Add an Additional Passkey
This guide demonstrates how to add a new credential (specifically, a passkey) to an existing wallet using the Turnkey SDK.
Initialize the Passkey Client
Begin by initializing the Turnkey SDK by passing in a config object containing:
rpId
: The Relying Party Identifier, which is the effective domain of your application.apiBaseUrl
: The base URL of the Turnkey API:https://api.turnkey.com
defaultOrganizationId
: Your parent organization ID, which you can find in the Turnkey dashboard.
First, wrap your application with the TurnkeyProvider
in your app/layout.tsx
file:
Then, create a new file app/add-passkey.tsx
where we’ll implement the passkey functionality:
First, wrap your application with the TurnkeyProvider
in your app/layout.tsx
file:
Then, create a new file app/add-passkey.tsx
where we’ll implement the passkey functionality:
Create a new file src/add-passkey.ts
:
Authenticate the User
Now that that the Passkey Client is initialized, we’ll call the login
function which will prompt the user to authenticate with their passkey. Additionally, this function will set the current user in local storage upon successful authentication, which will be used later when creating an additional authenticator.
The user object which gets stored in local storage is defined as follows:
Get the current user
Before creating a new passkey, we’ll get the current user. This function will retrieve the user from local storage, which was set after calling the login
function. We’ll need the userId
to create the authenticator in the final step.
Create User Passkey
Now that you have authenticated the user, you can call the createUserPasskey
function to create a new user passkey credential. Calling this method will prompt the user to create a passkey, which will be securely stored by their browser. This credential will be associated with the user’s account and used for future authentication. Once the credential is created, we’ll use it in the next step to create a new authenticator for the user.
The credential includes an encoded challenge and attestation. The encoded challenge ensures the request is fresh and legitimate, while the attestation verifies the authenticity of the device creating the credential. For more information on how passkeys work, including details on the challenge and attestation objects, you can refer to the Passkeys Documentation.
Add the credential to the wallet
Now that you have created a new user passkey credential, we’ll use this credential to create a new passkey authenticator for the user. We’ll need the userId to create the authenticator, so we’ll get the current user first. This value comes from local storage which was set in the previous step when the user successfully authenticated via the login
function.
Optional: Read/Write Sessions
In some cases, you may want to create a read/write session for the user to reduce the number of passkey prompts. This session can be used instead of the passkey to sign requests to Turnkey’s API to improve the user experience.
In the this tutorial we used the passkey to authenticate the request to create a new authenticator. The result is that the user will be prompted 3 times:
- To login
- To create the new passkey
- To authenticate the request to create a new authenticator
By creating a read/write session, we can reduce the number of passkey prompts to 2:
- To login and create a session
- To authenticate the request to create a new authenticator
To create a read/write session, we simply replace passkeyClient.login()
with passkeyClient.loginWithReadwriteSession()
:
Assuming the login is successful, a read/write session object will be stored in local storage. We’ll use the stored session in conjunction with the iframe client to authenticate the create authenticator request.
We’ll use the active client returned from the useTurnkey
hook which will be initialized with the read/write session. The rest of the code remains the same.
We’ll use the active client returned from the useTurnkey
hook which will be initialized with the read/write session. The rest of the code remains the same.
1. Initialize the iframe client
We’ll create a new function to initialize the iframe client and inject the read/write session.
When using the TypeScript SDK, you’ll need to ensure that the HTML element exists somewhere in the rendered DOM.
2. Update the addPasskey
function
We’ll update the addPasskey
function to use the iframe client to authenticate the request to create a new authenticator.
Conclusion
In this guide, we’ve walked through the process of adding a new credential to an existing wallet using the Turnkey SDK. By following these steps, you can improve the usability of your application by allowing users to create multiple authentication methods. This flexibility enables users to add a hardware security device like a Yubikey, or a native passkey via providers like iCloud keychain or 1Password, enhancing their overall experience with your application.
For a complete example, check out our demo embedded wallet.
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