Trust & Will vs. Empathy: Which Platform is Right for You?

When researching estate planning and end-of-life support tools, you may encounter both Trust & Will and Empathy. While they share a commitment to supporting families through difficult moments, the two platforms are built around fundamentally different purposes, and understanding that distinction matters when choosing where to invest.

Overview: What Each Platform Offers

Empathy is a platform designed to help families both prepare for and navigate loss. Its flagship product is bereavement support, helping survivors manage the practical and emotional tasks that follow a loved one's death. Through LifeVault, Empathy also offers estate planning document creation for pre-loss planning. Both products are distributed through life insurance carriers and employers, not available for direct purchase.

Trust & Will is a comprehensive estate planning and settlement platform built for individuals, families, and enterprise partners. We offer attorney-backed, state-specific documents, a guided consumer experience, and partner tools designed to help families prepare before a loss, with Probate and settlement support available when it's needed.

Key Differences at a Glance

Both platforms serve families navigating significant life events, but at very different stages of the journey. Here's how they compare:

Pricing

• Trust & Will offers transparent pricing, including a Will Plans starting at ($199), Trust Plan starting at ($499), and optional Attorney Support ($299) for the year. Probate Concierge and Probate Attorney plans are also available.

• Empathy is not available for direct purchase. Access depends on whether your employer or life insurance carrier has a partnership with the platform.

Business model and intended audience

• Trust & Will serves both consumers and partner institutions. Our estate planning tools are built to help families prepare in advance, so loved ones could be better prepared before a loss occurs.

• Empathy is distributed exclusively through insurance and employer partners. Its core product is post-loss bereavement support, though LifeVault extends its offering into pre-loss estate planning for institutional partners.

Product and user experience

• Trust & Will delivers a guided, consumer-first planning experience shaped by 1 million+ users. Families can complete attorney-backed wills, trusts, and healthcare documents at their own pace.

• Empathy offers a post-loss support experience: task lists, bereavement coaching, document organization, and estate settlement assistance. Through LifeVault, it also offers a guided document creation tool for wills and trusts, accessible through institutional partners.

Legal oversight and compliance

• Trust & Will documents are attorney-vetted, state-specific, and maintained by in-house legal experts. Optional attorney review is available to members.

• Empathy's core product is post-loss settlement support and guidance. Through LifeVault, Empathy also offers attorney-designed, state-specific document creation for wills and trusts, accessible through institutional partners. Unlike Trust & Will, Empathy does not offer optional Attorney Support.

Support model

• Trust & Will offers dedicated partner support, member support via chat, phone, and email, and optional attorney guidance. Our Probate services include a dedicated case manager.

• Empathy offers post-loss support on the consumer level through a dedicated Care Team, including personalized care plans, grief support, and hands-on help with logistics like closing accounts and navigating probate.

Settlement support

• Trust & Will offers Probate services with dedicated case managers, helping families navigate estate settlement with both guidance and document support.

• Empathy provides task-based settlement guidance and executor support, but does not include the legal document backbone or attorney network that a full probate service requires.

Privacy, security, and reporting

• Trust & Will is SOC 2 certified, uses AES-256 encryption, and provides partners with analytics dashboards.

• Empathy is SOC 2 Type II certified and uses SSL encryption. Partner-level reporting capabilities are not prominently detailed in public documentation.

Why Families and Institutions Choose Trust & Will

1. Plan before it's needed

The most meaningful thing you can do for your family is put a plan in place before it's needed. Trust & Will helps families get ahead of loss, not just navigate it after the fact.

2. One platform for the full journey

Trust & Will supports families through every stage: planning documents, secure storage, ongoing updates, and Probate and settlement support. There's no need to piece together multiple tools.

3. Attorney-backed documents

Our documents are reviewed and maintained by estate planning attorneys, updated for state-specific legal requirements, and designed to hold up when they matter most.

4. Accessible to anyone

Because Trust & Will is available directly to consumers, not gated behind an insurance policy, any family can start a plan today, regardless of their existing benefits or provider relationships.

The Bottom Line

We hope these Trust & Will vs. Empathy reviews helped clarify how the two platforms differ. Empathy offers a genuinely compassionate post-loss support experience, and for families who have just lost a loved one, that kind of guidance can be invaluable. But it doesn't replace the estate plan that could have been in place beforehand.

For individuals and families looking to protect their loved ones before a loss occurs, and for partners who want to deliver that kind of forward-looking benefit, Trust & Will is designed to do exactly that.

Trust & Will makes estate planning simple so you can create a customized, state-specific plan from the comfort of your own home. Take our free quiz to discover which estate plan best fits your needs today, to secure your family’s future.

Is there a question here we didn’t answer? Browse more topics in our learn center, visit our Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page, or chat with our member support!

Trust & Will is an online service providing legal forms and information. We are not a law firm and we do not provide legal advice.