Don’t Hold Your Breath for iPhone Driver’s Licenses in These Two States
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While 16 states have embraced digital driver’s licenses in Apple Wallet, with a couple more expected in the coming months, at least two states have explicitly stated they won’t be adding support for mobile driver’s licenses any time soon — if ever.
The first on the list is Florida, which isn’t too surprising, as it’s had a strange relationship with the technology over the past five years.
While Florida wasn’t among the first eight states to promise support, state officials expressed an eagerness to support Digital ID cards in Apple Wallet only a few weeks later, with Terrence Samuel, motorist modernization director for the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles (FLHSMV), telling Florida Politics that he was surprised the state wasn’t on that initial list, and that it had “exchanged information with Apple in the hopes of getting added to the list of partners.”
Nevertheless, the state had already begun rolling out its own Smart ID app, which had been in the works since 2014. Despite Samuel’s optimism, Florida never joined Apple Wallet, and instead yanked Smart ID from the App Store in mid-2024, instructing Florida drivers to delete it from their devices.
At the time, it promised a new app would be developed by “early 2025,” but that never happened. The reasoning seemed to become clear when Florida Governor Ron DeSantis tweeted his opposition to digital driver’s licenses due to the potential for government abuse, making it clear it would never happen in his state.
That presumably includes both Florida’s now-defunct Smart ID app as well as any hope for Florida digital driver’s licenses coming to the iPhone.
The other holdout is Rhode Island, where Walter Craddock, the state’s DMV administrator, recently explained that he doesn’t see the point of spending money to develop mobile driver’s license (MDL) technology when it’s currently limited to use by the TSA.
Craddock’s comments came during a recent episode of the AAMVACast podcast recapping his year as Chair of the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators (AAMVA) [via 9to5Mac]:
I don’t think we’re ready to jump in completely with MDL. I want to see more universal adoption or need for an MDL. […] the main user right now is TSA. Up until recently, there was no airport in New England area that could accept an MDL. So why would I spend the money in the development of it? And also, I’m looking to do a solution that is across all platforms. Instead of just doing one for Apple or the Google Wallets, I don’t want to replicate and duplicate efforts. I want to do it one time.
While Craddock’s perspective is arguably pragmatic for his relatively small state, others that have embraced digital driver’s licenses have found that they need to take a more proactive approach. Some, like Ohio and Oklahoma, have released free reader apps that local businesses can use for age verification, allowing iPhone users to present proof of age without the need to share everything else that’s printed on a physical driver’s license.
US States that Support Digital Driver’s Licenses in Apple Wallet
Sixteen states currently allow iPhone users to add their driver’s license or state ID to Apple Wallet: Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Virginia, and West Virginia. Puerto Rico is also on the list, along with Japan’s My Number Card — the only international partner at this point.
While residents of Florida and Rhode Island may be disappointed by this news, we’re expecting North Carolina and Utah to be the next to go live. Meanwhile, Connecticut and Kentucky were among the first eight that committed to the technology in 2021, and while we’ve heard nothing more from them since, let’s hope no news is good news in this case.
