Most people have a rough idea of what a physical estate looks like. Property. Savings. A pension. Maybe some investments. Things you can point to, value, and hand over to someone else.

What most people haven't thought about is the digital version. The accounts. The passwords. The photos. The messages. The subscriptions still billing a card that nobody will cancel. The cryptocurrency sitting in a wallet with no recovery phrase written down anywhere.

Digital estates are messier than physical ones, less visible, and far easier to lose permanently. A house can be found. A bank account can be traced through probate. But a Gmail account with no password left behind, or a Bitcoin wallet with no seed phrase, is simply gone.

This checklist exists to help you sort yours out. It is not complicated. It does not require a solicitor. It requires an afternoon and the willingness to think about something that most people keep putting off.

Work through it in sections. Come back to it once a year to update it.

Before you start — one important principle

The goal is not to create a document that lives on your laptop and that nobody will ever find.

The goal is to create organised, up-to-date information that the right people can access when they need it — and that is secure enough that it cannot be misused in the meantime.

Keep that tension in mind throughout. Too accessible means it is a security risk. Too locked away means it is useless. The checklist below will help you find the right balance.

Section 1 — Financial accounts

These are the highest priority. Money is traceable through probate, but only if people know where to look. Accounts that nobody knows about can remain unclaimed indefinitely.

For each financial account, record:

  • Institution name (bank, building society, investment platform, pension provider)
  • Type of account (current, savings, ISA, SIPP, stocks and shares, cash)
  • Approximate balance or value
  • How to access it — the email address used to register, and where the password can be found
  • Whether there is a nominated beneficiary already in place

Accounts to cover:

  • Current accounts
  • Savings accounts
  • ISAs (cash and stocks and shares)
  • Workplace pension
  • Personal pension or SIPP
  • Investment accounts (Vanguard, Hargreaves Lansdown, Trading 212, etc.)
  • Premium Bonds
  • Shares held directly
  • Cryptocurrency (see Section 5)
  • PayPal or other payment wallets
  • Any joint accounts

Also note:

  • Life insurance — policy number, provider, and who the beneficiary is
  • Any outstanding loans or debts the estate will need to settle

Section 2 — Email accounts

Email is often where the trail to everything else begins. Bank statements, pension correspondence, subscription receipts, legal documents — the inbox of a primary email account holds the map to most of a digital life.

For each email account:

  • Email address
  • Provider (Gmail, Outlook, Apple Mail, Yahoo, etc.)
  • Password location
  • Two-factor authentication method — is it tied to a phone number or an authenticator app? If the phone is lost, how can 2FA be recovered?
  • Recovery codes if applicable

Legacy features to set up:

  • Google Inactive Account Manager — nominate a trusted contact to receive data or be notified after a period of inactivity. Go to myaccount.google.com → Data & Privacy → Make a plan for your digital legacy.
  • Apple Legacy Contact — allows a nominated person to access your Apple ID data after your death. Go to Settings → [Your Name] → Password & Security → Legacy Contact.
  • Microsoft — no built-in legacy feature, but family members can request data access through a formal bereavement process.

If you use a password manager, note its name, the master password location, and any emergency access contacts you have set up.

Section 3 — Cloud storage and photos

For most people this is the most emotionally significant section. Photographs. Videos. Documents. Years of memories stored somewhere in the cloud that could become permanently inaccessible without the right credentials.

For each cloud storage service:

  • Service name (iCloud, Google Photos, OneDrive, Dropbox, Google Drive, etc.)
  • Login details and password location
  • What is stored there — give a brief description so your family knows what to look for
  • Whether a Legacy Contact has been set up (Apple) or Inactive Account Manager (Google)

Additional steps worth taking:

  • Download your most important photos to a physical hard drive at least once a year. Cloud services can close accounts, change policies, or become inaccessible. A physical backup is yours permanently.
  • Consider printing a selection of the most important photos. It sounds old-fashioned. It is also insurance against every kind of digital failure simultaneously.

Section 4 — Social media

Social media accounts are often the most visible part of someone's digital presence after they die, and the part that families find most difficult to navigate.

For each account:

  • Platform name
  • Username or profile URL
  • Whether you want the account memorialised, deleted, or left alone
  • Login details if relevant

Platform-specific options:

  • Facebook — set a Legacy Contact in Settings → General → Memorialisation Settings. This person can manage your memorialised profile. Alternatively, note that you want the account deleted.
  • Instagram — same Legacy Contact option as Facebook, managed through Meta accounts.
  • Twitter/X — no legacy feature. Either leave login details or note that you want the account deleted.
  • LinkedIn — no legacy feature. Note whether you want the account removed.
  • TikTok, Snapchat, others — note your preference for deletion.

One practical suggestion: if there are posts or content on your social media accounts that you want preserved — photos, videos, things you have shared over the years — download them now. Most platforms have a data download feature in their settings. Do not assume your family will be able to access them later.

Section 5 — Cryptocurrency and digital assets

This section deserves extra attention. Unlike every other account on this list, cryptocurrency held in a self-custody wallet has no recovery path if the access details are lost. There is no customer service. There is no frozen-funds process. There is no court order that can unlock a wallet.

If you hold cryptocurrency, the access information needs to be stored somewhere secure and discoverable by the right person after your death. This is not optional.

For each cryptocurrency holding:

  • Type of cryptocurrency (Bitcoin, Ethereum, etc.)
  • Approximate value
  • Where it is held — exchange (Coinbase, Binance, Kraken) or self-custody wallet
  • If on an exchange: account email, password location, and 2FA recovery details
  • If in a self-custody wallet: wallet name, seed phrase location, and any passphrase
  • Hardware wallet details if applicable — device location, PIN, and seed phrase

A note on seed phrases: Never photograph a seed phrase and store it in cloud storage. Never email it to yourself. Write it down on paper and store it somewhere physically secure — a fireproof safe, a solicitor's sealed letter, or an encrypted vault with a separate delivery mechanism. The seed phrase is the wallet. Whoever holds it controls the funds.

Also cover:

  • NFTs or other digital collectibles
  • Domain names with monetary value
  • Any other blockchain-based assets

Section 6 — Subscriptions and recurring payments

Less urgent than the above, but worth covering. Active subscriptions will keep billing until cancelled. If your family doesn't know they exist, they may continue for months.

Create a list of:

  • Streaming services (Netflix, Spotify, Amazon Prime, Disney+, Apple TV+, etc.)
  • Software subscriptions (Adobe, Microsoft 365, etc.)
  • News and magazine subscriptions
  • Insurance policies paid monthly
  • Any other regular direct debits or card charges

Note which card or account each subscription is billed to. When that account is eventually closed as part of estate administration, subscriptions attached to it will cancel automatically — but knowing in advance saves confusion.

Section 7 — Legal and practical signposts

This is the information that transforms bereavement from a bureaucratic nightmare into something manageable. A single page of this information is worth more than almost anything else on this list.

Record the following:

  • Location of your will — physical copy and/or digital copy
  • Solicitor name and contact details
  • Executor name(s) and contact details
  • Accountant name and contact details
  • Financial adviser name and contact details
  • Employer HR contact (for death in service benefits)
  • Any outstanding legal matters
  • Mortgage provider and account number
  • Property deeds location
  • Vehicle registration documents location
  • Passport and driving licence location
  • National Insurance number
  • NHS number
  • Any specialist medical information relevant to end-of-life care

Section 8 — Personal messages and wishes

This is the section most people skip. It is also the section that matters most to the people left behind.

You do not have to write much. You do not have to be eloquent. You just have to write something.

Consider including:

  • A letter to your partner or closest person
  • Individual notes to children or other family members
  • Any specific wishes for your funeral or memorial
  • Any wishes about how you want to be remembered
  • Anything you have wanted to say but never quite got around to saying

These do not expire. They do not go out of date the way passwords do. Once written, they are done — and they are, by a considerable distance, the thing that families are most grateful to find.

Keeping it up to date

A digital estate plan that was accurate three years ago and has not been touched since is better than nothing — but only just.

Passwords change. Accounts are opened and closed. Subscriptions come and go. The seed phrase for a new wallet needs to be added. A letter that no longer reflects how you feel needs to be updated.

Set a reminder once a year — your birthday is a reasonable prompt — to go through the checklist and update anything that has changed. It takes less than an hour if you have done it properly the first time.

Where to store it

This is the question the whole checklist hinges on.

A document on your laptop is better than nothing. It is not encrypted. It is not delivered automatically. It relies on someone finding the laptop, accessing it, and knowing to look for the document. But it is a start.

A printed document in a fireproof safe is better. Physical security, no digital attack surface. Still relies on someone knowing where the safe is and having access to it.

A sealed letter with your solicitor is a reasonable option for the most sensitive information. Professional, legally recognised, physically secure. Does not update itself when your passwords change.

A dedicated digital estate service handles all of this properly — encryption, regular updates, automatic delivery to the right people at the right time. No relying on someone knowing where to look. No relying on a document being found. Just a vault that reaches the people you chose, when it needs to.

Whatever you choose, the most important thing is this: the information you have put together in this checklist needs a delivery mechanism. It needs to reach the right people at the right moment. Without that, it is just a document.

The conversation worth having

There is one more thing this checklist cannot do for you.

Hand someone a key.

Not a lengthy explanation. Not a tour of every service and platform involved. Just a key — a password, a phrase, a code — given quietly to the person you trust most. Your partner. Your executor. Your closest family member.

Tell them it is important. Tell them to keep it safe. Tell them they will know what to do with it when the time comes.

You do not need to explain the systems behind it. You do not need to walk them through how anything works. If you have used an encrypted vault service, the delivery will explain itself when it arrives. If you have stored everything in a secure location, the key is all they need to open it.

The simpler the handover, the more likely it is to actually happen. A long conversation about platforms and processes is easy to put off. Passing someone a phrase and asking them to remember it takes thirty seconds.

That conversation is uncomfortable to start. It is considerably less uncomfortable than the alternative — which is leaving the people you love to find the door without ever having been given a key.