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We signed up for a LifeLock plan to show you exactly what you can expect from your subscription.
Updated September 20, 2024
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As one of the companies that started the identity theft protection industry, LifeLock still stands near the top. It has kept up with current trends, coming a long way from its inception with new services such as dark web monitoring. It also partnered with Norton, the antivirus company, to offer online device protections. That makes it one of the best identity theft protection services.
We recently signed up for a LifeLock Ultimate Plus plan so we could give you an inside look at the sign-up process before you pull out your credit card. We’ll also cover the prices and features of each plan to help you figure out which one is right for you. Let’s dig in!
Our LifeLock dashboard after we purchased our subscription.
LifeLock gave us a lot of plans to choose from — and we liked having the options — but we can see how some people could get overwhelmed. There isn’t a good page on LifeLock’s site to compare all the plans you can choose from. The pages show only the bundles with Norton 360 or the individual LifeLock plans.
FYI: Norton 360 is a bundle of device protection services that includes antivirus software and a VPN. You can install Norton 360 on five, 10, or unlimited devices, depending on the LifeLock tier you bundle it with.
We made a table to compare the prices of every plan. Note that the prices are for the first year if you pay annually.
| LifeLock Standard and Select | LifeLock Advantage | LifeLock Ultimate Plus | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Individual plan | $7.50 per month | $14.99 per month | $19.99 per month |
| 2 adults plan | $12.49 per month | $23.99 per month | $32.99 per month |
| Family plan | $18.49 per month | $29.99 per month | $38.99 per month |
| Individual plan with Norton 360 | $8.33 per month | $16.67 per month | $25.00 per month |
| 2 adults plan with Norton 360 | $13.24 per month | $24.99 per month | $34.99 per month |
| Family plan with Norton 360 | $18.99 per month | $30.99 per month | $40.99 per month |
If you’re not ready to pay for a year up front, expect to pay about twice as much as you would with an annual plan.
When we signed up for our LifeLock plan, we needed to permit LifeLock to obtain our credit data. That made us nervous when we first read it, but all the best credit monitoring and protection services need that permission. Accessing our credit data is how the company monitors our credit for signs of identity theft, so we permitted it. In the same vein, we needed to provide our Social Security number too.
We got a free trial of LifeLock Ultimate Plus to test its capabilities.
We appreciate that Norton LifeLock has a free trial, but we ran into an issue when trying to sign up for it. The first time we tried to get the free trial, we used our Mozilla Firefox browser. When we clicked “Start 30-day trial,” the free trial coupon code wasn’t copying over. Our “Total Due Today” section was the full price of the plan. Had we not checked, our credit card would have been charged.Once we switched to our Chrome browser, the coupon code copied over and we were able to sign up without our card being charged. The coupon code for us was ALL30DF, so if your code won’t copy over, try that to see if it will work.
Pro Tip: You can sign up for LifeLock’s family plan as a free trial. It’s a great way to see how its parental controls can help you keep an eye on how your kids use their devices. Before you sign up, read through our list of the best family identity theft protection services to see if another option would be better for you.
Even though getting the free trial wasn’t as easy as we hoped, we could use it on any plan we wanted. That impressed us. Most companies force you to do a free trial of the highest-priced plan, so you get charged a lot when you forget to cancel the trial before the auto-bill date. But you still can sign up for the premium plan like we did.
Each LifeLock plan has different features, except for the Standard and Select plans. They’re the same plan, except it’s called LifeLock Select instead of LifeLock Standard when bundled with Norton 360. We’re not sure why there’s an inconsistency in naming, and it makes things more confusing when trying to compare plans. They are the same though.
With that in mind, we made a table comparing the features included with each LifeLock plan.
| LifeLock Standard and Select | LifeLock Advantage | LifeLock Ultimate Plus | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Identity and SSN alerts | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Credit monitoring | 1 bureau | 1 bureau | 3 bureaus |
| Insurance for lawyers and experts | $1 million per adult | $1 million per adult | $1 million per adult |
| Personal expense compensation | $25,000 per adults | $100,000 per adult | $1 million per adult |
| Stolen funds reimbursement | $25,000 per adult | $100,000 per adult | $1 million per adult |
| Dark web monitoring | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| TransUnion credit freeze | No | Yes | Yes |
| Fictitious identity monitoring | No | Yes | Yes |
| Bank account activity alerts | No | Yes | Yes |
| 401(k) and investment activity alerts | No | No | Yes |
| Social media monitoring | No | No | Yes |
| Bank account takeover alerts | No | No | Yes |
Since we tested the Ultimate Plus plan, we got to use all the features. We’ll cover the extra features in each plan to make it clear what you can expect. We’ll include screenshots of us using the service, too, so you can see what you’re signing up for.
Here’s what our LifeLock dark web monitoring alert looked like.
To our surprise, the only alert we received when we tested LifeLock was included as a feature in its least expensive plan. Just under two hours after we finished creating our account and activating our subscription, we received an email alert that it found our information on the dark web.
That was impressive, but we wanted to learn more about it. We bought cryptocurrencies as an investment several years back and figured it had to do with that. After clicking the big “Review this activity” button, we were brought to a page describing what was included in the alert, what the alert meant, and how LifeLock found the leak.
LifeLock gave us information on its alerts and how we could minimize our risks.
As you can see from the screenshot of our alert description, LifeLock scans its dark web database that goes back to 2008. That means if any of your information was leaked on the dark web since 2008, like ours was, you’ll be notified and LifeLock will help you take action. Thankfully, the only information that leaked was an old email address we no longer use.
Did You Know? Some identity thieves don’t use your identity themselves. Instead, they sell it on the dark web for someone else to use. Dark web monitoring keeps an eye out for your information on these anonymous marketplaces so you can take actions before your identity gets sold.
On top of dark web monitoring, the Standard and Select plans include identity and Social Security number monitoring. We imagine those alerts would look the same as our dark web alert, but we didn’t receive any. There’s one-bureau credit monitoring and over $1 million in total identity recovery insurance spread across three categories.
The main features you’ll be paying for are the TransUnion Credit Lock and three-bureau credit freeze capabilities.
Credit Lock let us temporarily freeze our credit with a simple toggle.
The Credit Lock feature is unique to LifeLock. It lets you lock your TransUnion credit file at the click of a button. Normally, when you freeze your credit file, it takes time to freeze and unfreeze it. That means if you suddenly need a new line of credit, you’ll need to wait until your credit files unfreeze to apply.
>> Learn About: LifeLock vs. Equifax Comparison 2024: Which Is Best?
With the Credit Lock toggle, we could essentially freeze and unfreeze our TransUnion credit file at the click of a button. To take advantage of that flexibility and maximize our security, we turned on TransUnion Credit Lock and froze our credit file with the other two bureaus. That way, if we need to urgently apply for a new line of credit, we can click off our Credit Lock and find a creditor that accepts TransUnion credit checks to get a credit line immediately.
Freezing our credit files was easy with LifeLock’s help.
Basically, with Credit Lock, you can get the benefits of freezing all your credit files without 90 percent of the drawbacks. You also get fictitious identity monitoring, which keeps an eye out for synthetic identity theft. LifeLock gives alerts for suspicious activity related to your credit, checking, and savings accounts.
The biggest advantage of going with an Ultimate Plus plan is the increased monetary coverage. The $3 million of total coverage per adult stands out in the industry; LifeLock is the only company that offers it. We could get up to $5 million in coverage when we tested Aura’s family plan, but that’s the total coverage for all adults. The Aura plan covers up to five adults, so that’s the industry standard of $1 million per adult. We cover all the differences in our Aura vs. LifeLock comparison.
>> Read More: Best Alternatives to LifeLock Identity Theft Protection
That’s the biggest reason, but it’s far from the only one. We also got access to three-bureau credit monitoring. Some creditors check only one credit bureau when processing a credit check. With three-bureau credit monitoring, suspicious activity gets caught every time. One-bureau credit monitoring can let some small credit checks through.
LifeLock’s Credit Services gave us tips to improve our credit score.
There’s also more monitoring. We can’t think of anything that isn’t monitored with the Ultimate Plus plan. The company even monitored social media for our information. During our time with LifeLock’s Ultimate Plus plan, we felt like our identity was safe.
Any of the LifeLock plans can be bundled with Norton 360. With any of the bundles, you’ll get full access to Norton 360. The only difference is the number of devices the plan supports. Here’s how many devices each plan supports:
It surprised us that they changed the number of supported devices with the LifeLock tier instead of the number of people supported in the LifeLock plan. Even if you get the family Norton 360 with LifeLock Select bundle, your VPN and antivirus still support only five devices. We would rather see five devices supported for all individual plans, 10 devices for all two-adult plans, and unlimited devices for family plans.
We hate to be the bearer of bad news, but right now LifeLock doesn’t have any special pricing — just the usual discount for an annual subscription. That discount is steep though. It’s up to 51 percent on some plans, such as the Norton 360 with LifeLock Select family plan.
Just because there aren’t deals right now doesn’t mean the company never has deals. When we rounded up last year’s LifeLock Black Friday sales, Norton 360 with LifeLock Select was 61 percent off instead of the normal 44 percent. During LifeLock’s Cyber Monday sale, the company offered 10 percent off all plans whether you pay annually or monthly.
Yes, LifeLock is a leader in the identity theft protection industry. Its services make up over 15 percent of the entire industry’s revenue 1, but just because a company is big doesn’t mean it stays ahead in terms of technology and service. LifeLock stays ahead in all categories, although the cost reflects it.
In terms of technology, LifeLock offers unique features. Its fictitious identity monitoring tackles one of the latest types of identity theft — synthetic identity theft. It also has a Credit Lock feature that lets you freeze and unfreeze your TransUnion credit file at the click of a button.
FYI: LifeLock offers protections for children with its family plans. The protections aren’t as strong as the adult protections, but they’re still better than most. They give you identity and Social Security number alerts and over $1 million in total identity theft coverage. We rounded up five child identity theft statistics every parent should know so you can better understand the risks.
For service, it’s the only company offering up to $3 million in total identity theft coverage.
We’ve all heard about LifeLock at this point, whether for good reasons or bad.
About a decade ago, the CEO decided to share his personal information in an ad as a way to show the efficacy of the service. It didn’t work as well as he promised, though, and the company had to pay a fine. He promised it was 100 percent effective when a 100 percent effective identity theft protection service is impossible. LifeLock has since reined in its extravagant advertising methods and hasn’t had any other legal issues. Check out our guide to identity theft protection services for more details on why the services are never 100 percent effective.
LifeLock has been around for almost two decades, so it’s an established name in the industry. It has built up its reputation over the years, so now we know what we can expect: protected data with no reported data breaches, quality identity theft protection services, and up to $3 million in identity theft coverage.
When looking at LifeLock as a whole, we think it offers solid value. It provides a top-tier service at a top-tier price. We couldn’t find any other service that offers up to $3 million in coverage, and it monitors a few areas we don’t often see, such as fictitious identities and 401(k) activity.
If you’re on a budget, though, you’ll get more out of a service like Identity Guard. Its plans start at $6.67 per month for individuals or $10 per month for families, which includes five adults and unlimited kids. For comparison, LifeLock’s family plan supports two adults and five kids while starting at $18.49 per month. Both plans provide $1 million in coverage with similar capabilities. Check out our review of Identity Guard to see if the budget option is right for you.
>> Learn More: LifeLock vs. Identity Guard Comparison
For anyone who wants top-tier protection and has the budget for one of LifeLock’s premium plans, we don’t think there’s better protection.
Norton 360 keeps devices like smartphones and laptops virus- and malware-free. It also includes a VPN, ad-blocker, anonymous browsing tool, PC SafeCam, and a cloud backup system for PCs.
You can protect up to five devices on the Norton 360 with LifeLock Select plan and an unlimited number of devices on the Ultimate Plus plan.
All LifeLock plans include $1 million in coverage for attorneys and experts used in identity theft recovery. Each plan also includes coverage for personal expenses and stolen funds related to identity theft. The coverage in here starts at $25,000 each and grows to $1 million with LifeLock’s top
No. LifeLock is designed to keep you aware of potential threats and ring the alarm when fraud takes place. However, you can limit your risk of being an identity theft victim by doing things like using strong passwords and shredding personal documents.
Technically, you don’t need any monitoring at all — but we recommend you have it! Monitoring your credit helps you spot fraud fast. Most of the time, the three major bureaus see the same things. However, it’s possible for financial activity to be reported to just one or two of the three bureaus. So we recommend springing for three-bureau monitoring for extra coverage and peace of mind.
IBIS World. 2024. Nortonlifelock Inc. – Company Profile.
https://www.ibisworld.com/us/company/nortonlifelock-inc/10097/
