You can now share passwords within your Google family group

Google is now letting users securely share passwords with members of their own family group over the internet, making it easier for everyone in the household to access passwords for shared services like Netflix. The new ability is included in the Google Play services update for May 2024 that’s rolling out now, as reported by Android Authority.

The new password sharing feature just applies to ones that are stored in Google Password Manager, the company’s service that natively stores your passwords and passkeys in Chrome and Android and is linked to your Google account. As of today, the new password sharing feature works on mobile — but apparently not via Chrome on desktop, yet. Once you share a password with one of your family members, a copy of it will be saved into that member’s own Google Password Manager.

You can’t use this feature with people who aren’t in your Google-sanctioned family group (which can only have up to six people). So if you want to share a password with anyone else, you’ll need to use Nearby Share to zap it over in person or use more rudimentary and / or less secure methods.