There are plenty of password managers out there to choose from – services that can remember all the passwords you use online – and some browsers like Google Chrome even have this feature baked into them. But most of them have a flaw that 1Password is hoping to fix.
When you sign up for something you can go down one of two routes. There’s the typically longer process where you give the site your email address, a password, and possibly some other data to make an all-new account. Alternatively, you can choose to sign up using your account details from another service, a generally faster option. Unfortunately, the second option won’t be remembered by your password manager.
Sometimes it’s easy to remember which account you signed up with. If you have the option to choose between logging in to a service with either your Google account or an Apple one, you probably signed up using the one tied to the smartphone you use every day (either Android or an iPhone respectively).
But other sites might force you to remember if you used Google, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, Twitter, Steam, or one of a number of other options. Only one of these will log you into the account you want, while the rest will set up a brand new account.
1Password wants to end this confusion (via The Verge). When you sign into a service using your Google account (or one of the many others) 1Password’s new beta feature can remember this was the option you chose. The next time you go to log in, 1Password will remind you which account you used and can authenticate your details just as easily as it can with a regular password and email logins.
If you want to try out 1Password’s new tool there is one downside: you’ll need to pay for the service. A basic personal subscription costs $2.99 per month when billed annually and a Families plan costs $4.99 per month for five people when billed annually. If you want to try it out first, there is a free 14-day trial. It will give you a sense of how much more useful the updated 1Password is compared to free options before spending anything on it.