456 Million Amazon Customers Have Enrolled in Passkeys

Amazon announced today that over 456 million customers have enrolled in passkeys, a 75 percent gain year-over-year (YOY).

“Passkeys are one of the most useful changes in user auth security in the last 10 years,” Amazon CSO Stephen Schmidt writes. “465 million of our customers agree, and not necessarily because passkeys really improve their account security (although they do), it’s because the user experience with passkeys is SOOOOOOO much better.”

Amazon’s announcement is tied to today’s celebration of World Passkey Day, which Schmidt points out used to be called World Password Day. The renaming is tied to the importance of this shift from passwords to passkeys, he says.

“The challenge with security has always been the tradeoff,” he explains. “Stronger security usually means a worse experience for the customer. Better usability usually means weaker protections. Passkeys break that pattern. Customers sign in with a fingerprint, face scan, or device PIN the same way they unlock their phone. There’s nothing to remember and nothing that can be phished or guessed. And our data shows customers sign in six times faster than with a username and password. That’s better security and a better experience, and it’s why we’ve invested so heavily here.”

Schmidt says this places us well on our way to a passworldless future, and I have to agree. It’s long overdue, and excellent progress.