1Password vs NordPass: Price, Features and Which to Choose

1Password and NordPass both charge $2.99 a month for an individual plan and $4.49 a month for a family plan when you buy directly from the companies and pay annually — the two best-known paid password managers that have never been compared head-to-head on this site are, at the entry tier, priced identically. The real differences show up in how each one encrypts your vault, how far along its passkey support is, and what a team or business pays once you move past a single user. 1Password uses a dual-key model built around a 128-bit Secret Key plus your account password; NordPass encrypts your vault's private key with XChaCha20-Poly1305 and derives your Master Key with Argon2id. Both are solid, audited, zero-knowledge systems — the choice comes down to ecosystem, business pricing and how much passkey functionality you need today.

Quick verdict: 1Password or NordPass?

• Pick 1Password if you want the more mature passkey rollout (creation and sign-in already live on desktop browsers and iOS 17+), a published per-seat business price, and a security page backed by a public SOC 2 Type 2 report.
• Pick NordPass if you want a named, specific encryption algorithm (XChaCha20-Poly1305) rather than 1Password's unnamed "industry-recommended" ciphers, or if you're already a Nord Security customer (NordVPN, NordLocker) and want one account across products.

Both are closed-source, cross-platform, and encrypt your data so that neither company can read what's in your vault. Neither has a permanent free tier. The gap between them is narrower than most password-manager match-ups, which is exactly why the fine print below matters.

How much do 1Password and NordPass cost?

Figures below come from 1Password's personal pricing page and NordPass's pricing page, in US dollars, as published in November 2026. Both vendors quote a monthly price that's actually billed annually, plus a higher true monthly-billing price.

1Password's promotional rate applies only to new customers who subscribe directly on 1Password.com; it doesn't apply if you buy through the Apple App Store, Google Play or another third-party store. NordPass advertises a similar structure: an extra discount for the first 12 months on a direct purchase, on top of its "up to 40%" annual-billing saving, with the same caveat that app-store purchases aren't eligible for the extra promo. Because both companies run frequent, time-limited promotions, the discounted figures above can change at any time — the regular (non-promotional) rates of $3.99 and $5.99 a month are a more stable number to compare against competitors.

Encryption and security architecture

1Password's security page describes a "dual-key" model: your account is protected by a password that 1Password never stores and only you know, combined with a 128-bit encrypted Secret Key that's generated on your device. The company says this combination means even it can't see what you've saved. Credentials are never sent over the internet during authentication — 1Password uses Secure Remote Password (SRP) to verify your identity instead. The page doesn't name the underlying encryption cipher, describing it only as "proven, industry-recommended encryption algorithms." 1Password is SOC 2 Type 2 certified, publishes its SOC 2 report, runs a public bug bounty, and commissions independent third-party security audits.

NordPass takes a more specific, named-algorithm approach. According to the company, all vault data is encrypted on your device before it's ever sent to NordPass's servers — a zero-knowledge design. Each account gets a public/private key pair, and the private key itself is encrypted with XChaCha20-Poly1305-IETF before it leaves your device. Your Master Password is run through the Argon2id key-derivation function with a 16-byte salt to produce a Master Key, which in turn decrypts the private key. NordPass has said it was the first major password manager to adopt XChaCha20, and has pointed to an independent audit of its cryptographic design and codebase by security firm Cure53. See NordPass's security page for the company's full description of this architecture.

Both approaches are defensible, zero-knowledge designs with no ability for the company to read your vault contents. The practical difference is transparency about the specific cipher: NordPass names XChaCha20-Poly1305 and Argon2id on its own materials, while 1Password's public security page keeps the algorithm names unspecified and instead leans on its SOC 2 report and third-party audits as the evidence base. If you've compared 1Password against Bitwarden and Proton Pass before, this is the same pattern: 1Password's public pages emphasize certifications over cipher names.

Passkey support compared

1Password's passkeys page lays out a staged rollout. You can already create, save and sign in with passkeys from the 1Password browser extension on desktop, and from iOS 17 and iPadOS 17 devices. Viewing, managing and sharing existing passkeys works across Mac, iOS, Windows and Android, and passkeys sync across all of them alongside your other vault items, with sharing available through shared vaults or one-off item sharing. 1Password also lets you create and unlock a brand-new Individual account using a passkey instead of a master password, currently in public beta; unlocking an existing account with a passkey is listed as "coming soon" across Mac, iOS, Windows and Android.

NordPass handles passkeys from a dedicated "Passkeys" tab in its sidebar, where you can swap an existing saved password for a passkey on sites that support it, following that site's own verification flow. Signing in with a saved passkey, or creating a new one, requires verifying with your Master Password or biometrics. You can hold more than one passkey per account if a site allows it, and passkeys can be shared like other vault items — but they can't be viewed in plaintext, edited, or exported to another password manager, since they're cryptographically tied to the site that issued them. On Android 14 and later, NordPass can be set as the system-wide passkey provider from the device's Passwords and Accounts settings; on iOS, it integrates through Apple's third-party AutoFill API once the app or browser extension is installed.

Neither company's passkey implementation is finished. 1Password has the more visible lead on using a passkey to unlock the vault itself (in beta for new accounts), while NordPass's documented flow still leans on the Master Password or biometrics as the unlock step, with passkey management built around individual saved items rather than account-level sign-in.

Core features: autofill, sharing and breach alerts

At the feature level, the two products look similar on paper. NordPass's pricing page lists autofill, password generation, secure sharing, multi-device use, breach and weak-password alerts, and developer tools as included on every paid plan. 1Password's personal plans bundle the same basics — autofill, a password generator, secure item sharing, and its Watchtower feature, which flags password breaches and other security problems with items saved in your vault, and only fills your details on sites it has verified. Both companies describe developer-focused tools as part of every paid plan, aimed at people who need to manage API keys and other secrets alongside regular logins.

Where the two diverge is in how directly each one publishes the mechanics behind these features. 1Password's security page spells out specifics like SRP for authentication and the 128-bit Secret Key; NordPass's own support documentation names XChaCha20-Poly1305 and Argon2id. If you've previously read our breakdown of 1Password against Dashlane, the pattern here is consistent — 1Password's marketing centers on certifications (SOC 2) and architecture description, while this NordPass comparison shows the Nord Security side naming its cryptography more explicitly.

Family plans

Both companies cap their family tier at 5 people and price it identically at the promotional and regular rates shown in the table above. NordPass's family tier gives each member their own private vault alongside family invites, unlimited shared vaults, and admin controls for the account owner. 1Password's Families plan similarly brings up to 5 people into one plan, each with their own private vault, shared family vaults, and recovery options if someone loses access to their account.

Business and team plans

1Password's business pricing page publishes clear, fixed rates: a Teams Starter Pack at $2.49 per user per month (billed annually, limited to 10–20 users, with additional seats priced separately), a Business plan at $8.99 per user per month with no minimum seat count and identity-provider integrations such as Okta, Entra ID, OneLogin and Duo, and a custom-quoted Enterprise tier. Both the Teams and Business tiers come with a 14-day free trial and require no credit card to start.

NordPass sells business access through its own Teams, Business and Enterprise tiers, each requiring a minimum number of seats and adding features like centralized admin controls and, at the higher tiers, single sign-on. NordPass's published per-seat rates vary by region and by promotional period, so rather than repeat a figure that may already be out of date, the most reliable way to check current business pricing is directly on NordPass's business plans page. If per-seat cost certainty matters for budgeting, 1Password's flat, consistently published rate is the easier number to plan around today.

Platform and browser support

Both password managers cover the same ground: native apps for Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS and Android, plus browser extensions for the major browsers. Passkey creation and management, as detailed above, is currently ahead on desktop browsers and iOS for 1Password, and built around Android 14's system passkey settings and Apple's AutoFill API for NordPass. For either product, the deepest passkey functionality currently depends on which device and browser you're using, not just which company you choose.

Which to choose in 2026

For an individual or a family, the decision is close to a coin flip on price — both companies charge the same $2.99 and $4.49 introductory rates, and the same $3.99 and $5.99 regular rates. From there, pick based on what you value: a named, specific encryption algorithm and ties into the wider Nord Security ecosystem point toward NordPass; a published, predictable business per-seat price, a public SOC 2 report, and a slightly more developed passkey-based account unlock point toward 1Password. Readers who've already compared 1Password against LastPass will recognize 1Password's side of this comparison; NordPass is the newer name to weigh against it.

What to do next

Start a 14-day trial of whichever product's pricing page you trust more for your region — both are free to try with no card required. If you manage a team, request exact current seat pricing in writing from 1Password's sales team or through NordPass's business page before committing, since both companies run time-limited regional promotions that can change the headline numbers above. And if passkeys are the deciding factor, check which platforms you actually use day to day: 1Password is currently stronger on desktop-browser and iOS 17+ passkey creation, while NordPass leans on Android 14's system passkey settings and Apple's AutoFill API.

Written bySana Qureshi

Sana Qureshi runs the security and privacy desk. She reports on actively exploited vulnerabilities, vendor patches and data breaches, and covers the password managers, VPNs and authentication tools readers use to protect themselves. Her alerts cite vendor advisories, CISA and the CVE record directly.

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