The Best Bitcoin Wallets of 2018
- Best Hardware
- Best Mobile
- For Beginners
- Feature Rich
- Best Multicoin
Picking your bitcoin wallet(s) is one of the most important decisions you make when getting into crypto. Different wallets serve different purposes – you would obviously not store your life savings on a phone wallet, but why not some spending cash? Likewise, it probably does not make sense to invest $80 in a trezor if you only have $200 worth of bitcoin.
We detail on this page some of our favorite wallets. If you are entirely new to this, it would not hurt to read up on bitcoin wallets and get an idea of the considerations that go into picking one out. OK, with that being said, our favorite wallet is:
Best Hardware Wallet
Trezor
Trezor has been around for many years, and its active developer community continuously strives to improve the product. With an excellent security record, good crypto coverage, and a great UI, Trezor is best in show.
Bitcoin
Ethereum
Litecoin
Bitcoin Cash
Dash
Ethereum Classic
NEM
Ripple
Zcash
- Hardware
- Cold Storage
A good hardware wallet needs to do a few things well. It must facilitate the creation of private keys in an entirely offline environment. It must allow users simple access to their bitcoin without compromising security. And the developers behind it must actively integrate new features and facilitate access to air dropped coins like bitcoin cash.
Trezor does this all in spades. The private key is generated on an offline USB device, never touching an online environment. The Trezor allows easy and secure access to the online interface. Your chosen number password is scrambled on the device screen with the same order replicated in the web wallet, but without numbers displayed so that only the trezor holder knows the order to input on the keypad. (If that sounds confusing it is due only to this author’s poor explanation, it is very intuitive with the device). Unlike some other cold storage systems, you can pretty easily send your bitcoin without having to transfer them to a hot wallet.
And the development company Satoshilabs is a well respected pillar of the bitcoin community. They continuously improve on the trezor, implementing upgrades like segwit promptly, and providing customers access to coin splits like bgold and bcash as quick as possible without compromising security. Support for additional important coins like Ethereum, Litecoin, Dash and more are available through the device.
And as for as hardware wallets go, this one is relatively cheap at $89 or equivalent bitcoin.
Runner up: Ledger
Best Mobile Wallet: Copay
Copay
Super m-of-n multisig wallet, brought to you by BitPay. This is the best multisig mobile wallet out there.
- Bitcoin
- iOS, Android, Desktop, Web
- Multisig
We are big fans of Copay, the wallet solution offered by bitpay. We love Copay for a few reasons. It is available across all platforms, including excellent iOS and Android applications. But what really sets Copay apart is its multisig solution. Adding a partner or spouse as an additional required signer is an excellent means of security against hacks, using two of three signatures with a third stored offline. Users may configure the consigning requirements as anything from 2 of 2 to 4 of 6.
Best for Beginners: Bread Wallet
Bread Wallet
Breadwallet is made for mobile, and the user experience feels native to the devices. Excellent entry-level product, which does not cheap out on security.
- Ease of use does not detract from security
- Breadwallet a.k.a BRD has been integrating additional cryptocurrencies regularly
- Has repeatedly handled coin drops extremely well for their clients
- Bitcoin
- Ethereum
- Bitcoin Cash
- iOS, Android
Breadwallet is an extremely simple mobile wallet for bitcoin and a few additional cryptocurrencies. By simple we mean that the engineers at bread wallet are single mindedly focused on providing an easy on-ramp for new users to hold their coin. This is the wallet I told my own mother to download when I gave her some bitcoin – and if she can handle it, so can you.
Best for Privacy and general cool gadgetry: Samourai Wallet
Samourai Wallet
Samourai offers some excellent and unique privacy and security features. Still a bit rough around the edges, but expecting excellent things.
- Sets the bar in terms of privacy innovation
- a host of very interesting security concepts integrated
- still only Android and a bit difficult to master
- Bitcoin
- Android
Samourai Wallet jam packs their wallet with a number of extremely cool features that are not found elsewhere, or at least not found together in a single package. We are talking payment codes, or permanent addresses that redirect to new, rotated addresses. This is great for anyone who must publish their bitcoin address for payment, the only caveat being it is restricted to Android.
Samourai allows the app itself to be hidden, and offers a remote self destruct option. Users may connect the wallet to their own personal node, or any node they want for that matter, and transactions can be routed through VPN and over TOR from within the wallet interface.
Their Ricochet functionality allows transactions to “hop” between four addresses, which helps makes transactions more discrete. They are currently working to release in 2018 the “whirlpool” function, a coin mixing solution which makes tracking a particular transaction to a particular user very difficult.
Best Multicoin: Coinomi
Coinomi
Coinomi sets the bar for multicoin wallets. All this - and more! - in our review.
- Our favorite altcoin wallet with 150 coins integrated; HD means that all coins and addresses are backed up from one seed
- Great apps for both iOS and Android
- Bitcoin
- Ethereum
- Litecoin
- Bitcoin Cash
Clams- Dash
DigiByte
Dogecoin- Ethereum Classic
Feathercoin
GameCredits
Gulden
Komodo
MonaCoin
Namecoin
NeosCoin
Nubits
OKcash
Omni
Peercoin
PIVX
PotCoin- Ripple
Stratis
Syscoin
Tether
Vertcoin- Zcash
- iOS, Android
This one is easy! Coinomi supports 150 coins which are all stored with ONE backup, meaning your master passphrase will restore all of the different 150 coins to a supported wallet. The wallet works just like a normal bitcoin wallet in terms of UI and backup, and offers applications on both Android and iOS devices.
Still unsure? Check out our wallet comparison tool to find the wallet that best suits your needs, or have a look at our additional picks for top iphone, android, or hardware wallets.