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Common problems

Grouped by where you hit them. Several of these are not faults — they are the app refusing to do something unsafe, and the entry says which.

If none of this covers it, email support@passwordepic.com and include the email address you sign in with. That is what we look up.

Autofill​

Autofill does not appear at all​

Work through these in order — the first two account for most cases.

  1. Is PasswordEpic actually selected as the autofill service? Setting it once is not permanent: a system update, or another password manager being installed, can quietly replace it. Check with the paths in Setting up autofill.
  2. Are you on Android 8.0 or newer? Autofill did not exist before that. The app will tell you which Android version you are running.
  3. Is battery optimisation restricting the app? The autofill dialog is a separate window, and an aggressively restricted app cannot open it. Exclude PasswordEpic from battery optimisation.
  4. Did you sign out? Signing out revokes autofill on purpose.

It works in apps but not on websites​

You are almost certainly in Chrome, and Chrome keeps web forms to its own password manager until you tell it otherwise.

Turn on "Autofill using another service" in Chrome's own settings, then restart Chrome. Full steps are in Making it work in Chrome.

"Autofill Not Supported"​

Your phone is on Android 7 or older. Autofill is an Android 8.0 feature and there is nothing the app can do about it. Everything else in PasswordEpic still works — you copy and paste instead.

"Failed to open autofill settings"​

The app tried to jump you straight to the right system screen and your phone refused. Harmless, and the manual route works: open Settings, search for autofill, and select PasswordEpic. See the per-brand paths.

PasswordEpic is not in the list of autofill services​

Usually Samsung, where Samsung Pass holds the slot. Select None first, leave the screen, come back, and PasswordEpic should now be listed.

One particular app never offers autofill​

Some apps opt out of the autofill framework entirely. That is their choice and no password manager can override it.

Open PasswordEpic, copy the password, and paste it into the app. Slower, but it is the only honest answer — see why we do not work around it.

The suggestion appears but the wrong entry is offered​

Autofill matches on domain. Check the entry's saved website address — a login saved for example.com will not be offered on example.org, and by default subdomains like mail.example.com match only if subdomain matching is on (Settings → Autofill Management).

Signing in and your device​

"Account is active on another device"​

Your account is bound to one phone at a time on the paid tiers. This is seat licensing, not a fault.

  • You still have the old phone: open PasswordEpic on it and choose Settings → Reset Account. That erases the data on that device and frees the account.
  • You no longer have it: email us and we will release it. This is the one situation where support genuinely is the only way forward, because releasing a device normally needs that device's own hardware signature.
Releasing an account does not bring the old vault with it

You start fresh on the new phone. The old vault stays encrypted with a key that existed only inside the old phone. See Backups and exports.

"Device Integrity Check Failed"​

Platinum and Titanium require the app to prove it is genuine and unmodified, running on a device that has not been tampered with. Something in that check did not pass — a locked bootloader is a common requirement, and a rooted or modified device will not pass at all.

Two ways forward: use an unmodified device with a locked bootloader, or select the Gold tier, which has exactly the same encryption and does not run these runtime checks.

Gold is not a downgrade in cryptography. It is the same engine, the same hardware-backed keys, the same cipher. See Security tiers.

"Rooted Device Detected"​

The app has detected that your phone's built-in restrictions have been removed. On a rooted phone, other apps can read this app's memory — including your passcode as you type it, and the DEK while it is in use.

The hardware-backed key itself is still protected, but everything around it is not. The paid tiers refuse key operations here on purpose.

Biometric unlock is not working​

  • "Biometric authentication is not available on this device" — no fingerprint or face hardware, or none enrolled. Enrol one in your phone's settings.
  • "Unable to unlock with biometrics" — a read failed. Enter your passcode instead; biometrics are a convenience over the passcode, never a replacement for it.

Note that changing your phone's screen lock can invalidate enrolled biometrics at the OS level. Your vault is unaffected — you unlock with your passcode and re-enrol.

"The credentials you entered do not match"​

The passcode was wrong. There is no lockout that destroys your vault, so try again carefully.

If you genuinely cannot remember it, there is no recovery — read Your passcode before you set the next one.

Warnings you might see​

These are the app telling you something about your environment. None of them mean the app is broken.

"Screen recording detected. Passcode entry is locked"​

Something is recording your screen, and the app has locked passcode entry until it stops.

This is deliberate. It matters most for the autofill dialog, which sits over a different app that is being recorded normally — inside PasswordEpic itself a recording comes out black anyway, keyboard included. Stop the recording and try again.

A screenshot is a different matter: Android refuses those outright while a PasswordEpic screen is showing, so nothing at all is captured.

Available on Android 15 and above. On older versions the app cannot detect a recording at all, and does not claim to.

"Third-party keyboard: …"​

The keyboard you are using did not ship with the phone. Any keyboard sees every key you give it, in every app.

This is a dismissible warning, never a block — installing Gboard or SwiftKey from the Play Store is completely ordinary. If you would rather not take the risk while typing your passcode, switch to the keyboard that came with the phone for that moment.

The app deliberately keeps no list of "approved" keyboards, because an app can claim any name it likes and a name is not proof of identity.

An overlay or accessibility warning stops you unlocking​

Something is drawn over the passcode pad, or an accessibility service is active. Both can capture your passcode as you type it, before any encryption is involved.

Close the app that is drawing over the screen — screen dimmers, chat heads and screen recorders are common causes — or turn off the accessibility service temporarily, then try again.

PasswordEpic itself installs no accessibility service, so nothing it warns you about here is its own doing.

Backups and restore​

"This backup cannot be restored on another device"​

Correct, and true on every tier. Backups carry a layer of encryption tied to the secure hardware of the phone that wrote them.

They protect you against losing data on the phone you still have — an accidental delete, a bad import, a vault reset. They are not a migration path, and no setting makes them one. See Backups and exports.

My backup restored but the entries are unreadable​

Same cause. The file opened because you had the passcode, but the entries inside are still encrypted with a DEK that needs the original phone's hardware.

I want to move to a new phone​

There is no way to bring the vault across. Release the account from the old device (or ask us to), sign in on the new one, and re-enter your passwords.

We would rather say this plainly than let you discover it after losing a device.

🎁 One thing we can do that has nothing to do with passwords​

Can I use this to check a second-hand phone?​

Yes, and you should. It is free and you do not have to keep the app.

The paid tiers verify that the device is genuine, unmodified, not rooted and booted from a verified system — because that is what has to be true before your passwords go anywhere near it. That same check answers a question worth real money when you are buying a used phone.

  1. Install PasswordEpic from the Play Store — a sideloaded copy cannot pass the check no matter how healthy the phone is, so it would tell you nothing.
  2. At setup, choose Platinum or Titanium.
  3. If the tier is available, the device passed. If you get "Device Integrity Check Failed", it did not — and the message names the verdict.

A pass means: a Google-certified device, verified boot, not rooted, bootloader locked, app not tampered with.

A pass does not mean: the phone is not stolen (check the IMEI separately), the parts are genuine, or the battery is any good. It answers one question — has this device's software been tampered with? — and answers it precisely.

The longer version, with a diagram, is in The war for the vault.

Deleting everything​

Settings → Reset Account. Immediate, no queue, no retention window, no support ticket. It erases the vault and your account data from our servers.

It cannot be undone, and we cannot bring it back afterwards — that is the same property that stops anyone else reading your vault.