AWS Secrets Manager

Judgement

What it is

Building block

What it does

Stores secrets in AWS with IAM access control, audit logs and automatic rotation for RDS and other credentials.

Adopt it when

Your workloads run on AWS and you want secrets managed with IAM rather than another vendor.

Watch out

Charges per secret and per API call, and it is awkward to use outside AWS.

Ready for

Production-ready

Runs as

Cloud service

What the license allows

Closed source: you use it under the maker's terms and cannot change or resell the code.

Judged on 2026-11-03 from the maker's description and Wikipedia. The license and age lines are worked out directly.

Open-source alternatives to AWS Secrets Manager

1. 1
   SOPS getsops

   Simple and flexible tool for managing secrets

   Developer tool Production-ready You keep infrastructure config in Git and want secrets encrypted alongside it, often with Flux or Helm.

   ★ 24k MPL-2.0 Go Active, pushed today
2. 2
   OpenBao openbao

   OpenBao is a software solution to manage, store, and distribute sensitive data including secrets, certificates, and keys.

   Complete system Production-ready You need Vault-style secrets management but want to avoid HashiCorp's BSL license.

   ★ 8.8k MPL-2.0 Go Active, pushed today
3. 3
   Dotenvx dotenvx

   a secure dotenv—from the creator of `dotenv`

   Developer tool Production-ready Your team shares .env files and wants them encrypted in the repo without adopting a secrets server.

   ★ 5.9k BSD-3-Clause JavaScript Active, pushed 3 days ago
4. 4
   Git-secret sobolevn

   :busts_in_silhouette: A bash-tool to store your private data inside a git repository.

   Developer tool Usable A small team wants a few secret files in Git and already uses GPG.

   ★ 4.1k MIT Shell Active, pushed 35 days ago
5. 5
   Secretspec cachix

   A declarative interface for every secret provider.

   Developer tool Experimental You want one declaration of required secrets that works across developer machines and CI with different backends.

   ★ 1.6k Apache-2.0 Rust Active, pushed today
6. 6
   Pwd.sh drduh

   Manage secrets with Bash and GnuPG symmetric encryption

   Developer tool Usable You want a tiny, auditable shell-based secret store that can be decrypted with plain GnuPG.

   ★ 1.6k MIT Shell Active, pushed 15 days ago
7. 7
   WrongSecrets OWASP

   Vulnerable app with examples showing how to not use secrets

   List, course or other material Production-ready You run security training or want developers to learn secrets-management mistakes hands-on.

   ★ 1.5k AGPL-3.0 HTML Active, pushed today
8. 8
   Berglas GoogleCloudPlatform

   A tool for managing secrets on Google Cloud

   Developer tool Production-ready You run workloads on Google Cloud and want a simple way to load secrets into Cloud Run or GKE apps.

   ★ 1.3k Apache-2.0 Go Active, pushed 12 days ago
9. 9
   FreeIPA freeipa

   Mirror of FreeIPA, an integrated security information management solution

   Complete system Production-ready You manage many Linux servers and need centralised logins, sudo rules and certificates, often alongside Active Directory.

   ★ 1.3k GPL-3.0 Python Active, pushed 4 days ago
10. 10
    Kingfisher mongodb

    Detect secrets + live validation. Map blast radius. Revoke fast. Use the CLI or embed in Rust and Python.

    Developer tool Usable You want fast secret scanning with live validation in pre-commit hooks or CI.

    ★ 1.3k Apache-2.0 Rust Active, pushed 4 days ago

Every alternative to AWS Secrets Manager

Other commercial secrets managers

1. 1
   HashiCorp Vault Enterprise HashiCorp

   Building block Production-ready A large organisation needs central secrets management across many teams and clouds, with compliance features.

   Commercial
2. 2
   1Password Secrets Automation AgileBits

   Securely store, manage, automate, and share secrets for your applications and infrastructure where and when you need them. 1Password secrets management has you covered.

   Developer tool Production-ready Your company already uses 1Password and wants infrastructure secrets in the same place as staff passwords.

   Commercial
3. 3
   Doppler Doppler

   Doppler's secrets management platform helps teams secure, sync, and automate secrets across cloud and on-prem environments with security and developer-friendly workflows.

   Developer tool Production-ready A development team wants to stop passing .env files around and sync secrets to many platforms easily.

   Commercial

Under it

Every program, AWS Secrets Manager included, runs on a microchip.

How compilers were built, back to punched paper tape