We have google fi and I bought my wife a new phone. She's one of those people that often forgets passwords, so to activate the new phone was like a 2 day wait s

We have google fi and I bought my wife a new phone. She's one of those people that often forgets passwords, so to activate the new phone was like a 2 day wait since she wasn't able to authenticate from the old phone or computer and didn't have her password for the new phone. Luckily gmail support did reset it, because google-fi has no real support. Having a backup device should help, but you may still end up locked out for a day or two if the initial verification fails. I don't remember why it failed for my wife, typically they just send a number or a prompt to the other device that you have to enter into the new device. IIRC they also have secret keys you can print out ahead of time that you can use to recover your gmail. Presumably you'd put them in a safety deposit box or store in another secure location.