Your Samsung phone changes and looks a little more like an iPhone

Your Samsung phone changes and looks a little more like an iPhone

One of the great things about smartphones is that the software is constantly changing, with features being added and improved regularly, and the same goes for Samsung phones as they now have access to a Samsung Wallet app.

This new app is basically a combination of the previous Samsung Pay and Samsung Pass apps, but with some new features and Samsung Blockchain Wallet integration thrown in for good measure.

From the Samsung Wallet app, you can store payment cards (for contactless payments) and also store loyalty and membership cards. But you can also use it as a password manager to store and access your passwords, and if you own crypto, you can use Samsung Wallet to check its value on various exchanges.

Screenshots showing different parts of Samsung Wallet

(Photo credit: Samsung)

Other documents, such as COVID-19 vaccination records, can also be stored in Samsung Wallet, as can boarding passes, although airlines will have to comply, and at the moment it appears only Korean Air has done so.

And with SmartThings integration, Samsung Wallet can also be used to house digital home and car keys. So far, the company has partnered with nine home security companies, as well as BMW, Genesis, and Hyundai, though only certain cars are supported. Over time, Samsung also plans to sign more car brands.

Samsung also aims to support things like driver's licenses and student cards in Wallet starting later this year.

Of course, with all this important information housed in Samsung Wallet, you need serious security, and for that Samsung uses its Knox security platform, which allows Wallet to encrypt data and requires a fingerprint to access it. Truly sensitive data can also be stored in an isolated environment, to protect against hacking.

If you live in the US, UK, France, Germany, Italy, or Spain and have a Samsung Pay-enabled Galaxy phone running Android 9 or later, you should now have access to Samsung Wallet. Simply open Samsung Pay or Samsung Pass and you'll be prompted to migrate your data to the new service.

If Samsung Wallet's features sound familiar, it's probably because iPhone users have access to a very similar offering in the form of Apple Wallet.

The feature set isn't identical, but the idea is basically the same, with Apple Wallet housing payment cards, car keys, boarding passes, loyalty cards, tickets, and more. In fact, it even supports driver's license and state IDs in some areas, so it's a bit ahead of Samsung there.

Google is also working on a similar idea called, unsurprisingly, Google Wallet, which is expected to launch soon. So if you have an Android phone but not a Samsung, you won't miss out on all these wallet perks for long.