How Password Managers Keep Your Data Safe in Four Apps
1Password and NordPass keep your data safest of the four managers Passebo compares here, each with a 9/10 security score and no breaches in five years. Readers on a budget get that record for less with NordPass, at £1.49 a month on its 12-month plan or £17.88 for the year.
| Provider | Security score | Breaches in five years | Price a month, 12-month plan |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1Password | 9/10 | 0 | £2.32 |
| NordPass | 9/10 | 0 | £1.49 |
| Dashlane | 8.5/10 | 1 | £4.10 |
| LastPass | 7.5/10 | 1 | £2.60 |
Dashlane costs £31.32 more than NordPass over a year, at £49.20, which makes it the dearest of the four. Passebo's own comparison data supplies the scores, breach counts and prices in the table, most recently checked in October 2026.
Encryption and zero-knowledge begin on your device
1Password encrypts your data end to end with keys that only you hold. It locks every item with AES-GCM-256 authenticated encryption. Your account password goes through PBKDF2-HMAC-SHA256 before it becomes a key, a step that slows down anyone guessing at it over and over. A 128-bit Secret Key then joins that password to encrypt your data. Among the table's four, NordPass encrypts stored passwords with XChaCha20, where Dashlane uses AES-256.
Passebo's data marks LastPass, 1Password, Dashlane and NordPass as zero-knowledge designs, where the provider cannot access your master password. 1Password never stores your account password beside your data and never sends it across the network. Signing in uses the SRP protocol, so the password stays off the internet even at login.
Breach counts and audits
Each breach in the table's count is an incident at the provider's own systems, disclosed by it or reported by reputable news. Passebo's note on LastPass names its 2022 breach as one.
LastPass, 1Password, Dashlane and NordPass each undergo regular third-party security audits and alert you when one of your accounts is compromised. Two-factor sign-in works with every one of them too. Dark web monitoring and a check for weak or reused passwords come with each of them as well.
Passebo rates 1Password and NordPass at 4.2 stars overall, Dashlane at 3.8 and LastPass at 3.
Phishing protection comes from autofill
1Password fills a password only on the site where you saved it, a guard against lookalike pages. It checks that your browser was signed by an identified developer before filling anything sensitive. Copied passwords can be wiped from the clipboard so clipboard-history tools never keep them. Step away from the computer and 1Password can lock itself so nobody else gets into your vault. Watchtower, its warning service, tells you when a website you use has been hacked without sending AgileBits a list of the sites you visit.
Face ID, Touch ID or a fingerprint unlocks LastPass, 1Password, Dashlane and NordPass. Their generators build strong passwords. Their basic paid plans store as many as you like. Each also fills in credit cards and personal details for you.
Emergency access and travel mode differ
A trusted contact can request access to your vault on the basic paid plans of LastPass and NordPass if something happens to you. 1Password and Dashlane offer nothing of the kind on theirs.
Travel Mode lets 1Password and LastPass take chosen vaults off your devices while you travel. Dashlane and NordPass have no such mode. Of the four, LastPass alone pairs emergency access with Travel Mode. Dashlane publishes the source code of its apps, unlike LastPass, 1Password and NordPass.
Shared and stored items stay encrypted
LastPass, 1Password, Dashlane and NordPass let you share passwords securely and keep encrypted notes and documents beside them. One subscription to any of them covers unlimited devices and syncs the vault across all of them. On basic paid plans, the 1Password and NordPass comparison shows NordPass with 3 GB of file storage against 1 GB for 1Password, the same 1 GB Dashlane gives.
Dashlane and NordPass keep your vault usable without an internet connection. On their basic plans for one person, both let you choose view-only or edit rights when you share a password. Each of them runs in Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge and Brave. Both answer by email and live chat and keep a knowledge base. NordPass also has a free tier with basic features, while Dashlane has none.
Family plans cover 10 people at Dashlane, 6 at NordPass and 5 at 1Password.
NordPass for most readers, 1Password for travel
Most readers should pick NordPass, because it costs the least of the four without giving up anything on security score or breaches. Frequent travelers lose out with it, since Travel Mode is missing.
Pick 1Password instead if you cross borders with a full vault, since its Travel Mode takes chosen vaults off your devices for the trip. A family planning for the worst should still lean to NordPass, because 1Password's basic paid plan leaves out emergency access.
Choose Dashlane if you want apps whose source code anyone can read, and accept the top price of the four and one breach in return. A big household gains from it too, since its family plan reaches 10 people. LastPass fits a reader who wants emergency access and Travel Mode in one plan, at the cost of a 7.5 security score and a breach.
