tigerpassword vs Bitwarden
Bitwarden is open source, free, and hosted. tigerpassword is pay-once and has no server. Where each one is better, without spin.
Bitwarden is the password manager we recommend to people who want a good free option, and its code is open. So the comparison is not “good versus bad”; it is about where your vault lives and who you pay.
The one-line difference
Bitwarden syncs your encrypted vault through its servers (or one you host). tigerpassword has no server at all — the vault is a file on your devices, synced through your own cloud.
Where Bitwarden is better
- Free. The free tier covers most people forever. tigerpassword costs money once.
- Sharing and organisations. Collections, groups, policies, SSO, enterprise administration. tigerpassword has none of this.
- Self-hosting for the people who want it. Bitwarden’s server can run on your own hardware. tigerpassword’s answer — no server — suits individuals and households, not IT departments.
- Emergency access. A trusted person can request access after a waiting period. tigerpassword’s equivalent is your printed Recovery Kit in a place they can find.
- Audits, repeatedly. Bitwarden publishes third-party audit reports every year. tigerpassword’s first audit is what the campaign funds.
- Open source. Anyone can read Bitwarden’s code. tigerpassword’s is not published; its design documents are shared with auditors.
- Send. Encrypted one-off sharing of text and files.
Where tigerpassword is better
- No account, no server, no breach surface. Your vault never leaves your control. A cloud folder holds ciphertext and a signed manifest; neither we nor the cloud can read a title.
- A Secret Key on top of your password. Steal the file, a sync blob or a backup, and an attacker still faces 2^128 work even if the password was weak. Bitwarden’s protection at rest rests on the master password and its KDF settings.
- Seed phrases done properly. BIP-39 checked word by word, never autofilled, never searchable, revealed only on purpose.
- Hardware-key unlock with a FIDO2 key on Mac, Windows and Linux.
- Sync conflicts keep both versions. When two devices edit the same item, neither edit is silently lost.
- Always-encrypted backups to your folder, WebDAV, S3 or SFTP, with no plaintext-backup switch anywhere in the app.
Roughly equal
Autofill, passkeys, one-time codes, breach checking (both use the k-anonymity range check), importing.
Who should stay with Bitwarden
Anyone who needs it free, anyone in an organisation, anyone who wants an audited product today.
Who should switch
People who want the vault as a file they own, who hold crypto recovery phrases, who prefer paying once, or who want to fund an independent audit of a tool built around those ideas. The switch guide takes ten minutes.