How to Enable the Play Store & Fingerprint Sensor on a Chromebook Using G Suite

If you happen to be using a G Suite account on your Chromebook, you might notice some features are glaringly missing when you first start it up.

Namely, we’re missing the Play Store to download Android apps and if your Chromebook has a fingerprint sensor, you’ll notice you were never asked to set it up.

Unfortunately, searching around the settings doesn’t help either as none of these options are where every other article on the internet tells you they are (can we tell I’ve gone through all this and am slightly annoyed at this point?).

Well, it turns out that Google disables these by default for G Suite customers for safety reasons. The only way to get them is to contact your IT department at your company to get them to enable them.

But… what if you are your own IT person?

This is the case for me as a company of one whole person and since the documentation on Google’s site for how to enable these things are clearly written by and for an IT person, I figured I’d try and write down, in plain English, exactly how you can enable the Play Store and fingerprint sensor on your Chromebook when using G Suite.

(Side note: we’re also missing the Google Assistant but that’s literally just something Google has disabled for now on Chromebooks using G Suite–annoying, I know.)

Enable the Play Store on Your Chromebook

First, let’s get the Play Store on your Chromebook so you can use Android apps.

1. Login to admin.google.com on your computer with your main admin account.
   
2. Type in “chrome devices” into the search bar at the top and click on Chrome devices with the sub-heading Device management.
   
3. Click on Chrome management on the left side under Device Settings.
   
4. Click on User & Browser Settings.
   
5. Scroll down to Apps and Extensions and click on the new apps & extensions page link there.
   
6. In the Allow users to install other apps & extensions and if you want to not be limited at all select Allow all other apps & extensions (just know if you do have employees this will let them do so as well unless you limit it by user/organizational unit on the left side).
   
7. Click back on your browser to go back to the previous settings page and click on the application settings page link there.
   
8. Select Allow next to Android applications on Chrome devices.
   
9. Then click Save at the top of the screen (none of this will take effect if you don’t by the way so don’t forget).
   

Now, it may take up to 24 hours for this new permission to populate but once it does:

1. Open Settings on the Chromebook by clicking the bottom right icon and clicking the gear.
   
2. Type in “play store” and then click the Google Play Store option.
   
3. You should be good to go but if there is an option to turn it on here do that (if it’s just blank that’s fine, it still worked).
   
4. Log out of the Chromebook and log back in and you should be good to go.

Enable the Fingerprint Sensor on Your Chromebook

And finally, if you have one, here’s how to enable the fingerprint sensor on your Chromebook so it’s much faster to log in to.

1. Login to admin.google.com on your computer with your main admin account.
   
2. Type in “chrome devices” into the search bar at the top and click on Chrome devices with the sub-heading Device management.
   
3. Click on Chrome management on the left side under Device Settings.
   
4. Click on User & Browser Settings.
   
5. Click where it says search or add filter (not the search bar at the very top, it has a plus sign and is a bit lower).
   
6. Type in “quick” and hit enter to search the settings for full-text containing the word quick.
   
7. You’ll see an option for Quick unlock under Security. Turn on Pin and Fingerprint there.
   
8. You can also open Settings on the Chromebook by clicking the bottom right icon and clicking the gear.
   
9. Type in fingerprint and click on the Security & sign-in option.
   
10. Input your account password and click OK.
    
11. You’ll an option for Edit Fingerprints and a Setup button there, as well.
    

There you go! I hope that helps someone out that was looking for this like I was. Let me know how it goes and if you have issues below in the comments and don’t forget to subscribe to the weekly email newsletter for more tips, tricks, videos, etc delivered every Sunday.