General sign in feedback
I'd like to give some general feedback. In general, it worked what I tried to do. No complaints.
Devices used:
- Windows 11 desktop
- Android 13 phone
- Windows 11 remote desktop (accessed with rdp)
First, I created a new beta test account on the website. A passkey was created with Windows hello on the local PC, I was able to verify its existence in the Windows 11 passkey configuration.
I don't remember if the 1password browser extension offered to save the passkey in my regular 1password account. If it did, I declined and Windows Hello popped up.
Some tests proved I was able to use the passkey to login. Windows hello asked for the Hello pin and it logged me in.
Then I sign in to the desktop app. I don't remember how I did it, so it worked without problem. I guess I used the "sign in with passkey" option, since the passkey was already present on the PC.
Then I tried to sign in to the beta account on my Android.
Scanning the setup code from the PC didn't work. The Android app just didn't respond as if there was no setup code. Trying to use the setup code for my regular account worked immediately, so it's something in the app, not something with monitor and camera.
Then I tried the "sign in with passkey" option. It tried to find a passkey, but there wasn't any, so it failed. I searched the blog post and other 1password documentation about how to do this, but I found nothing. I knew I had to somehow push the passkey to the Android smartphone. But how? I went to the new "Authorization" feature of the beta account and tried to create a new passkey. I detected Windows offered creating a passkey on a mobile device. I did this, and a passkey was created on the Android phone, associated with the beta 1Password account.
Then I retried signing in with the beta account on the Android phone and was successful.
It took quite some time to be successful, because I tried different things that failed, I only report which of my findings were successful. In retrospect it's straightforward, but you have to know what to do.
Unlocking the Android app seems to actually use the passkey, since the dialog to authorize with passkey is different to the dialog to unlock an account secured with password.
Then I tried to sign in to 1password on my rdp desktop, which is some Windows 11 VM for testing and practicing purposes.
Windows Hello isn't working through rdp, so I expected this to fail.
But to my surprise rdp seems to have some passkey passthrough feature, because when I tried to just sign in with passkey, Windows Hello on my local PC popped up and asked for my pin, then providing the locally stored passkey to the remote VM. I was signed in. Unlocking later also works the same way. Mission accomplished!
I also created a passkey for the beta account in 1Password itself, so it's being synchronized to other devices. However, the only use for this I guess is to login to 1password.com with the browser extension already signed in and unlocked. In all other cases, for signing in, you're caught in a circular dependency.
If I decline the browser extension login offer, Windows Hello offers its passkey.
From what I see, it's working, and it's working good if all your devices support passkeys. If one of your devices don't support passkeys, the whole feature is useless for all devices, since you're not offered a password as alternative sign in / unlock.
For me, I thought rdp would be the show stopper - if rdp didn't work, I would not consider unlocking with passkeys a real alternative today. But it worked, so if unlocking with passkeys is out of beta, I will seriously consider switching.
1Password Version: 1Password for Windows 8.10.24 (81024016)
Extension Version: 2.19.15
OS Version: Windows 11
Browser: Chrome
