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acqcolor
February 12, 2025
Solved

Difficult to tell if re-authentication is needed

  • February 12, 2025
  • 1 reply
  • 98 views

I use two 1password accounts: 1 is my business team member account and 1 is my family member account. I have two chrome profiles: one business and one personal, and the appropriate vault is the only one that autofills in each Chrome profile. When 1password on MacOS determines that re-authentication is needed for one of my accounts, my logins just don't show up at all in the drop-down and I have to remember that the app likely needs to re-authenticate. The same thing happens when I open the 1password desktop app and I search in the search bar for logins - it only shows me the authenticated logins and just doesn't show the non-authenticated ones.

There is no pop-up in this situation, it does not prompt me to re-authenticate. This is a terrible user experience because once every 1-2 weeks, I will wonder why 1password is broken or not working when I really just need to re-authenticate. It would be really helpful if 1password popped up a prompt to re-authenticate some period before it was actually needed and at minimum when it is needed so the app doesn't appear on first glance to be completely not working.

Best answer by 1P_Dave

Hello @acqcolor! 👋

Thank you for reaching out and I'm sorry for the confusion when using multiple 1Password accounts in the same app or browser. You can unlock all accounts at the same time by using the same account password for each account, we have a guide here: How to use multiple accounts

It's safe to use the same account password for multiple accounts: 

  1. Your account password never leaves your device.
  2. When you use the same account password for all of your 1Password accounts, each account is also protected by a unique Secret Key.

However this guidance won't work if your 1Password accounts are using different authentication methods such as SSO or passkey unlock. The reason why 1Password requires that you unlock each account separately is because each account is encrypted using it's own secret. If you're using different account passwords for different accounts, or different authentication providers, then you'll need to provide each secret separately.

If you use Touch ID to unlock 1Password then 1Password is able to store the secrets securely in the Secure Enclave (a hardware component on your Mac) so that all accounts can be unlocked at the same time once you provide your fingerprint: Use Touch ID to unlock 1Password on your Mac

Improving the unlock flow for multiple accounts is something that the team is discussing and I'll share your post in the internal work item created for this functionality so that team is aware of the friction that this is causing you and can consider your suggestions for future versions of 1Password.

-Dave

1 reply

1P_Dave
1P_DaveAnswer
1Password Employee
February 12, 2025

Hello @acqcolor! 👋

Thank you for reaching out and I'm sorry for the confusion when using multiple 1Password accounts in the same app or browser. You can unlock all accounts at the same time by using the same account password for each account, we have a guide here: How to use multiple accounts

It's safe to use the same account password for multiple accounts: 

  1. Your account password never leaves your device.
  2. When you use the same account password for all of your 1Password accounts, each account is also protected by a unique Secret Key.

However this guidance won't work if your 1Password accounts are using different authentication methods such as SSO or passkey unlock. The reason why 1Password requires that you unlock each account separately is because each account is encrypted using it's own secret. If you're using different account passwords for different accounts, or different authentication providers, then you'll need to provide each secret separately.

If you use Touch ID to unlock 1Password then 1Password is able to store the secrets securely in the Secure Enclave (a hardware component on your Mac) so that all accounts can be unlocked at the same time once you provide your fingerprint: Use Touch ID to unlock 1Password on your Mac

Improving the unlock flow for multiple accounts is something that the team is discussing and I'll share your post in the internal work item created for this functionality so that team is aware of the friction that this is causing you and can consider your suggestions for future versions of 1Password.

-Dave

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