Quick answers to the most common questions. Each links to a detailed page if you want to go deeper.
If this happens, your passwords cannot be recovered. Keygrain derives every password from your master secret — there is no server-side copy, no recovery email, no reset flow. This is by design, not an oversight.
Write your master secret down physically and store it somewhere safe. The visual fingerprint (4-color indicator) catches typos the moment you enter your secret, so you will know immediately if something is wrong.
Traditional managers store encrypted passwords in a vault. Keygrain derives passwords on demand from your master secret — nothing is stored, so nothing can be breached. The trade-off is that you cannot store arbitrary passwords you did not derive.
Yes. The server holds only an encrypted blob it cannot decrypt. All cryptographic operations happen on your device. A complete server compromise yields opaque ciphertext, pseudonymous lookup IDs, per-service timestamps, and payload size — no passwords, no service names, no email addresses.
Read the trust boundary analysis → The security page includes a visual trust boundary diagram showing exactly what crosses the wire.
Yes. Password derivation is entirely local — it requires only your master secret, your email, and the site name. No network connection is needed. The server is only involved if you choose to sync your service list across devices.
Your email is used as a cryptographic salt — it ensures that two people with the same master secret still get completely different passwords. It is not sent to any server or used to create an account. You can use any email address, real or not, as long as you use the same one consistently.
Increment the counter for that site. This produces a completely unrelated new password from the same inputs. Your other passwords are unaffected because each derivation is cryptographically independent.
Export your data from your current manager, import it into Keygrain's migration wizard, then rotate passwords at your own pace. You can run both managers side-by-side during the transition — no cliff edge.
Browser extension (Chrome and Firefox — store submissions pending; install from source in the meantime), Android app, web PWA that works offline, and a Python CLI for automation and scripting. All produce identical output from the same inputs.
Yes. The full source code is MIT-licensed. The algorithm specification, test vectors, and all implementations are public.
Yes. Keygrain supports deterministic derivation of SSH keys, cryptocurrency wallet seeds, and TOTP secrets using domain-separated derivation paths. Each type is cryptographically independent from your passwords.
Last reviewed: June 2026