Sync and devices

How your vault syncs, what happens when two devices change the same thing, and managing signed-in devices.

How sync works

Your vault syncs on its own: when the app opens, after each change, and every minute. Settings › Sync shows the status and when it last synced, and Sync now syncs straight away. Changes made offline are kept and sent when you’re back online.

Everything is encrypted on your device before it’s sent; see Security.

When two devices change the same thing

Sync works item by item: each host, group, key, identity, snippet, forward or known host is one item. If two devices change the same item before syncing, the later change wins and replaces the whole item.

The version that lost isn’t thrown away. It’s kept on the device that made it for 30 days, in Settings › Replaced versions. Restoring one makes it the current version on every device, and that can be undone from the same place.

If your Mac’s clock is wrong

Changes are ordered by time, so a Mac whose clock is set far ahead could otherwise win every time. If your clock is more than five minutes ahead, the server turns the change down and the app tells you your clock is wrong. The change stays on your Mac until the clock is fixed.

Devices

Settings › Account › Devices lists every device signed in to your account, with when it last synced. Signing one out stops it syncing until someone signs in there again; what’s already on it stays. See if you lose a device.

A device that isn’t used for 90 days is signed out by the server. The app then shows Sign in again, which needs only your master password.

Sign Out (Settings › This Mac) removes your account and vault from this Mac. Signing in again needs your master password and Secret Key.

Limits

An account holds up to 10,000 items and 100 MiB of encrypted data. A single item, such as a key with a long certificate, can be up to 64 KiB.