The PayPal website is getting support for signing in with a password on Apple devices.

PayPal website authentication using password technology works on iPhone, iPad, and Mac in the US, with other countries coming later.

• What is happening? PayPal is one of the first major services to be the first to roll out support for the new passwordless login method on Apple devices.
• Why care? Passkey technology makes online accounts like PayPal more secure by forgoing a password in favor of cryptographic key pairs.
• What to do? Update your iPhone, iPad, and Mac to iOS 16, iPadOS 16.1, and macOS Ventura, respectively, to be able to use passwords in Safari.

PayPal uses passwords to login

The official announcement was published on October 25, 2022 in the PayPal Newsroom. The secure access token option is currently available on the PayPal mobile and desktop website for US customers.

The company says it plans to roll out passkey support on non-Apple platforms to its mobile app and other countries in early 2023.

Passkey technology makes PayPal more secure by replacing the password with something much harder to crack: cryptographic keys. Instead of entering a password, you simply scan your face or finger for biometric verification, that’s all!

More security for your PayPal account

Apple supports passkeys for iPhone, iPad, and Mac as long as those devices are running iOS 16.0, iPadOS 16.1, and macOS Ventura, respectively.

Access keys are not exclusive to Apple. It is an industry-wide security standard based on the FIDO Alliance and W3C standards supported by industry heavyweights.

You can see the passcodes in action on the Apple ID website – go to appleid.apple.com in Safari on your iPhone and click the Sign In button.

How to enable a password to login to PayPal.com

You’ll need to manually enable password entry for PayPal.com by signing in to PayPal.com for mobile or PC using Safari on an iPhone with iOS 16.0 or later, an iPad with iPadOS 16.1 or later, or a Mac with macOS Ventura or later.

If it’s not present, look for the option to create a password on login, find it in your PayPal settings. With the passkey enabled, you will be signed in to PayPal.com by authenticating with Touch ID or Face ID instead of entering your PayPal password.

How Access Technology Works

Passkeys are stored securely on your iPhone, iPad or Mac and synced with end-to-end encryption to other devices via iCloud. The private key is stored locally and never leaves the device while the public key is on the server.

These cryptographic keys are almost impossible to crack. They cannot be easily phished like passwords through brute force. In addition, passwords are not leaked when a server is hacked and cannot be reused or on unauthenticated devices.

With this technology, you can even log into the web application on your computer if you have already saved the password on your iPhone.

When will the PayPal app use passwords?

Passkey support will be coming to the PayPal mobile app [ App Store link ] in early 2023.

When will PayPal support access codes in other countries?

In early 2023, PayPal will expand password support to additional countries.

When will PayPal support access keys on other platforms?

PayPal will introduce password support on other platforms as soon as they complete the necessary installation work and provide support for the technology. Google, for example, already supports passwords in Android and Chrome.

Microsoft is working on adding password support to Windows in the near future.