CiteGround teardown / passwordmgr-category

When your buyers ask AI about your category, who gets named?

citeground.com · 10 buyer prompts · 180 runs across ChatGPT (API, web-grounded), Google AI Overviews, Perplexity (API) · rolling 28-day window · generated 2026-07-13 18:51 UTC

Weekly series, episode 2. The leaderboard already moved: Bitwarden led episode 1 (first-named in 33 of 90 runs vs 1Password's 29); one week later 1Password leads (34 vs 27). Same prompts, same engines, seven days apart. A one-off reading would have printed the wrong leader. Even here, the top grounding domains remain the vendors' own pages.

CiteGround is absent from the AI answer on 10 of 10 buyer prompts. Every number below carries its run-to-run variance band: AI answers are noisy, and a single run is not evidence. We show the noise instead of hiding it.

Share of voice across the basket

Fig. 01 / share of answers mentioning the brand180 runs

Bitwarden84%

1Password78%

Keeper49%

Dashlane40%

NordPass34%

Proton Pass20%

LastPass16%

RoboForm12%

Zoho Vault6%

Passbolt3%

CiteGround (us)0%

Share of all 180 archived runs in the window that mention the brand. Basket-level only; per-query AI rank is statistical noise and is never reported here.

Prompt-by-prompt: what the AI actually says

Prompt 0118 runs

“best password manager for small business teams”

CiteGround absent (0/18 runs)set agreement 33% (unstable)

The AI names:

1Password (18/18)Bitwarden (17/18)Dashlane (11/18)NordPass (9/18)Keeper (7/18)RoboForm (3/18)LastPass (1/18)Proton Pass (1/18)

Grounding sources: 1password.com, bitwarden.com, securden.com (32 distinct domains cited across runs)

Prompt 0218 runs

“best password manager for startups 2026”

CiteGround absent (0/18 runs)set agreement 33% (unstable)

The AI names:

1Password (16/18)Bitwarden (16/18)NordPass (8/18)Keeper (5/18)Dashlane (5/18)LastPass (5/18)Proton Pass (4/18)RoboForm (2/18)

AI answer returned in 16/18 runs.

Grounding sources: youtube.com, linkedin.com, securden.com (30 distinct domains cited across runs)

Prompt 0318 runs

“1Password vs Bitwarden for business use”

CiteGround absent (0/18 runs)set agreement 50% (mixed)

The AI names:

1Password (17/18)Bitwarden (17/18)

AI answer returned in 17/18 runs.

Grounding sources: bitwarden.com, 1password.com, alexn.org (20 distinct domains cited across runs)

Prompt 0418 runs

“most secure password manager for enterprise”

CiteGround absent (0/18 runs)set agreement 17% (unstable)

The AI names:

Bitwarden (18/18)Keeper (17/18)1Password (16/18)Dashlane (8/18)NordPass (4/18)RoboForm (1/18)Proton Pass (1/18)

Grounding sources: bitwarden.com, gartner.com, securden.com (22 distinct domains cited across runs)

Prompt 0518 runs

“best free password manager for a team”

CiteGround absent (0/18 runs)set agreement 17% (unstable)

The AI names:

Bitwarden (18/18)Proton Pass (12/18)Zoho Vault (8/18)Dashlane (6/18)1Password (5/18)NordPass (4/18)Passbolt (3/18)Keeper (2/18)LastPass (1/18)

Grounding sources: bitwarden.com, reddit.com, pcmag.com (27 distinct domains cited across runs)

Prompt 0618 runs

“password manager with SSO and SCIM provisioning”

CiteGround absent (0/18 runs)set agreement 17% (unstable)

The AI names:

Bitwarden (16/18)1Password (15/18)Keeper (13/18)Dashlane (13/18)LastPass (4/18)NordPass (3/18)

AI answer returned in 17/18 runs.

Grounding sources: bitwarden.com, 1password.com, keeper.io (19 distinct domains cited across runs)

Prompt 0718 runs

“Bitwarden alternative for companies”

CiteGround absent (0/18 runs)set agreement 17% (unstable)

The AI names:

Bitwarden (17/18)1Password (16/18)Keeper (15/18)Dashlane (15/18)NordPass (11/18)Proton Pass (7/18)LastPass (6/18)Zoho Vault (2/18)RoboForm (1/18)Passbolt (1/18)

AI answer returned in 17/18 runs.

Grounding sources: bitwarden.com, youtube.com, privacyguides.net (27 distinct domains cited across runs)

Prompt 0818 runs

“is a paid password manager worth it for a small company”

CiteGround absent (0/18 runs)set agreement 17% (unstable)

The AI names:

Bitwarden (10/18)Keeper (10/18)1Password (8/18)NordPass (5/18)RoboForm (4/18)LastPass (3/18)Proton Pass (2/18)Dashlane (1/18)

AI answer returned in 15/18 runs.

Grounding sources: g2.com, bitwarden.com, lastpass.com (31 distinct domains cited across runs)

Prompt 0918 runs

“how to choose a password manager for my company”

CiteGround absent (0/18 runs)set agreement 17% (unstable)

The AI names:

Bitwarden (12/18)1Password (12/18)Keeper (9/18)NordPass (9/18)LastPass (8/18)Proton Pass (6/18)RoboForm (4/18)Dashlane (4/18)Passbolt (2/18)

Grounding sources: bitwarden.com, youtube.com, reddit.com (45 distinct domains cited across runs)

Prompt 1018 runs

“best passkey manager for business”

CiteGround absent (0/18 runs)set agreement 17% (unstable)

The AI names:

1Password (17/18)Bitwarden (11/18)Keeper (11/18)NordPass (9/18)Dashlane (9/18)RoboForm (6/18)Proton Pass (3/18)

Grounding sources: pcmag.com, 1password.com, heimdalsecurity.com (33 distinct domains cited across runs)

See the move sequence to get CiteGround into these answers

Method: each prompt runs multiple times per engine; brands and cited domains are extracted per run and archived append-only from run #1. Counts of runs, not certainty theater. Presence counts (k/n) and set agreement are two different measurements: an answer can include a brand in every run while the full named set still churns. Engine access, reading construction, and what we exclude: /methods.