- Digital legacy services store your documents and instructions and pass them on after you die. Several are running, from free to about $40 a month.
- Many have closed or been absorbed. One 2014 count found 42% of the services on a list had gone.
- Some lock your documents behind a subscription.
- A free inventory plus the tools Google, Apple and your password manager already offer covers most people.
A digital legacy service is a company that holds information about your accounts, documents and wishes, and releases it to people you choose. Some add will-writing, scheduled farewell messages or help with paperwork after a death. The question is whether that is better than doing it yourself.
What these services do
They fall into three rough groups:
- Vaults and planners. You store documents and account details, and name people to receive them. Everplans, GoodTrust, Trustworthy and SecureSafe work this way.
- Message services. SafeBeyond offers messages triggered by a date, an event or a location, and farewell posts on social media. Its website is live, but we couldn’t confirm it is actively maintained.
- Notification services after a death. Life Ledger and Settld in the UK contact companies on behalf of the family. The Death Notification Service does the same for member banks.
Which are running and what they cost
These services had live websites when we checked in October 2026. Prices are as shown on each site at the time of writing and change often.
| Service | Based | What it offers | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|
| Everplans | US | Store and share documents and information | Free for up to 3 items; Premium $99.99 a year |
| GoodTrust | US | Will, trust and directives plus a digital vault | Estate+ $149 for the first year, then $39 a year |
| Trustworthy | US | Encrypted family vault and document sharing | Free plan (2GB, 1 member); paid plans $10 to $40 a month, billed annually |
| SecureSafe | Switzerland | Online storage held in Switzerland | Paid bundles, priced in Swiss francs |
| SafeBeyond | Unclear | Scheduled and event-triggered messages | Free to start; no pricing published |
| Life Ledger | UK | Notifies organisations after a death | Free for personal users |
| Settld | UK | Notifies organisations after a death | Free to families |
A few points behind those numbers:
- GoodTrust says an active subscription is needed to edit or download your documents. Stop paying and your own plan is harder to reach.
- Everplans was $75 a year in 2022 and is $99.99 now.
- SecureSafe’s pricing page doesn’t show its data-inheritance feature, so check it is still offered before you sign up.
- Settld is free to families because partners, such as probate practitioners, pay it introductory fees. Bear that in mind if it suggests a firm.
- Security claims such as AES-256 encryption or audit badges are the companies’ own statements.
The shutdown risk
Your plan may sit untouched for decades. The company holding it has to last that long, and the record isn’t encouraging.
- Lantern, a US end-of-life planning service that charged $149 one-off for expanded access in 2022, was bought by Wellthy in November 2024. Wellthy then posted a notice that Lantern would be decommissioned on 1 September, and accounts would be unavailable from the next day. Users had to email support to get their plans out.
- Legacy Locker was bought by PasswordBox in 2013. PasswordBox announced in November 2015 that it would shut down in 2016. Users were moved to Intel’s True Key, under new terms.
- The wider picture: in March 2014 the site The Digital Beyond found that 26 of the 61 services on its list (42%) had already gone. Others, such as Entrustet, were absorbed into SecureSafe. The article put the failures down to too few people being willing to pay.
If a service closes after you’ve died, your family may not find out in time. If it closes while you’re alive, you have to notice and move everything.
Don’t make a paid service the only place your instructions exist. If it shuts down, changes its terms or stops letting you download, the plan goes with it.
What the free route looks like
Most of what these services promise you can do at no cost:
- Write a digital asset inventory: a list of accounts and what you want done with each, without passwords. Our free templates include one.
- Set up the tools the big platforms already offer: Google Inactive Account Manager and Apple Legacy Contact.
- Use a password manager with emergency access. See 1Password vs Bitwarden vs Proton Pass.
- Tell your executor where everything is, in a letter of instruction kept with your will.
After a death, UK families can use the free Death Notification Service for member banks, and Life Ledger or Settld for other companies, without having signed up to anything in advance.
Our view
A paid vault can help if you want everything in one place and someone else’s interface to keep it tidy. Some people value the reminders and structure.
But the core job is simple: list your accounts, set the platform tools, and make sure one trusted person can get into your password manager. That costs nothing and doesn’t depend on a company still existing in 20 years. If you do pay for a service, keep a copy of everything somewhere else too.
For crypto, which needs a different approach, see our sister site on crypto inheritance.