How to fix Google Play Store “Authentication is required” error on Samsung Galaxy Note 9
The Google Play Store error “Authentication is required” may occur from time to time. It’s because it’s not a device-specific problem but an issue with the Play Store itself. Some of our readers that own the Samsung Galaxy Note 9 complained to have encountered this problem. The thing is it might be a very pesky little error but it’s not really that hard to fix. In fact, you may be able to get rid of it by doing a procedure or two.
Continue reading below as I will walk you through in troubleshooting your Galaxy Note 9 that keeps showing up the “Authentication is required” error every time you try to download an app from the Play Store. Since we’ve encountered this problem in the past, we’ll share with you the procedures we used to fix it.
Before anything else, if you have other issues with your device, try to browse through our troubleshooting page as we’ve already addressed several issues with this device. Odds are that we’ve already published a post that tackles similar problems. Try finding issues that have similar symptoms with what you currently have and feel free to use the solutions we’ve suggested. If they don’t work for you or if you still need our help, then fill up our questionnaire and hit submit to contact us.
Going back to our troubleshooting, here’s what you need to do if your Galaxy Note 9 keeps showing the “Authentication is required” error…
- Reboot your phone.
- Resync your device with Google servers.
- Clear cache and data of Play Store.
- Remove your Google account and add it again.
- Factory reset your Note 9.
First of all, you must try to restart your phone especially if it’s the first time you encountered this error. It’s because it might be just a result of a minor glitch in the system. Better yet, try doing the forced restart by pressing both volume down and power keys at the same time and holding them down together for 10 seconds or more. After which, download and app to see if the error still shows up.
It is an authentication error and if you’re pretty sure that you’ve properly set your account up in your phone, it might be just a minor issue with the sync. Your phone must be properly synced with Google servers. Go to your Settings, tap Accounts & sync, find your Google account, tap it and select Account sync.
After doing the first two procedures and the error is still showing up, then try clearing the cache and data of the Google Play Store itself. This will reset it back to its default settings and configuration as well as replace its cache and data files that may have been corrupted for some reason. Many owners who encountered this problem said this procedure fixed the problem so it might work for you as well.
The next thing to do is to remove your Google account from your phone and just add it again. Authentication has something to do with your account, most of the time. Removing and readding your account will let you know if your password still works because if not, you won’t be able to properly setup your device. After this and the error is still showing up, then you have no other choice but to do the next procedure.
Backup your files and data and then factory reset your Galaxy Note 9. You need to do this because you really can’t download and install applications from the Play Store without addressing the “Authentication is required” error.
- Back up data on the internal memory. If you have signed into a Samsung account on the device, you have activated Anti-theft and will need your Samsung credentials to finish the master reset.
- Turn off the device.
- Press and hold the Volume Up key and the Bixby key, then press and hold the Power key.
- When the green Android logo displays, release all keys (‘Installing system update’ will show for about 30 – 60 seconds before showing the Android system recovery menu options).
- Press the Volume down key several times to highlight ‘wipe data / factory reset’.
- Press Power button to select.
- Press the Volume down key until ‘Yes — delete all user data’ is highlighted.
- Press Power button to select and start the master reset.
- When the master reset is complete, ‘Reboot system now’ is highlighted.
- Press the Power key to restart the device.
I hope that we’ve been able to help you fix the problem with your device. We would appreciate it if you helped us spread the word so please share this post if you found it helpful. Thank you so much for reading!
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