8 ms·

I would like to throw out Bitwarden out there. Cross platforms, works on everything and can be self hosted if you so desire.

tw04 6y ago
Requisite: Use bitwarden-rs if you're planning on self-hosting. https://github.com/dani-garcia/bitwarden_rs https://github.com/dani-garcia/bitwarden_rs
- xienze 6y ago
  Yes, this is a fantastic project. The official Bitwarden Docker image is kind of wonky, it needs some sort of license and you have to generate the docker-compose.yml, etc. It really doesn't make for a good automated process at all. bitwarden_rs on the other hand, works just fine, never had an issue with it or incompatibility with the browser extensions or mobile apps.
  - mekster 6y ago
    The "rs" project is too good to be true. The official one uses MS SQL server and takes quite a bit of memory (which I call it a hidden monthly cost as I need to be using a bigger cloud instance) but this one only takes so little, you can host it on any cheap VPS and it has been working just fine against official clients for years.
xiaomai 6y ago
bitwarden looks cool. what parts are open-source and what parts are closed? (are all the premium features closed-source or are they just charging for that in the hosted-by-them version?)
- Macha 6y ago
  In the past it was entirely open source, though the hosted version did check for a license key before enabling the premium features. That said, the code for the premium features and the license key check were themselves open source. I see some of the newer premium features, particularly around SSO are under a noncommercial visible source license of their own devising though
mehrdadn 6y ago
I'm confused how the self hosting works. Doesn't it force you to give them an email address? Why is that necessary when self-hosting?
- nvr219 6y ago
  https://bitwarden.com/download/ https://bitwarden.com/download/ Download does not ask for email
  - mehrdadn 6y ago
    I'm talking about the program, not their website. It makes you enter an email before you can do anything. Says "Log in or create new account to access your vault", with a "Create account" button that asks for an email.
    - satysin 6y ago
      Click the settings "cog" and enter your self-hosted address. Of course you need to have setup your own self-hosted instance first :)
      - mehrdadn 6y ago
        Oh I see, thanks!
satysin 6y ago
Agreed. I have been using Bitwarden for over 3 years now, paid premium user as well. No big issues, the odd bug a few times but all fixed promptly and didn't impact my ability to access my data. While the Bitwarden apps are not as "pretty" as 1Password's I find them a little simpler to use. Obviously UI design is highly subjective though so your thoughts may be very different :) Anyway yes I highly recommend Bitwarden. Kyle and the team have built and continue to run a top class product that costs 1/3 the price of 1Password. Edit: To clarify I use Bitwarden solely for personal use. I cannot fairly compare Bitwarden and 1Password for multiuser/shared vault use.
- copperx 6y ago
  While almost everything is great about Bitwarden, the 5-8 second delay when performing a search is ridiculous (considering I have about 100 records), and I'm considering paying for a better maintained alternative.
  - gpanders 6y ago
    Where do you see this delay? I have not had this experience, Bitwarden has always been perfectly snappy for me.
    - copperx 6y ago
      It happens in the Android App.
  - satysin 6y ago
    Where do you have such a delay? I just tested in my vault (via Chrome web extension and desktop app) with 377 items and search is instant. I am on macOS Catalina although that shouldn't matter. I suggest you contact support https://bitwarden.com/contact/ https://bitwarden.com/contact/
    - copperx 6y ago
      It happens in the Android App. Desktop apps and extensions are OK.
mapgrep 6y ago
Not knocking the project, which sounds cool, but the absolute last thing I want to self host is a password database exposed to the internet. Hard pass on that element. 1password used to have a peer to peer sync mode that I loved. No need for a server anywhere. You would open it on your Mac and then open it on your phone and if they were on the same network they would self discover. Too inconvenient, perhaps, for most users, but for the paranoid like me, it was ideal -- no servers involved at all. (Technically, wifi sync I believe still exists IF you use 1password on Mac with a old style local vault, but it's basically unsupported. Mine just stopped working and I switched to 1password.com.)
- typicalbender 6y ago
  They have a paid hosted option that I use they just also allow you to self host which is great.
- dylan604 6y ago
  The switch from a paid for app to a renting app is my least favorite thing to come out of 1Password. I'm still on an older version that works on my laptop, desktop, iPhone, and iPad. I have a family license that allows up to 5 computers (I only use 2). My iDevice and laptop all sync via WiFi to the desktop. No iCloud, Dropbox, or whatever needed for syncing.
- parliament32 6y ago
  >no servers involved at all Personally, I'd trust one of my servers far more than a client shouting "yo someone send me a file to overwrite my db with" over multicast on the local starbucks wifi...
- uponcoffee 6y ago
  You don't have to have it exposed to the internet. Without an active connection, clients cant make new passwords/sync, but you can access previously saved passwords that are already synced. It also doesn't have to be exposed to the internet. You can have it accessible behind wireguard for instance. I have it, a DNS server, cloud storage, etc on my home lan, and use wireguard to access it on the go.
- 6y ago
eyeundersand 6y ago
Seconded. I tried a lot of other ones before settling for Bitwarden about two years ago. It's easily the best and most hassle-free one that covers all of my use cases. (Tried LastPass, Keepass, 1password, and a couple others)
dastx 6y ago
Bitwarden is great, but I'm getting frustrated at their ridiculous excuses for not implementing fixes. For the longest time bitwarden has been broken in the firefox's private browsing after mozilla deprecated some apis due to security concerns. They've given alternatives but they are just refusing to fix it, to the point of basically saying mozilla needs to fix the issue. What's sad is a similar mechanism is used in their chrome extension. Someone even raised a working PR that the CTO wasn't fully happy with, and asked for changes (which is fair), but the PR hasn't moved since, so I'd have expected the Bitwarden employees to take it and fix it up. It's absolutely ridiculous to still not have this fixed years later. By contrast, I was a 1Password customer at the time this change got introduced, and they'd pushed out a fix not long after. I will be trying to Linux client, and if it's good enough, I'm certainly switch away.
- mooman219 6y ago
  +1 on 1Password's dedication to fixing issues. I had an obscure field selection issue on their web view and pinged the support email. It was fixed a few days later and they updated me on it. I switched to 1Password from KeePass after 5 or so years because I just got tired of maintaining the data locally and keeping it in sync on my devices that I need the passwords on. I just backup the 1Password database locally now to calm some paranoia.
  - nemosaltat 6y ago
    I’ve been a happy one-password customer for several years and I switched to the family subscription model to get my parents away from their little notebook of passwords. I had self-hosted a PHP based password manager for a handful of years, before switching to 1P because I wanted a “real app” with tighter OS integration. I’ve had 3 gripes and this solved one of them. The other 2 are 1) Their insistence on 1PasswordX- I want a desktop app, I want tight integration, the browser extensions work just fine if I need something quickly. 2) Poor/no support for key management- storing ssh keys as an encrypted notes is a bad work around.
    - phren0logy 6y ago
ceocoder 6y ago
And doesn’t force you into non-local sync. Passwords are one thing I’m not comfortable moving to cloud. After using 1Password for about 9 years I switched to BitWarden this year - just for this reason.
chiefalchemist 6y ago
I went from LastPass to Bitwarden based on a HN thread a couple years ago. YubiKey support for what, a dollar a month? I mention this because my work uses 1PW and I don't like it at all. Not the browser extension. Not the desktop app. Bitwarden is well worth checking out.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
s_dev 6y ago
https://clipperz.is/ https://clipperz.is/ is a very worthwhile password manager. I like the UI.
eepp 6y ago
then you set the Bitwarden app as iOS's password manager and your general mobile UX is greatly improved.

tw04 6y ago

Requisite: Use bitwarden-rs if you're planning on self-hosting. https://github.com/dani-garcia/bitwarden_rs https://github.com/dani-garcia/bitwarden_rs

xienze 6y ago
Yes, this is a fantastic project. The official Bitwarden Docker image is kind of wonky, it needs some sort of license and you have to generate the docker-compose.yml, etc. It really doesn't make for a good automated process at all. bitwarden_rs on the other hand, works just fine, never had an issue with it or incompatibility with the browser extensions or mobile apps.
- mekster 6y ago
  The "rs" project is too good to be true. The official one uses MS SQL server and takes quite a bit of memory (which I call it a hidden monthly cost as I need to be using a bigger cloud instance) but this one only takes so little, you can host it on any cheap VPS and it has been working just fine against official clients for years.

xiaomai 6y ago

bitwarden looks cool. what parts are open-source and what parts are closed? (are all the premium features closed-source or are they just charging for that in the hosted-by-them version?)

Macha 6y ago
In the past it was entirely open source, though the hosted version did check for a license key before enabling the premium features. That said, the code for the premium features and the license key check were themselves open source. I see some of the newer premium features, particularly around SSO are under a noncommercial visible source license of their own devising though

mehrdadn 6y ago

I'm confused how the self hosting works. Doesn't it force you to give them an email address? Why is that necessary when self-hosting?

nvr219 6y ago
https://bitwarden.com/download/ https://bitwarden.com/download/ Download does not ask for email
- mehrdadn 6y ago
  I'm talking about the program, not their website. It makes you enter an email before you can do anything. Says "Log in or create new account to access your vault", with a "Create account" button that asks for an email.
  - satysin 6y ago
    Click the settings "cog" and enter your self-hosted address. Of course you need to have setup your own self-hosted instance first :)
    - mehrdadn 6y ago
      Oh I see, thanks!

satysin 6y ago

Agreed. I have been using Bitwarden for over 3 years now, paid premium user as well. No big issues, the odd bug a few times but all fixed promptly and didn't impact my ability to access my data. While the Bitwarden apps are not as "pretty" as 1Password's I find them a little simpler to use. Obviously UI design is highly subjective though so your thoughts may be very different :) Anyway yes I highly recommend Bitwarden. Kyle and the team have built and continue to run a top class product that costs 1/3 the price of 1Password. Edit: To clarify I use Bitwarden solely for personal use. I cannot fairly compare Bitwarden and 1Password for multiuser/shared vault use.

copperx 6y ago
While almost everything is great about Bitwarden, the 5-8 second delay when performing a search is ridiculous (considering I have about 100 records), and I'm considering paying for a better maintained alternative.
- gpanders 6y ago
  Where do you see this delay? I have not had this experience, Bitwarden has always been perfectly snappy for me.
  - copperx 6y ago
    It happens in the Android App.
- satysin 6y ago
  Where do you have such a delay? I just tested in my vault (via Chrome web extension and desktop app) with 377 items and search is instant. I am on macOS Catalina although that shouldn't matter. I suggest you contact support https://bitwarden.com/contact/ https://bitwarden.com/contact/
  - copperx 6y ago
    It happens in the Android App. Desktop apps and extensions are OK.

mapgrep 6y ago

Not knocking the project, which sounds cool, but the absolute last thing I want to self host is a password database exposed to the internet. Hard pass on that element. 1password used to have a peer to peer sync mode that I loved. No need for a server anywhere. You would open it on your Mac and then open it on your phone and if they were on the same network they would self discover. Too inconvenient, perhaps, for most users, but for the paranoid like me, it was ideal -- no servers involved at all. (Technically, wifi sync I believe still exists IF you use 1password on Mac with a old style local vault, but it's basically unsupported. Mine just stopped working and I switched to 1password.com.)

typicalbender 6y ago
They have a paid hosted option that I use they just also allow you to self host which is great.
dylan604 6y ago
The switch from a paid for app to a renting app is my least favorite thing to come out of 1Password. I'm still on an older version that works on my laptop, desktop, iPhone, and iPad. I have a family license that allows up to 5 computers (I only use 2). My iDevice and laptop all sync via WiFi to the desktop. No iCloud, Dropbox, or whatever needed for syncing.
parliament32 6y ago
>no servers involved at all Personally, I'd trust one of my servers far more than a client shouting "yo someone send me a file to overwrite my db with" over multicast on the local starbucks wifi...
uponcoffee 6y ago
You don't have to have it exposed to the internet. Without an active connection, clients cant make new passwords/sync, but you can access previously saved passwords that are already synced. It also doesn't have to be exposed to the internet. You can have it accessible behind wireguard for instance. I have it, a DNS server, cloud storage, etc on my home lan, and use wireguard to access it on the go.
6y ago

eyeundersand 6y ago

Seconded. I tried a lot of other ones before settling for Bitwarden about two years ago. It's easily the best and most hassle-free one that covers all of my use cases. (Tried LastPass, Keepass, 1password, and a couple others)

dastx 6y ago

Bitwarden is great, but I'm getting frustrated at their ridiculous excuses for not implementing fixes. For the longest time bitwarden has been broken in the firefox's private browsing after mozilla deprecated some apis due to security concerns. They've given alternatives but they are just refusing to fix it, to the point of basically saying mozilla needs to fix the issue. What's sad is a similar mechanism is used in their chrome extension. Someone even raised a working PR that the CTO wasn't fully happy with, and asked for changes (which is fair), but the PR hasn't moved since, so I'd have expected the Bitwarden employees to take it and fix it up. It's absolutely ridiculous to still not have this fixed years later. By contrast, I was a 1Password customer at the time this change got introduced, and they'd pushed out a fix not long after. I will be trying to Linux client, and if it's good enough, I'm certainly switch away.

mooman219 6y ago
+1 on 1Password's dedication to fixing issues. I had an obscure field selection issue on their web view and pinged the support email. It was fixed a few days later and they updated me on it. I switched to 1Password from KeePass after 5 or so years because I just got tired of maintaining the data locally and keeping it in sync on my devices that I need the passwords on. I just backup the 1Password database locally now to calm some paranoia.
- nemosaltat 6y ago
  I’ve been a happy one-password customer for several years and I switched to the family subscription model to get my parents away from their little notebook of passwords. I had self-hosted a PHP based password manager for a handful of years, before switching to 1P because I wanted a “real app” with tighter OS integration. I’ve had 3 gripes and this solved one of them. The other 2 are 1) Their insistence on 1PasswordX- I want a desktop app, I want tight integration, the browser extensions work just fine if I need something quickly. 2) Poor/no support for key management- storing ssh keys as an encrypted notes is a bad work around.
  - phren0logy 6y ago

ceocoder 6y ago

And doesn’t force you into non-local sync. Passwords are one thing I’m not comfortable moving to cloud. After using 1Password for about 9 years I switched to BitWarden this year - just for this reason.

chiefalchemist 6y ago

I went from LastPass to Bitwarden based on a HN thread a couple years ago. YubiKey support for what, a dollar a month? I mention this because my work uses 1PW and I don't like it at all. Not the browser extension. Not the desktop app. Bitwarden is well worth checking out.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

s_dev 6y ago

https://clipperz.is/ https://clipperz.is/ is a very worthwhile password manager. I like the UI.

eepp 6y ago

then you set the Bitwarden app as iOS's password manager and your general mobile UX is greatly improved.