With the U.S. government now reopened after its longest-ever shutdown, the race is on to get air travel back on track. Hopefully, things will normalize before the busy travel season picks up later this month.
But there’s even more good news for anyone hoping for a smooth experience at airports: The days of fumbling through your bag to find your passport at Transportation Security Administration checkpoints are over!
That’s because iPhone users can now store a digital copy of their passport inside their phone thanks to Apple’s new Digital ID.
The ability to go paperless with your passport is huge. Not only is it super convenient to now have your boarding pass and ID both available on your phone, but it also provides the ultimate work-around if you haven’t gotten a Real ID yet.
So far, over 250 U.S. airports are ready to accept the new Digital ID. And while you’ll still need your physical passport for border control or certain international flights, the digital version can make domestic travel much smoother.
As a Real ID procrastinator, this is a godsend for me. I’ve held off on getting my Real ID since I normally travel with my passport anyway (even on domestic flights). But that proved a regrettable choice a couple weeks ago when I was flying to Chicago with my family and realized right as I was approaching the checkpoint that I had misplaced my passport.
Getting on that plane without a passport or Real ID meant having to go through multiple additional screening steps with my very antsy 2-year-old in tow (definitely would not recommend!) — all of which could’ve been avoided if I had a digitized version of my passport on my phone.
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