Unless otherwise configured, the client libraries use Application Default Credentials to authenticate with Google Cloud Services. While this works for most applications, in some cases you may need to override this default. You can do so by providing the UnifiedCredentialsOption The following example shows how to explicitly load a service account key file:
[](std::string const& keyfile) {
auto is = std::ifstream(keyfile);
is.exceptions(std::ios::badbit); // Minimal error handling in examples
auto contents = std::string(std::istreambuf_iterator<char>(is.rdbuf()), {});
auto options =
google::cloud::Options{}.set<google::cloud::UnifiedCredentialsOption>(
google::cloud::MakeServiceAccountCredentials(contents));
return google::cloud::speech_v1::AdaptationClient(
google::cloud::speech_v1::MakeAdaptationConnection(options));
}
Follow these links to find examples for other *Client classes:
[[["Easy to understand","easyToUnderstand","thumb-up"],["Solved my problem","solvedMyProblem","thumb-up"],["Other","otherUp","thumb-up"]],[["Missing the information I need","missingTheInformationINeed","thumb-down"],["Too complicated / too many steps","tooComplicatedTooManySteps","thumb-down"],["Out of date","outOfDate","thumb-down"],["Samples / code issue","samplesCodeIssue","thumb-down"],["Other","otherDown","thumb-down"]],["Last updated 2025-08-14 UTC."],[[["\u003cp\u003eThis page provides documentation for overriding default authentication credentials when using Google Cloud C++ client libraries.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eThe latest release candidate version is 2.37.0-rc, and the current version is 2.36.0, with a list of older versions available.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eUsers can override default credentials by utilizing \u003ccode\u003eUnifiedCredentialsOption\u003c/code\u003e and providing a service account key file, as demonstrated in the provided code example.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eExamples are provided for how to override authentication credentials for \u003ccode\u003espeech_v1::AdaptationClient\u003c/code\u003e, \u003ccode\u003espeech_v1::SpeechClient\u003c/code\u003e, and \u003ccode\u003espeech_v2::SpeechClient\u003c/code\u003e classes.\u003c/p\u003e\n"],["\u003cp\u003eFor further details and best practices regarding service account key management and creating \u003ccode\u003egoogle::cloud::Credentials\u003c/code\u003e objects, refer to the links provided in the "See Also" section.\u003c/p\u003e\n"]]],[],null,[]]