“Touchless” entry at airport security

Oh wow, that sounds nice! I already added my passport to my wallet, but will need to make sure my husband does that as well. Thanks!

Wait how do you add your passport to your digital wallet? I am unfamiliar with this! Is there a website to get a digital version?

It has nothing to do with your digital wallet. To get Touchless TSA you have to:

1) Have TSA Precheck

2) Have your passport information stored in your airline's profile

3) Opt in via your airline.

It's only available at some airports and with some airlines.

https://www.tsa.gov/touchless-id

Hey, solofemaletraveler, here is a link to something I posted a few weeks ago about adding a digital passport to your digital wallet.

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/tech-tips/digital-passport-in-apple-wallet-is-now-available

There’s also mention of it for Google wallet as well.

Frank, you’re right. I must’ve misread that. I do know the important thing is to opt in.

Here are the specific instructions for that:

Select “OPT IN” on your profile or at airline check-in: American Airlines, Alaska Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Southwest Airlines, United Airlines

Although I do think having a digital passport in your digital wallet is a good idea. 😊

A bit of a tangent but boarded a United flight in Houston to Oaxaca, Mexico and didn’t have to show either a boarding pass or a passport at the gate. They used facial recognition.

PS: Weather on Sanibel last week total crap one day, hope you do better.

Thanks for posting this information as well as the other post about putting your passport in your digital wallet. I've bookmarked since I don't use a digital wallet currently. It's just me needing to get used to having financial information on my phone.....troglodyte, I know.

I have used this a couple of times at Atlanta when I have stayed there overnight before heading on to Tulsa.

But I really do not remember opting in. I just noticed the other lane a couple of times, then noticed once it was printed on my boarding pass and tried it.

That is so cool, Mardee! Thanks for sharing your experience.

Kim--I was reading this to my husband and told him I would do his for him. He was already opted in, and he has no idea how that happened.

I was curious to see how this and Clear were different, and Google had a good description of how the two work best together. Hopefully my husband will pay attention this week when he flies to see how it works.

Thanks for this tip and on another thread the tip for storing DL information in our Wallets. We did both this morning but my DL wasn’t verified yet, 4 hours and counting, although my husband's verification happened within minutes. I see that my local airport doesn’t use the Touchless feature yet but our big international airport does. I too hate having to dig my DL out of its zippered, tethered pocket at the airport while juggling the phone with boarding passes and my hand luggage. It will be nice to have at least two things quickly accessible on my phone.

Thanks, Mardee! I have no idea when I will travel again, but I will update my profile in the Delta app to opt in.

ETA: I was already opted in!

With more airports coming online with TSA Touchless Precheck Clear may be losing customers.

I was automatically opted in as well. I just looked!

Good to know how it worked! I had to opt in for AA on my account profile, but haven’t flown since doing so.

I went to my Delta profile this morning on my laptop and see I am automatically opted in. I could not find it by going in through the Delta App on my iPad Mini last night but going in via the website this morning it was right there.

It’s not in my Delta app either. I did toggle “facial recognition” on in my profile for what that is worth.

Toggled on in AA app, easy to find.

Edit: As noted above easy to find in delta.com profile if missing in app.

My son got back in the US (MSP) last night with just facial recognition. He said it was so quick.

BAH! Was going to add touchless ID to my Southwest account but epic fail. Won’t accept passport scan because “gender does not match account.” (Gender is null in profile). Can’t add a gender to account profile without uploading a birth certificate scan. BAH! Will never get done.

mnannie, that's great! It was so nice to just walk past everyone else standing in line!

For anyone who's having trouble finding it on the Delta website, you just need to go to your profile, click on Personal Details and scroll down towards the bottom. It's right below Passport Info.

was curious to see how this and Clear were different, and Google had a good description of how the two work best together. Hopefully my husband will pay attention this week when he flies to see how it works

Clear is more expensive and has longer lines

Honestly clear is a huge waste of money and I used to get it for free and quit letting my credit card company pay for it because why should they waste their money on this lousy service?

Just to give you an example, I flew to St. Louis a few weeks ago on a Friday afternoon. By a miracle of travel when I got to the pre-check lines in Atlanta there were about three people in the regular pre-check line, there was nobody in the touchless line and there was nobody in the clear line. I get into the touchless line and a woman beside me goes into clear so I tracked it. I was through the screener before she got to starting to get her luggage through the screening. it also appeared that the regular pre-check line which had three people in it would have been faster than clear. Save your money. They don’t work best together unless you just want to give away cash and be in longer lines.

Per this article from Afar, touchless entry is currently available at 15 airports but increasing to 65 this year. Delta and United passengers can opt in and it is available to some Alaska Airlines passengers.

https://www.afar.com/magazine/tsa-expanding-facial-recognition?utm_campaign=mb&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_source=morning_brew

Delta and United passengers can opt in and it is available to some Alaska Airlines passengers.

Noting that the American and Southwest apps allow “opting in” right now so doesn’t seem to be airline restricted.

Also noting from my flight last week that United is already using touchless boarding for international flights (no showing passports or boarding passes) which I find the more valuable service.

Carol--Your experience and mine are very different. Here at SEA, Clear has been great for us with significantly shorter lines. When I fly out of Denver, it is the same thing.I think this just shows that every airport is different, and even times of day. For us, Clear is worth it and it is a bonus that our Amex covers it.

A few things to note....

Touchless TSA is primarily available to passengers on five airlines--Alaska, American, Delta, Southwest and United.

Touchless boarding has nothing to do with Touchless TSA. Many airlines are using touchless boarding to save time as well as to match stored passport information. It's basically just facial recognition.

Most people don't realize that facial recognition is used in many airports to scan just about anyone looking for "bad guys."

Today was a win one and lose one situation for me. I was able to get my DL to upload to my wallet after I cancelled the attempt from 2 days ago and resubmitted. However, when I tried to activate my touchless ID into my SWA profile I got the same error message as Toby upthread. I don’t dare call SWA today with all of their winter storm related flight rebookings going on today ahead of this weekend’s weather affecting about 1/4 of the country.

Toby: BAH! Was going to add touchless ID to my Southwest account but epic fail. Won’t accept passport scan because “gender does not match account.” (Gender is null in profile). Can’t add a gender to account profile without uploading a birth certificate scan. BAH! Will never get done.

Update for Touchless entry. After running into the same message as Toby about the gender not matching and not being able to add a gender in my Profile, I called SWA! It took less than 5 minutes for someone to answer. She was able to add a gender for me and when I logged out and back in again on the SWA app I could see that field was populated. I uploaded the passport information again and it said OK, upload successful. The agent wanted to stay on the line with me until she was sure it fixed the problem because she said it would give her a little break from all of the other calls she was fielding today 🥶

Mona: Thanks will give it a try.

Yesterday had a domestic flight in Mexico and had to show passport + boarding pass at security and then the same again at boarding. Will appreciate the day when both are touchless.

Hi,

I use exclusively United now , ie since the pandemic, in spite of its negatives. No more Southwest.

Thanks for the updated info, good to know. I don't have Touchless TSA and just show the boarding pass and the passport when asked. I'm not in any hurry to get through Security and all that as I get to SFO close to 4 hours prior to dep. anyway, easy by public transport, a straight shot on BART.

Gute Reise und viel Spaß dabei !

The benefits from clear are likely to be airport and time of day dependent. During quieter times at San Francisco it saves me just a little time. Weekday afternoon at JFK in New York…..big time saver. Regular security line at T4 was looooong. Reminded me of a Disney park. Regular Precheck probably 50 to 60 people in line. Clear about 8 and I was through in less than 10 minutes.