Consistent behaviour on clicking a listed item in vault

In the extension’s “Tab” view, clicking a login will attempt to AUTOFILL. However in the “My Vault” view, clicking will VIEW the login (side note…tooltip has a bug and says “Edit”).

I find this difference in behaviour rather frustrating. It’s also a potential security risk, since clicking a login may inadvertently autofill details into a page that you didn’t want them in.

I propose:

  • make the default click action in ALL cases be to VIEW the details of the entry.
  • change the “eye” (view) icon to something like a “writing pen” (autofill) icon in the “Tab” view.
  • in pop-out mode, suppress the autofill icon

This makes the action of autofilling a more deliberate choice. It would also bring the extension in line with the web vault, where clicking strictly gets you a detail view.

I ran into this consistency problem as well. @kriswilk’s suggestion would work for me.

@kriswilk Didn’t you propose that the default not be view in your GitHub thread?

Yes, in issue #473 (link) I had a change of heart since I usually use autofill rather than view details.

However upon further reflection I think my original point about not wanting to risk accidental autofills is more “security-conscious” default behaviour. Autofill should probably be the more “deliberate” action so I’d make it an icon instead of the “view” icon.

I’m also hoping for keyboard navigation (tried to repost that to the forum but got rate-limited by discourse for 24 hrs)…in which case I can do whatever I want just as easily.

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Follow-up here because I noticed a minor UI change in the Chrome extension. The “eye” icon to view the details for a login has been changed to a “window with details” icon.

When I saw this change I hoped that the vault UI had been brought in line, but it hasn’t changed (yet?).

Just wanted to make this clarification since my original post mentions the no-longer-existent “eye” icon…

Came here looking to open a request for this change to find someone has already requested.

I 100% agree with the @kriswilk this trips me every time.
The behaviour changes if you’re current tab has a detected login or if it doesn’t and it forces you to think “what should I click” and a lot of times I get this wrong.

It should be consistent and I agree the default click action should be “View” and autofill should be demoted to clicking an icon

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@triceps-tamale Put it perfectly. This trips me up too, and the proposed solution sounds good.

I’m of a different thought. “View” is rarely what I actually want. It’s clear things need to be consistent, but there’s a disagreement (and it’s not an unreasonable one, either way). I would like to see an option to choose between “view” and “fill.”

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Are you using the “hotkey” to autofill? (in macos it’s ⌥⌘CSHIFTL)
It’s very convenient and I use it 99% of the times without needing to open the extension window
https://help.bitwarden.com/article/auto-fill-browser/#keyboard-shortcuts-hot-keys

I agree that this inconsistency is rather annoying. Just like others, it also trips me up quite often.

The only place click-to-fill is used it the extension Tab, all the other use click-to-view (extension vault, web and android app)

For security reasons, I also agree click should view. Filling should be the one requiring another step, as suggested by @kriswilk and supported by @triceps-tamale and @bit.

Ideally there could be an option for people to chose between view or fill on click, to accoodate for those who’d prefer this working the other way around, like @oninoshiko . The hotkey could be used as well.

I just came here to suggest this as well. I don’t really mind which one is default, but I would love for the behavior to be consistent at the very least.

For me the best solution would be an option in settings that allows the user of the extension to either have a vault login item click perform either: a VIEW or an AUTO-FILL. This option would default to VIEW… which would make the behavior consistent across platforms, but if the user wished they could change the default click behavior to AUTO-FILL. I think @oninoshiko and @Oliv_er would agree.

I would go further in that if the URI was not matching the vault item clicked on the current tab, and the option was set to AUTO-FILL, I would take the user to that URI (like the LAUNCH functionality) and perform the AUTO-FILL, however that might be asking too much.

If the above cannot be accommodated, I would still prefer the original suggestion to have cross platform consistency.

@rscherker This does sound reasonable to me.

Yes, this sounds good to me as well.

Please add better consistency of the buttons in the Tab and My Vault pages.

When you open the bitwarden extension on a site you have logins for you are brought to the Tab page where clicking the login fills in your information and the view button brings you to the logins info. When using My Vault page when you click on the login you are brought to the logins info and instead of the view button there is a launch button to take you to the site. Since the layout of the two pages are identical the inconsistency of where to click is a little annoying. It always takes me a second when I search for a login to remember I need to click the main login banner to see the login info and not a view button like on the Tab page. I think that both sections should have the view button and either make clicking the main login banner in the My Vault open the site or do nothing and keep the launch button. I selected the browser tab as I mainly only use the chrome extension but it maybe apply to more platforms.

Tab page with view button
My Vault page with launch button

That’s kinda like getting phished by Bitwarden.

But yeah, the design is too minimalistic for a simple symbol switch out. In comparison, the Android app has the log-in options behind “three-dot” menu. When the menu pops up, the “view” action and “launch” action are on opposite sides, regardless.

Feature name

Site Item Consistent UI

Feature function

This is for app:browser

Right now when you are on a website in your browser and click on the Bitwarden browser plug-in (I’m in Firefox), you get a list of site entries. The UI names this list “Logins”. Each row in this “Logins” list has a set of UI behaviors (from left to right across the visual row):

  • Click on name: Auto-fill login
  • Icon1: View Item
  • Icon2: Copy Username
  • Icon3: Copy Password
  • Icon4: Copy Verification Code

In contrast, when you type in a site name in the search field of the browser extension, you also get a list of sites, and each entry in the search results list has the following set of UI behaviors (from left to right across the visual row):

  • Click on name: View Item
  • Icon1: Launch
  • Icon2: Copy Username
  • Icon3: Copy Password
  • Icon4: Copy Verification Code

THE MAIN IDEA: If you look at the UI for each item above, depending on if you are already on the site, or if you search for the site, the first two UI controls are swapped. This is very confusing.
If you are already on the site, clicking on the name “auto-fills” which is roughly equivalent to “Launch” on the item in a search list. But if you are in the search list, clicking on the name is “View Item”. The opposite is true for the first icon to the right of the name. If you are on the site, the first icon is “View Item”, if you are viewing an item in the search list, the first icon to the right of the name is “Launch”.

This swapping always confuses me, I am always clicking on the wrong thing because sometimes I’m accessing an item from Search, and sometimes because I’m already on the page. I’m always launching when I want to view the item or vice-versa.

Could you please make the UI for each list item the same between “Search” and “Logins”?

The benefits would be no more user interface friction, and a much happier user experience because of the new consistency.

Related topics + references

None that I know of.

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I commend your effort to explain this problem in such detail. However, I think it was perfectly clear already. This is another feature request that is 4 years old (I started it), and despite being such low-hanging fruit that it’s practically falling off the tree, it just isn’t on Bitwarden’s radar for some reason.

This one is a particularly sore point because they have (more than once!) updated the UI icons, but haven’t bothered to actually IMPROVE the consistency of this UI.

Bitwarden, if you’re listening: devote some time to resolving many of the smaller issues rather than (I assume?) spending it all on bigger things. Fixing 10 small issues may make a lot MORE people happy than fixing/implementing one bigger feature.

Hi @kriswilk, you’ll be happy to know that our product designers have been hard at work on the next phase of user experience improvements. I don’t have a specific ETA to share at this time or details on what specifically has changed, but just know that they read the forums and are planning significant long term improvements to the overall Bitwarden experience that goes beyond updating the icons.

That’s great to hear. All of us will be looking forward to it!

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