Big decision: 1P 8

Hey Mark_Sealey

Good to hear from you again. Glad to hear you're interested in what's happening with 1Password 8.

But I really like 1P, AB as a company and the level and friendly nature of the support I've always had in the many years during which I've been 99% happy with 1P.

❤️

If I upgrade to 1P 8, will I still have a truly 'local' vault… one **on my machine **over which I have control - to access it during an Internet outage, back it up and keep it where I want it? I have read conflicting answers to that question. (I am not too concerned about vaults' security because I trust the encryption.)

1Password has always and continues to work from a local encrypted database on your device(s). The important difference for some is that 1Password 8 requires a membership, and part of that means using 1Password.com 🇺🇸 (or 1Password.ca 🇨🇦 / 1Password.eu 🇪🇺) to sync. Dropbox and iCloud are out of the picture. It also means a subscription instead of a license purchase.

This does not change the fact that you can access your data while you (or we) are offline. That continues to be true today. There is definitely more we want to do in terms of offline backups, but I think that's ultimately a different question than the one you're asking. Happy to go down that path if you'd like, but I suspect this is where the discrepancy and confusion / conflicting answers come from. At the end of the day: your encrypted 1Password data(*) exists on any device you've signed into one of our apps with. It is easy to test this: disconnect from the internet and then open and unlock 1Password.

(*) There is one caveat, which is also true with 1Password 7: Documents and attachments may not be available offline. The way this works varies a bit depending on which versions and platforms you're using, but generally if you've viewed a Document/attachment on a particular device previously, or if you're using the device you used to create that item, it will likely be cached on that device.

tl;dr If you already have a membership... nothing really changes in this regard.

How detrimental to a dedicated Mac user is the Electron environment; is 1P 8 as stable and robust, reliable and usable as 1P has always been?

Obviously I'm biased, but I wouldn't say that Electron has affected the stability, robustness, usability, or reliability of 1Password in any negative way. Is the design a significant change from 1Password 7? Yep! But it was going to be regardless of which technology stack we went with. That was part of the goal. I think we've delivered a beautiful and functional app that we're quite proud to call 1Password.

Any informed and objective pointers gratefully received?

I'd say give it a try and see for yourself. 😃 We'll be happy to answer any questions along the way. I hope you decide to stick with us, but whatever path you choose I hope you stay safe out there. 😊

Ben