'ZDNET Recommends': What exactly does it mean?
ZDNET's recommendations are based on many hours of testing, research, and comparison shopping. We gather data from the best available sources, including vendor and retailer listings as well as other relevant and independent reviews sites. And we pore over customer reviews to find out what matters to real people who already own and use the products and services we’re assessing.
When you click through from our site to a retailer and buy a product or service, we may earn affiliate commissions. This helps support our work, but does not affect what we cover or how, and it does not affect the price you pay. Neither ZDNET nor the author are compensated for these independent reviews. Indeed, we follow strict guidelines that ensure our editorial content is never influenced by advertisers.
ZDNET's editorial team writes on behalf of you, our reader. Our goal is to deliver the most accurate information and the most knowledgeable advice possible in order to help you make smarter buying decisions on tech gear and a wide array of products and services. Our editors thoroughly review and fact-check every article to ensure that our content meets the highest standards. If we have made an error or published misleading information, we will correct or clarify the article. If you see inaccuracies in our content, please report the mistake via this form.
How to set up Bitwarden for personal and work use - and why you should keep them separate
I've been using Bitwarden for a long time. I like it for its ease of use, security, feature set, and that it's open-source.
One thing about Bitwarden is that it makes it easy to move between different accounts. With the click of a menu item, you can switch between your personal account and your work account -- without having to leave the Bitwarden window.
That's right, multiple accounts.
But why?
Also: 7 ways to get more out of your Bitwarden password manager
Some businesses have policies that require users not to include personal items within a password manager. Or maybe you don't want to have to use separate password managers for your personal and work accounts. That's inefficient.
Another reason I like to separate the two is simply for peace of mind. When I'm not in my office, I'm not working; and when I'm not working, I don't always want to be reminded of work. By separating those accounts, I don't have the reminders of clients and deadlines when I'm "off the clock."
But how do you do this? It's remarkably easy.
Let me show you.
How to add a second account to Bitwarden
What you'll need: To make this work, you'll need at least two valid Bitwarden accounts. You can do this on the desktop, mobile, and web versions of Bitwarden, and I'm going to demonstrate it on my Pop!_OS desktop.
Let's go.
1. Make sure you have account information
The first thing you'll need to do is gather the username and master password for all of the accounts you intend on adding. If you only have one account, head to the official Bitwarden site and sign up for a second account. You can use this feature on both free and paid accounts, so don't worry if your personal account is not on a paid plan.
2. Log into Bitwarden
Log into Bitwarden with one of your accounts. It doesn't matter if you first log in with a paid or free account, because the feature will be there either way.
Also: Bitwarden vs. 1Password: Which password manager is best?
3. Add the second account
In the top-right corner of the Bitwarden window, click the username drop-down. In the resulting menu, click "Add account."
You can add up to five accounts in Bitwarden.
4. Login with the second account
This will take you back to the Bitwarden login screen, where you'll log in with the second account. Once you've done that, if you click the username drop-down, you'll see both accounts are available.
You can also create an account from this window by clicking "Create account."
5. Switch between accounts
When you're using one account, if you click the username drop-down, you can then select the other account, which will prompt you for the master password.
Switching between Bitwarden accounts is just a couple of clicks away.
And that's all there is to adding a second account to Bitwarden. You can add up to five accounts and switch between them with ease.
Also: How to log in to the Bitwarden password manager with a passkey
Once you've added the second account, start adding vault entries. The one thing you can't do is export a vault item from one account and import it into another. You could export the entire vault, import it into the new account, and then delete all of the unrelated entries. Of course, depending on how many entries your vault has, that could take a lot of time, so you might be better off adding them manually to the second account and then deleting them from the first.
Have fun.