I currently use KeepassXC that is synced through NextCloud. The sync isn’t very elegant, especially on my phone. So I’m looking for a new password manager, which has a native server sync support that I can self host. What do y’all recommend? I need at least a phone app and a browser integration that can autofill.
Have you tried syncthing? It works great with keepassxc.
Vaultwarden is pretty easy to self host.
+1 for Keepass + Syncthing. Free, no cloud, always synced.
Yeah this is me. It’s been just perfect for many years now.
This is faultless for me
Have been using it for 2+ years with 3 devices, no problem
Bitwarden
Never looked back.
Bitwarden is excellent and the paid plan is very reasonable unlike with others.
Vaultwarden works really well for me.
I use KeepassXC on desktop, KeepassDX on my phone and keep it all synced with Syncthing. Works great
This is the way.
Bitwarden.
My recommendation: Don’t use Vaultwarden (self hostable server side of bitwarden. Really easy to run and use). Why? You’re not a security personal, and securing your vault isn’t your job. You might do a slight mistake that’ll lead to the compromise of your vault.
The people at Bitwarden have their work dedicated to securing the vaults and all they do is security. And they’ll probably do it better then you. When it comes to serious matter, I prefer to trust the professionals.
Doesn’t the server just hold an encrypted vault? What could go wrong when the server is compromised? Just thinking out loud I don’t know the answer
Security is also about backups. 3 Replicas 2 Formats 1 Offsite location
I just don’t want any unauthorized persons anywhere near my vaults in general. I also see my vault as a critical service that requires high availability, and I know enough about system administration to know that my network and I are not qualified to provide that.
Let’s say I have an unupdated patch and my server is now vulnerable.
This could really happen. I have work and life to worry about and I might not notice.
This vulnerability, could be in the BW instance itself (say the web server or the backend itself), or in the server itself (say an old OpenSSH version), or another service (NextCloud instance hosted in the same server under a different subdomain).
So, first we see it’s a big attack surface. In any of those entrances an attacker could gain access to my server and with it the vault. It’s a short way from there to install a keylogger on the website where BW is hosted, and get my master password ¯_(ツ)_/¯.
Now take into consideration that I just sat a couple of minutes to think about this, and I’m not a professional in cyber security or web security. Neither blue nor red team. A professional, with more knowledge, time, experience and resources, could probably bring up much more things.
I would just put a server on the internet with only the bitwarden ports open to the internet. And put the server in its own isolated environment. With automatic updates I would be comfortable with this. Even if for any reason the isolated server gets compromised, the server is mostly a glorified sync server.
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Just to play devils advocate. Bitwarden.com is a much more valuable target. My instance is behind a VPN. I think its actually far more likely Bitwarden will have a breach similar to LastPass then I will. But I agree with you mostly.
The data stored on Bitwarden’s servers is completely encrypted though, which means a breach will not yield useful data, unlike the plain text storage for LastPass.
I have the ability to selfhost BW so I am interested in counterpoints.
Yes I agree. I was just offering a counter to the statement that Vaultwarden isnt as safe as Bitwarden. They both are encrypted but my vaultwarden instance is a lot less likely to experience a breach than Bitwarden. The guys with real skill are going after Bitwarden not me.
That’s a good point.
Notice, your server is less likely to be targeted. But much more likely to receive a breach once it’s targeted.
It’s helpful to analog. You got gold. Thieves are more likely to target a bank, but if they’ll know of some gold in your house, it’ll be much easier for them to take it from your house rather than from the bank.
And now you have to work and make sure people don’t find out about the gold in your house. Because once they did it’s game over.
For native sync, the two good and reputable alternatives are Bitwarden and Proton Pass
2nding the Bitwarden, absolutely love it. I moved from LastPass years ago and never looked back.
3rded moving from LastPass to Bitwarden and never looking back. I got out when LogMeIn got in.
KeePassXC. Despite a lot of room for improvement, overall it is pretty powerful & you don’t have to host a server. You can also sync your password file to cloud storage. With VaultWarden, it will store a cache of your passwords on your phone but you wont’ be able to update them away from home unless you also setup port forwarding, dynamic DNS, web server & all that.
I like to use SyncThing for my keepass vault. Imo it’s about as simple and elegant as it can get without involving third party services.
I know you’re asking for an integrated sync but this has been flawless for me and only rarely notice a delay between machines including android, linux, and windows (less that 30s in any case)
If you can’t self host --> KeePass If you can self host --> Vaultwarden
I hear good thing about Vaultwarden, but the web UI is horrible.
Vaultwarden’s web UI is very confusing, especially the search feature. And it’s difficult to move items between folders/collection. The desktop app is available as DEB/RPM package but without auto-update, which isn’t great.
Fon now I’m sticking to KeepassXC because the desktop app for my Linux distribution has a package for it and allows auto-update. The UI works well, and it has decent browser integration. Syncing isn’t smooth, but I can live with this.
Vaultwarden is not to be used in itself you can for example use the bitwarden app but with your vaultwarden server
You’re right. Above, I was referring to the bitwarden desktop app. See https://github.com/bitwarden/desktop
It’s an electron app, and there’s no auto-update solution for DEB packages (ie no DEB repo for apt auto update).
Some people are probably happy with it, but I prefer KeepassXC which is more lightweight (ie not electron based) and can auto update via APT.
Good thing the KeepassXC can be used as a 2nd factor authenticator, though it has TOTP only, doesn’t offer HOTP.
There’s a lot of arguments for one solution or the other based on security or privacy, but let me present a different scenario:
Imagine you’re in a natural disaster. Your home based self hosted server is down because of a general rolling network outage or just irrecoverably destroyed. Your offsite on the other side of the county is in a similar state. Can your cloud hosted backup be accessed at generic, public computer in a shelter or public building?
Bitwarden can. It has specific instructions for doing so as safely as possible.
Most here won’t like this answer. 1Password.
I’ve used it for years and it just works well for me. Finally convinced my spouse to also use it a couple of years ago. Switching is not an option since it took years of convincing to make that happen.
