Chrome’s Built-in Password Manager & a Bonus Tip

By | September 20, 2017
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Chrome’s Built-in Password Manager & a Bonus Tip

Windows 7, Windows 8.1 and Windows 10 – Google Chrome Browser Installed

As you know, we are adamant about using strong passwords and a good password manager like LastPass.

However, we know that no matter how much we harp on something some people are not going to use LastPass or RoboForm or any password manager. So we offer this as alternative – but not instead of. A password manager like LastPass has more features, is more secure, and is not tied to one browser.

If  you use Chrome, and you don’t have a password manager and you don’t want to install one, we suggest that you use Chrome’s built-in password manager. It’s not as robust as LastPass, nor as secure and it only works in Chrome.

But it’s not only better than nothing, it’s a whole lot better than nothing. It will store your passwords and automatically fill in user names and passwords on sites which require you to log in.

Here’s how to use it. Open Chrome. Click on the Chrome menu (click on the 3 vertical dots icon at the top right). then click Settings. In Settings scroll all the way to the bottom and click on “Show advanced settings”.

Under the heading “Passwords and forms”,

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Click on “Manage passwords.” Turn Google passwords on and turn Auto Sign-in on by moving the switches to the right. See the red arrows?

Also note, if you save your passwords in Chrome, and you have a Google account you can access your passwords from any device.

Now whenever you visit a site that requires you to log in, Chrome will save it for you. The next time you visit that site, Chrome will automatically fill in the username and password, for that site, for you. And it will store as many log-ins as you have.

Another nice feature is that you can see what the password hiding under the dots is – just by clicking the “eye” icon. But for your security, when you click the eye icon, you’ll need to type in your Windows password to see  the password hiding under the dots. Good security feature.

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We only recommend using Chrome’s built-in password manager if your Windows user account is password protected.


Bonus tip: How to enable the hidden Password Generator in Chrome

  1. Type chrome://flags in the URL bar to access Google Chrome’s flags page. When you do this you’ll see all the experimental features that are not yet included in the released version of Chrome.
  2. On the flags page, use the “Password Generation” and change its value to Enabled . Finally, click the Relaunch Now button that appears at the bottom to restart Google Chrome and save the changes you just made.

That’s all there is to it. From now on, when Chrome detects a password field on a webpage, it will automatically suggest a random password for you in a drop-down menu. You can simply click on the generated password to use it… and if you have Chrome Passwords turn on, it it save the password for you.  Pretty cool!

5 thoughts on “Chrome’s Built-in Password Manager & a Bonus Tip

  1. Nancy Boucher

    I was hoping the extra tip would be ‘how to find out what your windows password is’….

    Reply
    1. infoave Post author

      If you have windows 10 and you’re signed in with a Microsoft account (@hotmail.com, @msn.com,@outlook.com,@live.ca, @live.com) it’s easy to re-set your password. If you are signed in with a local account then hopefully you created a password reset disk when you first set up Windows. Otherwise, it’s not going to be easy to recover a lost Windows password. You might find this article interesting although outdated. Perhaps someone has more helpful advice for you.

      Reply
  2. Nancy Boucher

    Thank you! I’ve learned so much from y’all! Thanks for your help…

    Reply
  3. Shirley Woods

    I have always used Last Pass, but now Firefox will not accept it. What is my next best alternative. I don’t really like Chrome.

    Reply
  4. Marj

    Today, trying to see passwords I had a problem. Proceeding with accessing “Show Advanced Settings” there is no heading “Passwords and forms” to click on.

    Reply

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