How to Reveal Passwords (Asterisks) in Browsers

Password is the most important thing in the today’s Internet world. Most of the advanced browsers have a built-in password manager, where they manage all the password you use for different web services like Facebook, Twitter, Gmail etc. but with one condition that you allowed the browser to save passwords.

It helps us a lot and it’s very convenient because using an inbuilt password manager or third-party password manager extension or add-ons, we can sign-in any web service account with a single click instead of typing password every time, then there is also a chance that you may forget your own password because you don’t need to type the password every single time.

All the browser hide or mask the saved password field on the log-in or sign-in pages behind the asterisk characters or bullets, Which help to stop the stealing of password and if you type the password every time, anyone can overlook your password while you are typing it. This calls Shoulder surfing.

Reason can be anything but if you have forgotten your saved password than here is an easy workaround that will help you out to reveal the hidden passwords in your browser.

Method 1: Reveal Hidden Password Using the Browser Developer Options i.e Inspect Element

Trick: Every webpage can be editable on a temporary basis which allows you change the properties of the element and give the result what you want. Here in our case, we will see how we can change the webpage element property to reveal any saved password on the page.

1. Go the login page of the web service like Gmail account, Twitter Account, Quora Account and Facebook Account etc. Here, for better understanding, we will use Facebook.com, there I have already saved my Facebook account password.

1. Right, Click on the Password Filed and Select the Inspect element option from the popup menu. It will open the developer options or developer window which is highlighting two or three lines of code by selecting.

1. There you will find the element “input” which has the property type “password {type=”password”}”. Just replace the type of element from the “password” with “text”. It should look like type=”text”.

1. Hit Enter or just close the Developer or Inspect element Window. Your password will be revealed.

Note: you can view this password till you refresh or close the webpage.  Once the webpage is reloaded or closed, all the changes in the element properties will be removed and it will hide the password once again.

Method 2: Reveal Hidden Password Using the JavaScript

Above Method need a little knowledge of developer option but this method reveals the hidden password in just one second.  JavaScript is the mother of all the web scripts. It can do anything on a webpage. In this tutorial, we will use a JavaScript string to reveal the passwords in your browser.

1. Open the login or sign in the page which contains the saved passwords and browser hide it behind the Asterisks characters.

1. Just copy the below JavaScript and page in the browser’s address bar.

javascript:(function(){var s,F,j,f,i; s = ""; F = document.forms; for(j=0; j<F.length; ++j) { f = F[j]; for (i=0; i<f.length; ++i) { if (f[i].type.toLowerCase() == "password") s += f[i].value + "\n"; } } if (s) alert("Passwords in forms on this page:\n\n" + s); else alert("There are no passwords in forms on this page.");})();

1. Now just need to hit the Enter button and this JavaScript code do the rest of work for you. this JavaScript will automatically reveal the saved password behind the Asterisks or bullets in a popup window.

Note: To make this JavaScript work you need to manually type “javascript:” at the start of the code.

Tip: If you need this script too frequently to reveal the hidden password in any browser just create a bookmark of this javascript code and whenever you need to see the password. Just open the webpage and click on the bookmark, it will reveal the saved password in seconds.

Method 3: Reveal Hidden Password Using the Third-Party Extension or Add-ons

Personally, I don’t recommend this method because in your absence anyone can steal your password with a single click. You at your own risk.

For Chrome browser  ⇒ You can use ShowPassword Extension

This extension gives 3 ways to reveal the hidden password on demand like Mouse Over for some seconds, Double click, on Focus or Press Ctrl Key

The original source code of the extension is available on Github, you can download it use or change it or modify it but make sure one thing that you don’t use it for stealing someone else passwords.

For FireFox ⇒ Show/hide Passwords  Addon

Remark: After Firefox Quantum update most of the password revealing addons stopped working but here is the good news that this Addon still works on Firefox Quantum.

Show/hide Password Firefox Addon adds a  small button next to password filed which is clickable to reveal or hide the password according to your convenient

For Opera Browser ⇒ Show my Password Extension 

Show my password, Opera browser ads a bar at the top and give two button option to Show all my Password and Hide all my Passwords.

As you click on any one button, this extension will hide or show all the password available on an opened form of a webpage.

Method 4: Reveal Hidden Password Using Browser’s built-in Password Manager

Every browser comes with built-in password manager which store all the saved form data like username, password, address, atm number, bank account number and etc. This built-in password manager of the browser has a button to reveal stored passwords.

You can reveal the stored password by using the show or hide password button on the main interface of the manager.

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