In 2025, secrets management faces both traditional and new challenges, with the rise of AI and automation significantly increasing the complexity of managing non-human identities and ephemeral tokens. This evolution necessitates advanced tools that can handle modern infrastructure's security needs while adhering to tighter compliance frameworks like SOC 2 and ISO 27001. The blog post discusses six top secrets management tools, each tailored for different use cases, including developer-first environments, enterprise compliance, hybrid setups, and Kubernetes and CI/CD workflows. Doppler stands out for its developer-centric features and ease of use, while HashiCorp Vault offers robust security controls ideal for enterprises. Infisical provides an open-source alternative with flexibility in self-hosting, and Akeyless offers a vaultless architecture suitable for hybrid environments. The post also highlights the importance of choosing a tool that supports effective secrets management practices, emphasizing the need for rotation, access controls, and a robust audit trail to prevent security gaps.