AI was the main focus of the Google I/O keynote this year, but there are still a bunch of new feature updates hidden in the various developer sessions. Case in point, 9to5Google spotted that Android 15 and Wear OS 5 are going to get some convenient passkey updates.
In its “Passkeys and identity best practices” dev session, Google announced that Android 15 is going to get a single-tap sign-in process. Instead of having two separate screens — one to select an account and another for a biometric prompt — Google will merge them into a single screen.
The end result is you’ll be able to just use your face, finger, or any other screen unlocking method to log in to an account. For devs, this will be automatically supported in new versions of Credential Manager on Android 15 or higher. Another update is that Autofill will also display Credential Manager results in Gboard. That includes passwords, passkeys, and Sign in with Google.
Another neat update is it’ll get easier to log back in to your apps if you buy a new device thanks to a new “Restore” passkey feature for phones and tablets. An app will be able to save a restore key to Credential Manager. That key is then stored locally on the device, and if cloud backups are enabled, it can be automatically transferred over to the new device. In a nutshell, users won’t have to log into each app one by one.
Passkeys are also coming to Wear OS 5 in a quarterly platform release. That will allow you to use either passkeys, passwords, or Sign in with Google straight from the wrist. Google says this capability will also work with third-party password managers, naming Dashlane as one example. The Apple Watch already has some of these authentication features, so it’s nice to see Google continue to even the playing field for Android smartwatch users.
