A password manager stores all your passwords and automatically fills them in your web browser and mobile apps. But is trusting an app with your passwords and storing them all in one place a smart idea?
Yes, yes, it is. We recommend everyone use a password manager, which is far superior to other ways of keeping track of your passwords. Here’s why they’re a safe choice.
Password Managers Are Safer Than the Alternative
A password manager stores your passwords in a secure vault, which you can unlock with a single master password—and, optionally, an extra two-factor authentication method to help keep everything extra secure.
Password managers let you use strong, unique passwords everywhere. This typically isn’t possible for most people—can you really remember unique, strong passwords for every website you use? Password managers can generate and remember passwords like E.wei3-uaF7TaW.vuJ_w.
If you don’t use a password manager to store your passwords, you probably can’t remember all the unique, strong passwords you would need to use. Most people end up reusing passwords on multiple websites—that’s the most dangerous thing, as a password database leak at once website means your accounts on another site are wide open. Someone just has to try signing in with the same email address and password combination from the breach.
You could try creating “unique” passwords yourself based on a pattern. For example, maybe your base password is _p@ssw0rd_. You could modify it based on the domain—for example, when signing into facebook, you could take the “f” and the “a” and make it fp@ssw0rda. Repeat this for each account you use, and you have unique passwords you can remember yourself, right? Well, not really—your passwords are now predictable. And what happens when a website doesn’t allow special characters or limits you to a specific number of digits and your method doesn’t work?
With a password manager, you just have to create one strong password and remember it.
While you do have to place some trust in whatever password manager you choose, using a password manager is more secure than the alternatives. The password managers we recommend have never had their passwords compromised, but many people have gotten in trouble through reusing passwords. Exploiting those reused passwords is often how attackers “hack” accounts these days.
How Password Managers Secure Your Passwords
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