. It can save all your passwords, logins, serials, registrations and other sensitive information with encrypted and password-protected.
Besides that, Pastor password management also built in password generator, and is extremely easy to use. Pastor also runs on Mac OS 10.2 and up, so it is a great choice for older Macs.
Visit Pastor
Password Bank Vault for Mac
This free password manager offers to store all your passwords information in one easy place with just one master password to remember. All stored passwords entries will be 128 bit encrypted.
It offers various features such as insert, edit , delete, sort, change master password, random password creation, password to clipboard & auto save. Plus more, Password Bank Vault for Mac also allows mac user import & export data to and from spreadsheets in CSV format, backup / restore database feature as well as a special lock screen facility for unwanted prying eyes.
Visit Password Bank Vault for Mac
Do you use any of the Mac password managers mentioned in this post? If so, what’s your opinion of them? If not, do you have any other free mac password manager you highly recommend?