Norton password manager review: is it safe and reliable?

Norton password manager is a basic but secure tool that will look after your logins. Even though it doesn’t offer a wide range of features like the most popular password managers do, it can still be more than enough to fight against cybercriminals.

This password manager comes bundled with the Norton 360 security package that includes an antivirus tool and a VPN, but you can also get it for free separately. It can be a great option for those users who seek to have a free tool that’s capable of securing you as good as a paid password manager.

If you’re looking for more features in your password manager, or require more in-depth security credentials, we recommend checking out Keeper, one of the best password managers.

Best alternative to Norton

Keeper provides top-class security for your credentials and also makes password management easy. With its layered encryption and multiple 2FA methods, you can be sure that your data will be safe at all times.

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4.8 /5

• Impressive set of features
• User-friendly apps
• Secure password generator

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With the help of this Norton password manager review, you will find out how secure and reliable this service is, and what place it takes compared to the best providers on the market. So, read the article, enlighten yourself, and enjoy!

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Norton Password Manager review – pros and cons

Some might see this password manager as a poor online security tool because of the amount of the features they offer. However, we would like to introduce it as a basic but rather useful program that covers some of the crucial security needs. With it, you get unlimited logins, a reliable password generator, vault auditing, biometric login, and an automatic password updater.

Visit Norton Password Manager to learn more about the features

Norton Password Manager features review

Norton password manager doesn’t offer a fancy suite of security features. But it doesn’t mean that it can’t be a modest tool for your online safety. This password manager is able to cover basic password manager qualities and help you to protect your logins. Let’s have a look at what you get with Norton password manager.

Norton password generator

You can find this feature on the browser extension and the mobile app of Norton password manager. And starting with the positive side, it’s great that you can regulate the length of the password you want to generate. It can be as short as 4 symbols and as long as 64.

There are also indication levels that show the strength of your password. It can be strong (green), weak (orange), or bad (red). Nevertheless, you should keep in mind that Norton considers a password as strong even when it doesn’t include complex symbols - the password simply needs to be long. So, here you should think for yourself and remember that having various characters (uppercase, lowercase, numbers) is a must.

While there is some space left for your worries about the password’s strength, Norton offers a little help. It provides you with a minimal FAQ which helps you to learn more about strong passwords.

Sadly, we have to mention one more downside of this password generator. The Norton mobile app doesn’t indicate the level of password strength at all. Moreover, the mobile app’s generator suggests only the shortest possible password. Thus, your personal knowledge about passwords is very important.

Form filling

It’s rare to come across a form filling feature in a free password manager, and Norton stands out by offering it. Yet, this form filling feature is very limited and inconsistent.

With it, you can autofill your full name, birth date, gender, physical address, and email address, plus several phone numbers. On Norton’s password manager, these items are called Addresses and you may create an unlimited number of them.

As upsetting as it is, Norton is quite inconsistent with auto-filling forms. For example, you may see an icon in the box, but it will not respond to your click. Or it will simply won’t work.

Norton Password Manager Wallet

With Norton password manager’s wallet feature, you can save credit and debit card information. You can auto-fill these credentials and sync them across all your devices because all the items in your vault are stored in the cloud.

It’s quite easy to use the feature, as you can save a card’s credentials on the spot while entering them on a website. Or you can easily add them manually in your vault by clicking on the “+” symbol.

As convenient and needed as this feature sounds these days, Norton hasn’t developed it to fully ease your life. Norton’s bank card auto-fill is inconsistent, so sometimes you would still have to fill in the information manually.

Safety Dashboard

It’s a newly added feature to Norton password manager. Even though it’s still fresh, we can already find it useful. Norton’s safety dashboard overviews your stored logins and shows a pretty detailed analysis of them. Thus, you know what actions you should take and when.

The safety dashboard checks and informs you about the overall safety score of your passwords, indicating weak passwords, duplicate, and old ones. What’s more, right after you see those results, you can instantly change the chosen passwords on the dashboard.

This feature is a strong step for Norton towards improving. Most of the best password managers provide users with this tool as well.

Is Norton password manager safe enough?

Norton password manager is safe enough for primary security. A few of its features are good tools for protecting from real-time dangers, or preventing them in the future.

Military-grade 256-bit AES encryption is one of the main characteristics that ensure safety. It would take ages for a hacker to break it. And all of your items that are stored in the cloud are encrypted with it.

Your vault can be accessed with a master password that’s known only by you. Alternatively, you can also use biometric login instead. Both of these options are great assets to cyber security. Yet, Norton doesn’t offer two-factor authentication on its desktop version and this can be a weak point. However, if you download the app on your mobile device, then 2FA is available.

Nevertheless, you can always monitor your stored passwords and see if they need improvement with the help of a safety dashboard and vault auditing.

Ease of use and setup

Norton password manager requires you to sacrifice your nerves at the stage of setup. But after the setup is done, it’s an easy-to-use program.

Before the installation, you must create an account for Norton’s services at my.norton. There you will access your dashboard and sync your account over your devices.

The struggle starts with importing your items to Norton’s vault. It doesn’t allow you to import .CSV files, so picking all your items from various password storages can be frustrating.

Take a look at the overview of each version of Norton password manager:

Norton vault browser extensions

Norton’s extension is compatible with all the popular browsers: Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Edge, and Brave. Once you add it to your browser and log in to your Norton account, you can instantly start enjoying the services.

The interface is good-looking and easy to use. Once you open the main page of the vault, you see different sections for stored items. You can navigate between Logins, Wallet, Addresses, Notes, and Favorites.

It’s easy to add a new item to your vault. The “+” sign that is meant for it is quickly noticeable. And you would need to type in your login information and the exact URL of the page you want to add. Click Save and you have a new item in your vault.

Android & iOS apps

Norton password manager for mobile devices is adapted in a way so it would be comfortable to use and catchy for an eye. To get into your account you can use not only a master password but also a PIN code, biometric authentication, or two-factor authentication.

The mobile device’s version differs from the browser’s version. Starting with the password generator, its default suggested password reaches 8 symbols, while on desktop you get 20. Also, the password automatically includes various characters. The downside is that the mobile version can’t autofill the forms but it can autofill bank card information. Yet, you can capture and save new credentials with the help of a camera.

Speaking of iOS devices, it’s possible to use Norton on your Safari browser and autofill the websites. And as for Android, you can set up the password manager on Chrome. But it auto-fills only certain sites and applications. What we actually admire is that Norton vault syncs between your devices, so your cloud has the same items on all of them.

Pricing

Norton password manager is a completely free program. There are no paid subscriptions, so after installing the software you can instantly enjoy its services.

While Norton password manager doesn’t offer too many features, the ones that it does offer are of good quality. Moreover, other top password managers on the market would ask you for money in order to have an offline mode or sync across all of your devices. Therefore, it’s surprising that Norton doesn’t ask for you to pay.

Norton password manager can also be bundled with its overall security program’s subscription, Norton 360. In this case, you would get a complete security suite: an antivirus program with real-time protection, a VPN, PC Cloud Backup, and PC camera protection alongside other features. The password manager can be added to your individual, family, or mobile subscription.

At this point, we can only give our applause to Norton. You can sync your account over all of your devices, have an unlimited number of logins, access your items while offline, and even more at no cost!

Customer support

Norton offers a wide range of customer support options. You can either help yourself by using their manuals or contacting them directly. Have a look at the options below:

• Phone support
• Live chat
• Community forum

The support center on their website is helpful and provides you with illustrated manuals. And the customer support agents are competent, solving your issue pretty quickly.

Account and password recovery

Unfortunately, you can only reset your Norton password manager’s account on your mobile device. It doesn’t allow you to do that on your desktop device since you have to use biometrics for that. That can be a frustrating experience, yet it’s still better than nothing, right?

Let’s have a look at how to reset your Norton account on Android and iOS devices:

1. Log in to your Norton password manager account using biometrics
2. Find the Menu icon of three lines in the Vault page
3. Click Settings and then Vault
4. In the Vault section, hit Reset Password (your biometric authentication will be asked)
5. Follow the provided instructions and click Save

Though recovering your account only via a mobile device might be inconvenient, it can be a safer option. As many password manager providers allow you to reset your account via any of your devices and without biometric authentication, there is a high chance that a hacker will get into your system quicker than you. Biometric authentication ensures better cyber privacy and keeps your identity safe.

The most common Norton password manager issues

It’s common for cyber security software to have glitches. And we get that. Yet, it’s still disappointing. But knowing the possible issues in advance can be helpful. Here are the most common issues encountered by the users of Norton password manager:

• Inconsistent form filling
• Black/white screen on Android’s application
• The app isn’t loading or working
• Unable to install the application
• Unable to update
• Notifications are not working properly
• The toolbar is missing

You might not face all the issues, however, we have excluded two most potential ones and soutions for solving them:

Norton vault will not open

It can be that after the system’s update (or for other unknown reasons) the vault won’t open. The whole application will respond to your actions, except for the vault. In this case, there are several solutions:

• Try force quitting the application
• Try a different browser (for example, switch from Chrome to Firefox and vice versa)
• Try disabling the antivirus or VPN software. If the problem gets solved, then you would need to whitelist Norton’s password manager application
• Try to connect to a different network as your network connection might be unstable
• Complete Norton’s program update
• Look for updates for your OS
• Reinstall the software from the roots

If none of the solutions above help, then contacting Norton’s support team will be the best option.

Norton Password Manager toolbar missing

Norton password manager’s toolbar is installed together with the software. Yet, it happens that the toolbar vanishes on various browsers. But you can’t reinstall the toolbar separately. What to do then?

Run LiveUpdate

1. Start Norton
2. After it opens, locate Security on the main page and click on it
3. Choose LiveUpdate
4. When the update is finished, hit OK
5. The update is finished when you receive a message identifying that your Norton program is up to date
6. Afterward, restart your device

If running LiveUpdate didn’t help you out, then try this option:

Enabling the Norton toolbar on your browser

1. Start your browser
2. Find the Tools section
3. Locate the Manage add-ons option and click on it
4. In the section of currently added add-ons, find Norton Toolbar
5. If it’s enabled, then disable it and enable it back again. If it’s disabled, then simply enable it
6. Restart your browser

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Best alternatives to Norton password manager

Norton password manager is quite popular among the users. And it’s indeed a safe security product to entrust with your passwords. However, there are better alternatives on the market. The ones that offer more features that will effectively ease your life. Take a look at our two preferred password manager providers:

NordPass

NordPass password manager is one of the safest options you could choose. It implements the next-gen XChaCha20 encryption with Argon 2 for key derivation. In simple terms, it’s incredibly strong and less prone to misconfiguration. Also, they use zero-knowledge architecture, so your privacy is respected.

With NordPass, you are able to autofill and autosave credentials, share your items with trusted contacts, scan your breached data, and generate complex passwords. Yet, some features are only available on a specific OS and device.

This password manager offers both a free version and paid one. But the free version allows you to have only one active session at a time.

Enlighten yourself more about NordPass on our website.

LastPass

LastPass is one of those services that are constantly improving. And the results are obvious. For example, it offers several authentication options: multi-factor authentication (MFA), biometric authentication, in-house authentication, and hardware authentication devices.

You can easily import and export your items. The autofill feature didn’t disappoint us as well. On the contrary - it worked great. LastPass also offers a strong password generator that generates trustworthy passwords for your most visited websites.

One fantastic detail about LastPass is that even its Premium version is very affordable. Its price starts from only $3.00/month. A free version is also available but there are no cross-device capabilities.

Find out more about LastPass in our review.

Conclusion

Norton offers you a safe password manager. The range of features isn’t wide but the ones that are provided can be enough for a basic security level. So, on the one hand, it’s a great password manager for those who are looking for a free tool. On the other hand, there are considerations to make.

Norton password manager lacks two-factor authentication on its desktop version. Yet, on a mobile device, you have biometric, two-factor, and master password authentications. We believe that multi-factor authentication is a must for a security tool.

One more scarcity to consider is the autofill inconsistency - sometimes, you need to enter certain credentials manually. Yet, the times it works, it manages to autofill the fields correctly and fully.

However, Norton is a good password manager option as long as you need basic protection after your passwords. It has implemented strong encryption which protects your items stored on the cloud. It offers effective password monitoring that will serve you in the long term.

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