iOS 18.6.2
Is the following sufficient to add a trusted device to an Apple Account (former Apple ID) with an iCloud email ? The objective is to be able to get authentication / verification codes for each of those Apple Accounts.
iOS Settings→ Apps→ Mail→ Mail Accounts→ Add Account→ iCloud
Unless I am confused, it seems to work, but not mentioned in my searches on creating an apple trusted devices.
thanks in advance for your time and help
That will let your phone access your iCloud e-mail, but that won’t log-in the device, which is what you need in order to get authentication codes.
For that, go to the “Apple Account” page of iOS settings. This is the one all the way at the top, above the “Airplane Mode” setting. When your device is logged in, that entry will be the name of your Apple account.
See also:
I understand what you mean. Thank you very much. How would I use my iPhone as a trusted device for multiple iCloud accounts ? If I need my iPhone to generate a verification code, the idea of logging in via my Apple Account page which will itself require a verification code seems like a circular reasoning. I am sure that there is something that I don’t understand.
In my experience, yes. I have several trusted devices on an alternate iCloud.com address that I do not use as my primary Apple Account that are listed as trusted devices for that Apple account and which do receive authentication codes.
On these devices (my main iPhone, my iPad, my Macs) I have never logged in to this iCloud account as the main Apple Account on the device - just added it to the account list to collect email. (I just tried it and received a ton of pings with the authentication prompt.)
thank you VERY much for your comment. This is exaclty what I was referring to and do not understand because I have not found no reference to this when I searched the Internet. What do you think @Shamino ? It is confusing.
thanks again. Do you have any tricks when for reason X, those devices do not generate a verification code?. It happens about 1/5 times and I have been unable to find a solution because when you use this method, you can’t go “get verification code” in the iPhone (which works only with the main iCloud account).
I think we may be describing two different things.
Authentication via e-mail will work this way, because a phone can be configured for dozens of different e-mail servers.
But that automatic popups that ask for authorization (presenting a 6-digit number if you approve) only work on devices that are logged in as the main account.
At least that’s how I understand it. Those approvals don’t go through e-mail, but use a separate messaging mechanism (based on the low-level notification API that iMessage and other services use).
If being logged in to multiple accounts for other services (e.g. iCloud Mail) works (because they use the same underlying notification systerm?), that’s great, but it is news to me.
It is my experience and that of @ddmiller described above. It theoretically should not work, is not referenced anywhere but appears to work. thank you for your reply.
As I said, that is not the case for me. I just tried it. All of the Apple devices where I simply added the iCloud account to access email (so, on mobile devices, settings / apps / mail / accounts; on Macs, I think it’s simply Setting / Internet accounts) receive the popups and are listed as trusted devices in the Apple Account settings. They’ve never been logged in as the Settings / Apple Account.
I do have a spare iPhone that is always logged in to this account as its main Apple Account, and that one is no different from my main iPhone, Macs, etc. (But that phone is almost always powered off and, of course, was not prompted when I logged into iCloud in Chrome on my Mac.)
I will say that my Apple Watch does not receive those prompts, but I generally never use the Mail app on the watch anyway. I just use it for mail notifications.
I don’t recall that ever happening. But, of course, i rarely log in to that account. It’s just when I set up email on a new device (though the spare iPhone I bought last June when I learned that the Xr, my old spare iPhone, would not get iOS 26, was probably the last time before today that I logged in.)
thank you @ddmiller for all the information.
