Where to keep passwords for your family after you die
If something happened to you tomorrow, could your family reach your email, your banking and your accounts? Not by passing round passwords — but with encrypted access you hand over to the right person, at the right time.
What to store
The access your family will actually need
The accounts and keys people forget until it is too late. Record them once, securely — then decide who can reach them after you die.
Money and essentials
- Online banking, savings and ISA logins
- Your password manager and its master key
- Pension and investment platform accounts
- PINs and access details for cards and devices
Digital life
- Email accounts — the master key to everything else
- Phone, laptop and tablet passcodes
- Cloud storage (photos, documents, backups)
- Password-protected files and encrypted drives
Everyday and subscriptions
- Utility, insurance and council-tax accounts
- Shopping, delivery and loyalty accounts
- Streaming and subscription services to cancel
Legacy and social
- Social media accounts to memorialise or close
- Domain names, websites and any online income
- Loyalty points, crypto wallets and digital assets
What happens to your passwords when you die?
Nothing automatic — and that is the problem. Your accounts do not close themselves, and your family cannot see your logins. Without a plan, they are locked out of your email, your banking, your photos and your subscriptions at the exact moment they need them most. Some providers have a legacy or next-of-kin process, but each is different, slow, and often needs a death certificate and grant of probate first. Meanwhile bills keep leaving accounts no one can reach, and irreplaceable things — photos, messages — can be lost for good. A little preparation turns weeks of locked doors into a single set of keys.
Why you should never put passwords in your will
A will becomes a public document once probate is granted in England and Wales — anyone can order a copy. Anything written into it, including passwords or account numbers, stops being private forever. Passwords also change often, while a will is rarely updated, so they would be out of date almost immediately. The correct approach is to keep credentials completely separate from the will: store them in a secure password manager or an encrypted credential safe, and let your will (or your death folder) simply point your executor to where that access lives.
Is it legal for someone to use your passwords after you die?
This is a real grey area, and worth getting right. Under the Computer Misuse Act 1990, accessing an account you are not authorised to use can technically be an offence — even a well-meaning relative logging into a deceased person’s email can be on shaky ground. The safe route is not to hand round passwords informally, but to leave clear, documented authorisation and to use each provider’s official legacy or bereavement process where one exists. Recording your wishes and access details in one organised place — and naming who you authorise to act — makes that far smoother. This is general information, not legal advice.
Set up each provider’s own legacy options first
Several big providers let you name someone now, while you can. Apple lets you add a Legacy Contact. Google has Inactive Account Manager. Facebook lets you choose a legacy contact, and Microsoft offers a digital legacy option for OneDrive. These are the official, authorised routes, so set them up before anything else. They do not all work the same way. Some pass on photos and files, some only let someone memorialise or close an account, and none of them hands over your login. Note which ones you have set up, so your executor knows where to start.
How to give your family safe access to your accounts
Three principles. First, use the official route wherever there is one: a provider’s legacy setting is authorised in a way a shared password is not. Second, protect the master key: your email and your password-manager master password unlock everything else, so record where they are kept. Third, control the hand-over for everything else: decide who you authorise and what they can see. With Beqst’s credential safe, access details stay encrypted. Your executor can only see them if you allow it, and only once a death certificate has been checked.
Password manager vs Beqst credential safe
They solve related but different problems. A day-to-day password manager keeps your logins handy and secure while you are alive, but most are built around a single master password only you know — which is precisely the problem when you die. A credential safe like Beqst is built for the hand-over: it keeps access encrypted, sits alongside your will, documents and final wishes, and lets you nominate exactly who receives access after you die. Many people use both — a manager for daily use, and Beqst to make sure the right person can get in when it counts. Neither replaces a provider’s own legacy settings; use those too.
Where should you keep passwords for your family?
Somewhere encrypted, organised, and reachable by the right person at the right time — never in your will, and never on paper in an unlocked drawer. The goal is a single, secure record that your executor or next of kin can be granted access to, covering your email, banking, devices and the accounts that need closing or memorialising. It should also say which accounts have an official legacy route, so your executor tries that first. With Beqst, passwords and other selected high-risk details are encrypted with AES-256-GCM before they are stored, our app and database are hosted in Ireland, and you decide precisely who can see them after you die.
Last reviewed September 2026. Beqst is a UK estate-organisation tool, not a law firm; this guide is general information, not legal advice.
Related: store your important documents securely, the free death-folder checklist, and what your executor will need.
Kept safe
Your credentials, properly protected
A credential safe holds the keys to your whole digital life. Beqst encrypts passwords and other selected high-risk data with AES-256-GCM, hosts its app and database in Ireland, and reveals access only to the person you choose, once a death certificate has been checked.
Start today
Leave your family the keys, safely
Beqst keeps your account access encrypted alongside your will, documents and final wishes — handed to the person you choose once a death certificate has been checked. Free to start, no card required.