A capable password manager that has turned its attention to enterprise buyers, dropped its free plan in 2025 and now draws heavy criticism over billing and support.
By Brand Verdicts research deskLast updated October 2026Security & privacy
C
6.3/10
Quality7.6
Value5.8
Service5.1
Policies7.4
Transparency6.1
CONSIDER
Scorecard
Why C: Good autofill, a bundled VPN and a clear 30-day refund, outweighed by the end of the free plan, prices above most rivals and recent reviews describing chatbot walls and renewal disputes.
Criterion
Score /10
Weight
Product quality
7.6
30%
Value
5.8
25%
Customer service
5.1
15%
Returns & policies
7.4
15%
Transparency
6.1
15%
Overall
6.3
derived
Overall is the weighted mean of the five rows, adjusted by a small slug-seeded offset so that brands never line up in a false staircase, and capped at 9.8. Full working on the Methodology page (v2.1).
Key findings
Premium lists at $5.42 a month billed annually and Friends & Family at $8.13 a month for 10 members. There is no monthly billing option and no free plan.
Dashlane ended its Free plan on September 16, 2025. Former free users can no longer view or edit their data, only export it, until September 16, 2026.
A full refund is available within 30 days of purchase, but the self-serve refund button only appears for card payments made on Dashlane’s website.
Trustpilot shows a 2.7 ‘Poor’ score despite mostly five-star reviews overall, because recent reviews are heavily negative about billing, price rises and reaching a human.
The homepage now sells Omnix, an enterprise credential-risk platform, and personal plans are reached through footer links.
What you are buying
Dashlane is a password manager sold on annual subscriptions. Personal plans are Premium, for one person, and Friends & Family, for up to 10 members with separate private vaults. Both store passwords and passkeys, autofill in the browser, warn about breached or weak credentials and include a VPN from Hotspot Shield (on the family plan, for the plan manager only). Business plans are sold per user under the names Password Management and Credential Protection, with an enterprise tier marketed as the Omnix platform. Encryption follows a zero-knowledge model using Argon2d key derivation, documented on the security page. The company’s direction is clear from its homepage, which leads with enterprise phishing protection and an AI advisor in beta. Home users are still served, but they are no longer the main audience.
Product by product
5 items. Each chip is a per-product call and can differ from the brand verdict.
Premium CONSIDER
One member, unlimited passwords and devices, unlimited sharing, dark web monitoring, phishing alerts, 1 GB of encrypted document storage and the Hotspot Shield VPN. Listed at $5.42 a month, billed annually, with a 14-day free trial. Live chat support is named as a Premium feature, though recent reviewers report reaching a chatbot first. Passwordless login, using a device PIN or biometrics instead of a master password, is offered to new users only. It is a competent product with good autofill on mobile, but it costs more than 1Password’s individual plan and well over Bitwarden’s, and the VPN is the main thing the extra money buys.
StrengthBundled VPN and phishing alerts in one subscription
Up to 10 members, each with a private vault, plus a dashboard for the plan manager to add and remove people. Listed at $8.13 a month on annual billing. Breach alerts and phishing protection cover every member, but the VPN covers only the plan manager, a detail stated on the pricing page that is easy to miss. Ten seats is generous, and for a large household or a group of friends the per-person cost is reasonable. The plan has no free trial button on the pricing page, unlike Premium, so you commit on purchase and rely on the 30-day refund if it does not suit.
StrengthTen private vaults for the price of under two Premium plans
WeaknessVPN covers only the plan manager; no trial offered
The core business tier: employee vaults for passwords and passkeys, shared credentials, password policies and integration with SSO and SCIM. Priced per user a month on annual billing with a 14-day free trial, but the pricing page did not display a per-seat figure when read in October 2026, so the desk cannot quote one. Dashlane’s admin console is well regarded. A recent Trustpilot review from a business customer reports that removing users did not reduce billed seats, so confirm in writing how seat counts are reconciled at renewal before signing an annual contract.
StrengthSSO and SCIM integration with a 14-day trial
WeaknessPer-seat price not shown on the pricing page when read
A business add-on tier that watches for credential risks across sites outside single sign-on, flags phishing pages in the browser and feeds alerts into an existing security stack. It is sold through sales conversations only: there is no trial and no public price, just a “Contact Sales” button. For an organization already running a security operations team this may slot in neatly. For a small business it is the wrong first purchase, and the opaque pricing makes it impossible to compare with rivals from the outside. Buy Password Management first and revisit this only if a security team asks for it.
StrengthCovers logins that sit outside SSO
WeaknessNo trial and no public price; sales call required
Not sold separately, but a large part of what Dashlane charges for. Dashlane’s VPN page says it has partnered with Hotspot Shield to offer the VPN to Premium and Family users; on Friends & Family only the plan manager gets it. The feature page lists no device limits or server details, which makes it hard to judge. It is fine for protecting a laptop on café Wi-Fi. Anyone who wants a VPN for streaming in other regions or for heavier privacy use should buy a dedicated service, and App Store reviewers report the VPN interfering with some banking app logins.
StrengthAdds Wi-Fi protection at no extra charge
WeaknessFew details published; family plan gives it to one person only
Full refund within 30 days of purchase; self-serve for website card payments only
Warranty / guarantee
Not stated
Support
Help center and chat; live chat listed as a Premium feature, no phone listed
Payment options
Card on website; PayPal for new plans in the UK only; Apple and Google
Subscription / cancellation
Annual billing only; renews automatically; App Store refunds go through Apple
Values are short phrases taken from the brand's own pages at the time of the last update. "Not stated" means the desk could not find the policy in writing.
Caveats
The Free plan ended on September 16, 2025. Former free users lost the ability to view or edit their passwords and can only export them, and the export deadline is September 16, 2026.
Recent one-star Trustpilot reviews describe subscriptions renewing after cancellation was requested and refunds refused under notice-period rules.
Several reviewers report steep price increases at renewal; the personal pricing page shows no renewal-price fine print to check against.
Reaching a person is a common complaint: reviewers describe an unhelpful chatbot and no route to a human agent for billing disputes.
Review themes
The Trustpilot profile is a lesson in reading the score rather than the stars. Most of its several thousand reviews are five-star, yet the TrustScore sits at 2.7 ‘Poor’, because the few dozen reviews from the last year are mostly negative and weigh more. Those recent complaints are about money and access: renewals that went through after people believed they had cancelled, refunds refused, price increases, and a chatbot that will not hand over to a human. Former free users who relied on Dashlane to receive shared passwords are unhappy about the free tier’s end. Mac users report autofill breaking for weeks.
The Apple App Store is kinder, with a 4.8 rating from a very large number of ratings. Reviews there praise autofill and password generation, with complaints about plan pricing, the lack of a two-person family option and the VPN clashing with banking apps.
Compare against
1Password
Pick this if you want a similar polished experience at a slightly lower individual price and with family recovery.
Bitwarden
Pick this if you lost Dashlane’s free plan and want a free tier with no device limits.
NordPass
Pick this if you want a password manager from a company that also sells a full VPN.
Our call
Dashlane still makes a good password manager, and the 30-day refund is clearer than many rivals offer. But the business around it has moved toward enterprise sales, the free plan is gone, personal plans cost more than better-reviewed competitors, and the recent review record on billing and support is poor. Existing users who are happy have no urgent reason to leave. New buyers should look elsewhere first and choose Dashlane only if the bundled VPN matters. Verdict: CONSIDER.
Read dashlane.com homepage, personal and business pricing pages, VPN feature page and security page in October 2026.
Read Dashlane’s help center refund article for personal plans and its blog post announcing the end of the Free plan, October 2026.
Read the Trustpilot profile for dashlane.com, including the one-star filter, in October 2026.
Read the Apple App Store listing for Dashlane in October 2026 for rating and review themes.
Desk research only: the brand's own site and support pages plus published customer reviews. Nothing was purchased or tested by this site. Scored under Methodology v2.1.
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