Why Enpass is my perfect LastPass replacement password manager
Like for many others, LastPass was my first password manager, but a few years ago, I decided to switch away from it. That’s when Enpass caught my eye mainly because it didn’t force me to store my passwords on its online servers. I wanted something that struck the right balance between convenience and privacy. Enpass checked all the right boxes for me, and I soon ditched LastPass for good. This decision has started to feel even more aproposconsidering all the breaches LastPass has suffered in recent times.
Back in the day, Enpass was a lot stricter about the way it safeguards users’ privacy, down to making it more complicated to use. The app didn’t ask for an email or a phone number at all to sign up, and you could use it with just a master password. It was designed in a way that it didn’t need to connect to Enpass’ servers at any point. While excellent for privacy, this approach introduced some challenges that required some inventive (and cumbersome) workarounds. For example, you had to purchase the one-time Pro upgrade separatelyon each platform— Android, iOS, Windows, etc. — since these apps weren’t linked to an Enpass account.
When Enpass fixed this inconvenient processwith a more straightforward monthly subscription model, it required users to add an email address for the subscription to work across all their devices. But that didn’t take away Enpass’ standout privacy features: the ability to save your passwords entirely offline, away from the perils of the internet, and the plethora of storage options at your disposal.
Your data, your choice
Unlike most mainstream password managers, Enpass doesn’t have its own servers where the passwords are uploaded. It instead lets you choose where you want to store the encrypted file containing all your passwords and personal data. If you wish, you can keep it completely offline with no risk of internet exposure. A good thing about this is that Enpass can still sync your data between all your devices via your local network with Wi-Fi Sync. This is just perfect for the more privacy-conscious among us who don’t want to give up on convenience either.
If you’ve got a NAS at your place, like one ofour favorite Synology enclosures, you could use it as your personal cloud backup using WebDAV on Enpass — even NextCloud is supported. But a more popular choice that many of us are likely to use is the option to sync your encrypted passwords to an online cloud service of your choice, such asGoogle Driveor Microsoft OneDrive. This makes it easy to keep your passwords up to date across your devices even when you’re away from your home network.
Either way, you can rest assured that none of the external parties, including Enpass, can access your passwords. This is why I use Enpass not just for my passwords but also for organizing and safekeeping my important documents. The backup file is encrypted with 256-bit AES, currently the best kind of encryption consumer services offer. Only your master password can unlock this backup, and if you forget it, it’s game over.
Your choices for a password manager are plenty
I am on a grandfathered Enpass Pro lifetime plan, which makes Enpass a perfect choice for a lot of people like me. It’s got everything you can ask from a modern password manager, and there’s no reason for me to switch away from it.
As a new user, you need to shell out $24 a year for the individual Premium plan as its free tier is severely limited on Android and iOS — unless you’re aGoogle Play Passsubscriber, which Enpass is a part of. The service also offers a lifetime Premium tier costing $100 one-off (or even less during sales), which may prove to be a better deal in the long run.
Enpass’ regular prices are in the same territory as 1Password, but the latter offers additional encrypted storage space for your documents. Even our go-to password manager recommendation (and a popular choice among our readers) Bitwarden offers 1GB of storage for a measly $10 a year, but most users can easily get away with its robust free tier.
Where Enpass shines is the variety of storage options it lets you choose from, something neither 1Password nor Bitwarden can match. The latter does offer a self-hosted option, but Enpass’s solution is easier to grasp and manage. If you value that, Enpass is worth the asking price any day.
Do use a password manager, no matter which one
We all know at least one person who still uses one and the same password for all their accounts, or worse, has their passwords saved in an Excel sheet or a Keep note. With LastPass’s recent breach, you also shouldn’t trust its service with your credentials anymore. It doesn’t matter if Bitwarden fits your bill orone of the other dozen great password managers, you should consider upgrading to a proper password managerin wake of the recent breach incidents. Maybe you should even nudge your family and friends if they’re still stuck with the primitive ways of password management.
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This article is sponsored by Total Wireless.
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