Dropbox makes its password manager free — but there's a catch

Dropbox makes its password manager costless — merely there's a take hold of

Dropbox open on both a smartphone and a Windows laptop.

(Image credit: Nopparat Khokthong/Shutterstock)

Peradventure taking advantage of LastPass'south recent self-inflicted public-relations disaster, Dropbox is making a express version of its password manager available to free users starting next month.

"In early Apr we're rolling out Dropbox Passwords to all Dropbox users," states a mail today (March xvi) on the official Dropbox blog. "Now, with a free Dropbox Basic plan, you tin try a limited version of Passwords."

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How express? You'll be able to store upward to l username-countersign credential sets and will be able to sync new and changed passwords beyond iii of your devices, whether it be computers, tablets or smartphones. Dropbox says you tin "access" the password list from "anywhere."

That'southward non a bad bargain for someone who already has a free Dropbox account (standard data-storage limit 2GB) and doesn't take a lot of online accounts. "Grandparents come up to mind," quipped The Verge.

But frequent users of online services — i.due east., most people reading this news item — probable have a lot more than than 50 online accounts.

If then, and so you can upgrade to Dropbox's paid plans, which own't cheap, to get the unlimited version of the Dropbox countersign manager. The Dropbox Personal Plus programme gives yous 2TB of syncing storage for $12 a month or $120 a year.

Nearly paid countersign managers cost a lot less than that. LastPass and 1Password each toll $36 per yr, and Keeper undercuts those past a buck (eight dollars if you're a Tom'due south Guide reader). All 3 are loftier on our list of the best password managers and will let you sync all your passwords across all your devices.

Until today (March sixteen), yous would have been able to go that same unlimited universal syncing with LastPass'southward free tier. But that was also expert to last.

LastPass is reverting to its previous policy of limiting gratuitous users to one "type" of device — either PCs, Macs, Windows tablets and Linux boxes on one side, or smartphones, iPads and Android tablets on the other. We're sure it's merely a coincidence that Dropbox announced its own gratuitous tier on the day the LastPass costless plan became more restrictive.

LastPass's declaration of the imminent terminate of the free luncheon created a predictable moving ridge of online outrage. Many people assumed that LastPass was eliminating its free service altogether. Some online pundits oddly recommended a switch to 1Password, which is a fine countersign manager but has no gratis tier at all.

If yous still want everything for nothing in a password managing director, we can recommend Bitwarden, whose costless tier also syncs everything everywhere, or Norton Countersign Managing director, which is entirely free. For at present, that is.

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Paul Wagenseil is a senior editor at Tom'due south Guide focused on security and privacy. He has also been a dishwasher, fry cook, long-haul commuter, code monkey and video editor. He's been rooting around in the information-security space for more than than fifteen years at FoxNews.com, SecurityNewsDaily, TechNewsDaily and Tom's Guide, has presented talks at the ShmooCon, DerbyCon and BSides Las Vegas hacker conferences, shown up in random TV news spots and even moderated a panel discussion at the CEDIA home-technology conference. You tin can follow his rants on Twitter at @snd_wagenseil.