Sharing passwords with LastPass: how to share, stop sharing and check your plan

How does sharing passwords with LastPass work?

LastPass lets you share a saved password from your vault with another person by email, either one item at a time or through a shared folder. Password sharing in a password manager means giving someone the ability to use a login without sending the password itself over chat or email.

LastPass offers two routes, according to its support pages (checked 2026-10-18):

• Shared items: you send one password to one or more people. They receive a copy that they accept into their own vault.
• Shared folders: you create a folder, add people with set permissions, and everything inside it is shared.

The steps below come from LastPass Support articles. LastPass can change its interface at any time, so check the live help page if a button has moved.

How do you share one password in LastPass?

You share a single password from the Passwords view of your vault by selecting its Share icon and entering the recipient's email. LastPass Support ("How do I share a password in LastPass?") describes these steps:

1. Open your vault in a browser or the LastPass for Desktop app and go to Passwords in the navigation pane.
2. Find the password and select its Share icon.
3. Enter the recipient's email address. Leave Allow Recipient to View Password off if they only need to sign in.
4. Select Share.

A few behaviours are worth knowing before you rely on this for a team login:

• You have to verify your own email address before your first share.
• The recipient shows as Pending until they accept. Nothing appears in their vault before that.
• A shared item does not stay in sync. If you change the password later, you need to share it again.
• Recipients cannot edit the shared item. To change it, they clone it into their own vault, which creates a second copy you no longer control.

How do you create a shared folder in LastPass?

You create a shared folder from the Sharing Center, then add people and choose permissions for each of them. LastPass Support ("How do I create a shared folder in LastPass?") lists this path:

1. Select Sharing center in the left navigation.
2. Open the Manage Shared Folders tab.
3. Select the Add Shared Folder icon, enter a name and select Create.

LastPass Business admins can create shared folders from the Admin Console instead: Applications > Shared folders > New shared folder.

Each recipient gets a combination of three permissions: Read Only, Administrator and Hide Passwords. LastPass recommends keeping both Read Only and Hide Passwords on, which lets people use the logins without seeing or changing them.

Can you share a LastPass password without the person seeing it?

Yes. LastPass lets you hide the password from the recipient for both single items and shared folders.

• Single item: leave Allow Recipient to View Password switched off when you share.
• Shared folder: give the person the Hide Passwords permission.

Hiding the password stops casual copying and screen-sharing leaks. It is not a substitute for changing the password when someone leaves, because a determined person may still find ways to capture a login they can use. Treat hidden sharing as a convenience control and rotation as the real security step.

How do you stop sharing a password in LastPass?

You stop sharing by revoking the share from the Sharing Center. LastPass Support ("Revoke a shared item in LastPass") gives these steps:

1. Open Sharing Center.
2. Go to the Shared with Others tab.
3. Hover over the entry and select the Revoke share icon.

Revoking removes the item from their vault, but it cannot remove what they already know or copied. If the person could view the password, or you have any doubt, change the password on the website itself. This matters most when someone leaves the company, which our employee offboarding password checklist covers in detail.

Which LastPass sharing method should you use?

Use a single shared item for a one-off login and a shared folder for anything a group uses regularly.

What should you check on your LastPass plan before sharing?

Check how many people your plan lets you share with and whether shared folders are included, because sharing options differ between LastPass plans. Plan details change, so confirm them on LastPass's own plan page rather than relying on an old forum answer.

Before you build a team process on top of LastPass sharing, run through this checklist:

• How many recipients can one item be shared with on your plan?
• Are shared folders available, or only single-item sharing?
• Is the Hide Passwords option available for shared folders on your plan type?
• Do recipients need their own LastPass account, and on which plan?
• Who in your company can see which shares exist, and is there an admin view?
• What happens to shares a person created if their account is closed?

If several answers come back as "no" or "not sure", that is a signal your team has outgrown sharing from a personal vault.

When does a team need more than password sharing?

A team needs more than item sharing when several people use the same logins every day, people join and leave, and someone has to answer "who can access what?" quickly. Sharing from personal vaults works for two or three people. Past that, the gaps show up in three places.

1. Access levels: you need clear roles, such as who owns a login, who can edit it, who can only view it, and who can only sign in with it. Contractors in particular should get the narrowest level; see login-only access for contractors.
2. One source of truth: a shared copy that drifts out of sync after a password change causes lockouts and "which one is current?" messages.
3. Offboarding: when someone leaves, you need a list of everything they could reach, a handover of what they owned, and a list of passwords to change.

Whatever tool you use, write these three things down as a short team policy. The steps for any tool are in our guide on how to share passwords with teammates.

How does BobWork Vault handle team sharing and offboarding?

BobWork Vault is a free password manager for teams, and team sharing is included on the free plan. You share per password or through shared folders, and pick one of four access levels for each person: Owner, Edit, View or Login only. Login only means the Chrome extension fills the password, but the teammate cannot see or copy it.

Shared items are encrypted in the browser and keyed to each teammate, so the server only stores ciphertext. When someone leaves, a guided offboarding flow removes their access, hands over what they owned, re-keys the remaining shared items and builds a checklist of passwords to change on each site. An audit log records the actions.

If you are moving over, export a CSV from LastPass (Advanced Options › Export) and import it; the file is read and encrypted in your browser and duplicates are skipped. The LastPass alternative page compares the two in more detail, and you can create a free team vault to try it.

Try BobWork Vault — free for your whole team

BobWork Vault is a free, zero-knowledge password manager for teams, made by BobWork (BobOffice, LLC). Shared folders, login-only access, 2FA codes and guided offboarding, end-to-end encrypted. Add it to Chrome or create a free account.

Keep reading

• How to export passwords from Zoho Vault, LastPass, 1Password, Bitwarden and Chrome
• Employee offboarding checklist: what to revoke, rotate and hand over
• How to share a password without revealing it to contractors, agencies and interns
• Free LastPass alternative

More: free password manager · free team password manager · free company password manager · company password manager · password management software · how to share passwords with teammates · compare password managers