Bitcoin Forum

Should I divide them among multiple addresses and how many?

Separate question - is this a standard practice?

Yes, it's very risky to keep all of you bitcoin in one wallet. And Yes, it's standard practice to keep your entire holdings in multiple wallets.

The risk is based on the fact that if you lose access to your wallet you lose your bitcoin. So if you have all of your bitcoin in one wallet that wallet could be stolen, lost, password/private key forgotten, etc.

As for how many wallets you should have, there's no single right answer. But a test you can apply is how much of your bitcoin would you be willing to lose if you had to do to theft or lost access? This could be your threshold for how much you keep in each wallet. Further, a lot of people keep the bulk of their holdings in a more secure wallet offline while using an online wallet to facilitate transactions, given its convenience to use.

What other questions do you have?

What's the difference? Bitcoin cannot be store on address. Its the wallet itself. But that depends also where you are comfortable. Me, im comfortable on one wallet because im confident that its safe. My suggestion is, store it to paper wallet and duplicate the private keys and store it to safe box. That's super safe.

In my opinion it is not risky if you already made backup of your wallet or just made the copyof the private key of your Bitcoin address .
Because this is only the Bitcoin adress private key that can help you to handle your all btc .
But you have not much better space to save your private key of your Bitcoin address then I will suggest you  to have your Bitcoin in multiple places and save them in the Google drive ( with totally different email id that is never exposed by you to anyone ) .
Or just make print out of your Bitcoin private key for the save in the offline of your data .
If you will never share your Bitcoin private key and email address then no one will be able to havk your Bitcoin .
And you will remain full safe without any tension .

just make a bip38 encrypted paper wallet for cold storage. Store it's pictures in email/google drive/etc

This doesn't prevent me from stealing the paper wallet, emptying the bitcoin, and leaving the OP or anyone else with nothing!

To the OP, do some reading. There's plenty of information available on this Forum and others that will help you sort through bitcoin wallet and bitcoin storage best practices.

Depending on the address that you have stored those bitcoins. Addresses on desktop wallets would be somehow safe since you do have the full control of your keys and if you are talking or using about web wallets then storing your bitcoins in one place is very risky that's why its always advisable to make use of hardware wallets/cold storage because this is the safest way do I think to secure up your bitcoin.

I personally belief this question doesn't have a one-size-fits-all sollution.

I'd rather have all my funds on a single bip38 encrypted (strong password) paper wallet, from which i have 2 copies, both stored in 2 different banks than having all my funds dispersed over 10 online wallets...

It's a question about privacy, the broadcasting of your public key and risk management, IMHO.

privacy => using a couple wallets, using mixers, always using newly generated address and change addresses drasticly increases your privacy, while using a single address in a single wallet decreases your privacy

broadcasting of your public key => As soon as you spent unspent outputs, you need to include your public key in the transaction... As long as you generate an address, and use this address as output for transactions, but never use these outputs, you can avoid getting your public key known to the public.
There is a discussion about this, basically if ECDSA encryption ever gets broken, it would be technically less chalenging to recalculate the private key when you have the public key. Since the address is only a hash of the public key, it's safer if only your address is known on the network, since an attacker would have to work back from address to public key to private key... This is very futuristic stuff tough, for the time being, i don't think there's a lot of risk in exposing your public key.

risk management => It's all about which wallets you store where, how much funds, how many backups, which types of encryption... Like i said: it would be better to have a single paper wallet, BIP38 encrypted with a 30 letter password, 2 copies stored in the safe of 2 banks than it would be to have 10 online wallets... From a safety point of view, i think this setup would outbeat allmost all types of storage.

I would use a secure wallet like A Trezor. That is the only safe way to store coins.

Ya it is dangerous to keep all your bitcoins in single wallet. But still user can store all BTC in wallet. For that it needs higher security level and own wallet address private key.

Private key gives more control over users  BTC wallet as to send or receive BTC after synchronizing with network.

But still my suggestion will don't put all eggs in one basket.

As the famous quote says:

"Don't put all eggs in one basket"

It is why I never rely on 1 wallet alone. It's better to have multiple ones in case one of them is malfunctioning or not available.

Simple as that. :D

As long as you are using 1 wallet, it doesn't matter if you use multiple addresses. If the wallet is compromised, all addresses derived from the same private key are exposed.

You will need to make different wallets if you want to reduce the risk.

Using multiple addresses in 1 wallet does make you less of a target as there is no way to link those addressses to belong to you.

That depends, if you keep all that addresses in one place/wallet it doesnt matter really, if one will get stolen all will get stolen.
If you keep them separately, not only in diffirent address but on diffirent machines/phones/paper wallet. That is making a diffirence.

A friend got his wallet stolen one time. He was lazy and hadn't used a good password or 2FA. However the same laziness meant all his coins were spread among many other wallets, which he eventually planned to gather all in one(the one that got stolen) so he only lost a part of his funds. Learn from others mistakes, don't store everything at the same place or at least use adequate security measures.

Also if you hold everything in one place and lose your private key/JSON file or whatever you use to log in, it's game over.

Storing all your coin in a single address isn't dangerous as long as you take the proper steps to secure that address/wallet. Spreading the coins over several addresses is better for privacy but likely won't increase the security by that much. There are addresses with hundreds of thousands of coins in them, just see https://bitinfocharts.com/top-100-richest-bitcoin-addresses.html for example.

Don't trust one wallet with your BTC especially the Core wallet it's screwed me over so many times by becoming corrupted.

I like to split the Bitcoins among some investments, it's upon to you to decide how many places you want to store your Bitcoins, but for me I prefer to let it always generating passive income even if it's too little, better than nothing and my money is growing on long term. To let all money together in one place is too dangerous, don't do it. Find some legit investments you have interest and split your money, that is my hint.

How many addresses you choose to use does not matter
you need to understand the whole idea behind multiple addresses is to ensure privacy and security on your side
and in one way or another minimizes loss should you lose your private key

By the way, I have a question about wallets. Can wallet become a scam someway?

Yes, especially if it's online. They can down their site and you will be unable to withdraw your coins or even have access to it. Who uses online wallets is taking an extra risk if we talk about security.

However using a trusted wallet, even online, the risks to be scammed are lower and we can always split our money to decrease the risks.

Just make some research before using any wallet and you will be ok. For example, you shouldn't be using any wallet who just got announced by some random and it's not even open source. The best way to be safe is by using a well known open source wallet and mainly offline like Electrum, Multibit and etc.

I think you are talking about web wallets yes it's possible especially the more new ones. There are alternatives like hardware wallets if you don't feel safe using web-wallets.

Can the wallet be hacked?
I was worried, I saved the btc in 1 purse. How to keep our wallet safe?  ???

Yes it is risky not unless you have a hard wallet to store all your BTC's. Or if you haven't bought a hard wallet yet, make sure to authenticate the wallet your using. Register to a 2fa to make it safe.

Yes it is risky to keep it in a single address and it is recommended to maintain multiple wallets with maximum security and distribute bitcoins in those wallets. There is no sense of creating multiple wallets and storing all wallets with uniform method so make sure you are choosing different location in case of offline wallets and different wallets clients in case of using online wallets. It is necessary if you are looking to hold it for the long term.

In my opinion its depend on your style too, how you publish your address and keep your private key. With one address its more easy to own and control your coin

Yes in my opinion dangerous

Because bitcoin is technology money
Where everyone has a chance to steal the address of our wallet.

Not save for me if doing that, but unfortunately, a lot of people do that with high faith their btc will save forever. Everything can happen especially about hacking data, could happen to anyone. So, I suggest using wallet only for temporary transaction. Meaning after depo or wd please replace all your btc into currency, doing fast to avoid stealing data. Need little hard work but it's safe for me. Have a nice day.

Not dangerous in my opinion

Reason with a very difficult password.

better you have diferent wallet if you plan to store high amount of bitcoin...i will never use one wallet its not safe .

It is not recommended to put all of your coin in one wallet, it is only a precaution moves to prevent you from losing all of your money, a reputable wallet usually got a very high security system and it is not easy to break through a wallet, but sometimes the hacker is very slick and can deceived us, so it is safer to split your coin into different wallet

Yes, an online wallet can be hacked. It is not a safe solution.

I recommend to use offline wallets if you need to store (hold) your Bitcoin for a long period of time. If you need to move your coins on a daily basis (not easy nowadays because of high fess, though) , maybe an online wallet can be used too, since it is more practical. Just remember to move your coins as soon as possible to your offline wallet if you want to hold them. Electrum is a good choice, in my opinion.

Yes it is because the hackers will easily steal all your bitcoin there. Best choice is to divide it into many wallets and enable all the security measures of that wallet to keep the hackers away from targeting your wallet.

Use a ledger nano s and setup the hidden wallet Feature.

Wallet 1:
Only spare change <10BTC

Wallet 2 (hidden):
Long term storage >10BTC

Keep the 24 words plus the secret passphrase for the hidden wallet secure. Use cryptosteel to protect from environmental damage.
Store 2 copies in different banks and 1-2 copies in secure places.

It depends on the type of wallet. If you setup an electrum wallet for everyday use and then you add one new wallet which is only for receiving funds and you will never spend any amount of bitcoin for a really long time from this new wallet it is ok to store all bitcoins in one address.

Perfect practice for storing is if you use a hardware wallet from which you intend to never spend coins for a really long long time. This is not dangerous if you store all your coins in one address of this wallet.

What I can is that you should save all the information needed with the wallets you are in possession i.e. passwords and other more that you have already mentioned. This is a good practice especially if you have a lot of Bitcoin and you want to make it more secure by minimizing the risks of course by distributing it with a number of wallet you have so that you will not forget and be able to access it if you somehow missed something.

Find a reliable wallet that you will feel comfortable and will hold your savings securely.

Actually if you can keep and secure your wallet it does not matter if you store all your bitcoins in one wallet. But it is full of risk especially if you save on the wallet online, it is more at risk of hacked if not careful using your wallet. So it is advisable to store bitcoin in some wallet and use some address, I think it aim if one wallet is hacked, we do not lose all bitcoin. So maybe this is also a lot of users use to store bitcoin, usually they have 2-5 wallets even more. But I think now many wallets have good security so it is safe if only using one wallet.

Yep. It’s risky to put it all in one wallet especially when you are not comfortable with it like you have some trust issues. These online wallets can just run any time that’s why be wise to pick trusted ones to store your Bitcoin and it really is a matter of what if.

IMO it's a big risk to store all your BTC in one address. Risk to loose all you BTC if something (scam, pc broken, ext). So better be cautious. I think it's not a standard practice, just to reduce the risk of loosing your BTC.

That is a good question. Yes an online wallet could become a scam. Something I worry about is poswallet running. Do you know how many coins they hold ? What's to stop them besides trust ?

its up to you if how many addresses if you want as long as you remember all those password...yes it so risky to put your bitcoin in one address..maybe for hacking insident or wallet page problem also or what so ever...just like in  stock market dont put your egg in one basket..

Yes rather split your bitcoin up. This is so with anything in life. If everything is in one place and something bad happens it's all over and you screwed. If you split it up at least you don't lose everything. This is pretty much the main reason why banks were invented. To keep your money "safe".

Also you need separate wallets not addresses. One wallet can have many addresses.

But u must know what you are doing. Because simple keeping your bitcoins on diffirent addresses doesn't mean they are split for a attacker. He can grab your bitcoins from all your addresses by keylogger, stealing your wallet with all addresses etc.
Its not only diffirent addresses but diffirent hardware to keep them on.

Never put your all eggs in the same basket. Especially online wallets or website like Poloniex or Bittrex even 2FA is enabled. I don't trust them. If you trade, try to use more than 1 trade website. İf you just want to store your coins try to use hardware wallets.  1 address is secure enough for them if you are not paranoia. But for mobile and desktop wallet you also need more than 1 address.

I dont know for me even if you divide it in multiple addresses it doesn't really matter if you're careless even if you store your bitcoins in many address it doesn't really matter if you're clicking malicious links all the time, downloading any kind of suspicious software that is offered by somebody that you dont know.
One wallet is actually enough with the right precautions and if you know how to protect yourself from the internet just avoid clicking suspicious links and secure your pc with a good anti virus or use linux instead for better security cause windows has a lot of vulnerability in the wild and always use vpn services, secure your network from intruders by filtering them.

I agree with this.

When I take a look at the coins in the top 100 addresses, 10K+ BTC each:
https://bitinfocharts.com/top-100-richest-bitcoin-addresses.html

It's easy to notice that some of those single address have existed since 2010.
The best gauge of danger stems from the realization of how secure your passwords and private keys really are.

It's not just about dividing into different addresses. If you store an address safely then there is absolutely no need for further cold storage addresses. Sure it makes it safer, but by a tiny margin. If you are storing less than 1 btc there is really no reason to do it.

Try to keep your coins in different wallets altogether.

What I like to do is keep a few bit cents on blockchain.info for day to day btc transactions, keep around 20% of my coins in a desktop wallet and the rest in a trezor wallet.