Password Generator
Choose a length and which character types to include, and generate a random password — with its entropy in bits and an estimated offline brute-force crack time.
On-screen number pad
Step-by-step proofCheck by hand
How entropy and crack time are calculated
Every character position draws uniformly at random from the selected character types, so the total number of possible passwords is the character-set size raised to the length — entropy in bits is just the base-2 logarithm of that count. A brute-force attacker trying the whole keyspace at a fixed guess rate finds the password after, on average, half of it, which is where the crack-time estimate comes from.
The formulas
Worked example
A 12-character password using all 94 printable characters: entropy = 12 × log₂(94) ≈ 78.7 bits — well into "very strong," with a crack time far beyond a human lifetime at 10 billion guesses/second.
Frequently asked questions
What is password entropy?
Where does the crack-time estimate come from?
Why does adding symbols help more than adding length in some cases?
- NIST Special Publication 800-63B — digital identity guidelines, password entropy and strength.