Bitcoin Forum

Hey folks, I'm new here so thought I'd drop by and ask a few questions as I have a Ledger Nano S wallet and have had it for a few years now. I have asked Ledger but understand they are busy so thought I'd try here too. I'm sure the questions will be easy to answer for some of you here, so any help would be great!

1. The Nano S doesn't have much storage on it what so ever, so when I have multiple coins I will likely need to remove wallets/coins and add them again. I assume this is fine, and my coins won't be lost when I install the app again? I currently have three apps on there, which it is managing fine. Just thinking to the future.
2. I have my recovery phrase.. how does this work? I get that it's a recovery phrase, but what does it recover? Is it a case of it will recover all wallets to another Ledger device? Will it work to other devices/wallets?

Thanks in advance for any replies, I really appreciate it!

My first wallet was a ledger Nano S .
I used it to store Ethereum and Tron and trade on decentralized exchanges. When I added more coins, I got tired of uninstalling apps and bought a ledger Nano X.
Your coins will not be lost anywhere if you uninstall the application.

When I bought the Nano X ledger I used the seed phrase I generated for the ledger Nano S.
Seed phrase restores access to all wallets.
I'm willing to bet with you that in a year you will buy a ledger Nano X :)

That's right. Your coins aren't actually stored in the apps, but on each coin blockchain. They are only an interface and set of scripts that do what it's needed to see your balance and spend your coins. In simple terms, your wallet seed is basically the "key" to manage your coins.

Your recovery phrase a.k.a wallet/backup seed is what the Ledger device uses to generate the private-keys of your wallet. If you buy another device and import your seed, it will show up the same wallet and balance there.

If your device is gone and you don't want to buy or use a hardware wallet anymore, you can just import that seed into a supported desktop wallet and you'll be able to do the same there (P.S: don't actually do this since it throws away the extra security of having an hardware wallet).

Thank you both for your replies! That has cleared up all of my concerns.


I think I may well end up with a Nano X to be honest, seems to have a LOT more storage on it, and it can be used directly with a phone. Just to go on from this, can I then sell my Nano S, or does the recovery phrase stay the same so it means it's now vulnerable to a buyer? I know they aren't expensive, but a mate may well be getting into crypto so could be of use to him?

You can safely sell your device or give it to someone else. Before doing that, you need to wipe it. Either enter an incorrect PIN three times or factory reset your Nano S in the settings.

The Ledger Nano S can connect to a smartphone too. Of course, using a cable because the Nano S does not have Bluetooth features like the Nano X.

You can sell the unused Nano S by resetting it to factory settings first.

Nano S and Nano X can share the same seed to have the same wallet and make transactions on either of the two devices. By the way, why isn't the Nano S just used as hardware wallet to backup the Nano X that you are going to buy?

Well, actually Nano S can be used with a phone too. You just need OTG cable to connect it. Though, Bluetooth is more convenient than cable.
And if you hold BTC mainly and few altcoins, then Nano S is probably enough for you. But you have a lot of different coins/tokens and ayou don't simply hold it, but actively use, then offcourse Nan X is better option. Then there will be less hassle when you will have to install or uninstal apps. But still, even Nano X memory is very limited, despite that they are saying that you can have up to 100 apps installed.
BTW, before buying Ledger, you should know about Ledger privacy issues when hackers leaked sensitive personal data of Ledger customers. So, when you buy from them, I suggest to follow some tips which are posted here:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5288201.0

Take your time to sell your Nano S wallet. If your Nano X breaks or gets lost, you can use the Nano S.

To check the security, you can try to enter the password incorrectly 3 times :)

I would not recommend connecting the ledger to your phone or installing programs unnecessarily.
Thugs can get access to your phone and find out that you have cryptocurrency. The best defense is when no one knows you have cryptocurrency.

Just to pick up on this point, how would this work/benefit? I don't mean to come across as rude so apologies if it does, just want to learn as much as I can and wondered was all. May well be an option for me if I can get my head around it.

One of the benefits, when one day your Ledger Nano X is damaged or lost, you can still access your assets on Nano S if both are set using the same seed, even though the seeds can be imported to other wallets, too. If the seeds from the hardware wallet are imported to a wallet such as a desktop wallet or something else, your wallet's security level will be reduced.

Not to hijack the thread, but to add to it with a few questions. 

1) If you get a new device and use your old device's recovery phrase on the new device, what do you do with your new device's recovery phrase?  Do you keep both recovery phrases? Or which one to keep?

2) Can't you just send the crypto to the new wallet instead?

3) Someone mentioned resetting your old device back to factory defaults and selling it.  Does the resetted device generate an entirely new recovery phrase, or the same one?  I personally wouldnt buy someone's old device.

In the beginning, you are asked if you want to create a new wallet or restore an existing one. You won't get a new recovery phrase if you choose the latter option.


Of course, you can. However, that could involve a couple of transactions if someone used multiple accounts or coins.


Yes, it does. Otherwise, you would have to buy a new device if you somehow exposed your seed.

When I set up my nano x, i turned it on without the live app and it generated a recovery phrase.  I assume once you generate a recovery phrase this way, you wont be able to "restore an existing wallet" once you are on the app cause you already generated a recovery phrase to that device?  Is that correct?

You don't need Ledger Live to restore an existing wallet. You must have selected "Set up as a new device" during the initial setup. See this YouTube video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4oea8v9KyE) from Ledger. You can restore an existing wallet after you generate a new wallet if you wipe your device (either by doing so in the settings or by entering an incorrect PIN three times).

Does nano s has limit on coins only or on tokens as well? Like can you store unlimited erc20 and other blockchain tokens?

The limit is on the number of apps installed on the device. You don't need to install an app for every ERC20 token (like USDC, USDT, etc...). You just need the ETH app.

Remember that every ERC20 token lives on top of Ethereum, so all your device sees is your ETH interacting with a contract. So... yes, no limit.

If you are concerned about any crypto asset in particular, you can take a look at the list of those supported here:
https://www.ledger.com/supported-crypto-assets

The list is massive, so you may need to play around with the filters at the top.

There’s also this you may want to look into:
https://support.ledger.com/hc/en-us/articles/360011842739-List-of-supported-token-types

Not all tokens are supported by the ledger live .
I don't use ledger live  for tokens.
Use metamask with ledger. In metamask, you can add any tokens on the Ethereum blockchain to the wallet interface and trade them on uniswap,
other exchanges, or send transactions.

A lot of food for thought here, and I've learned a lot for sure. I was exposed during the Ledger hack, but should I buy a Nano X I will be getting from somewhere like Amazon and get it delivered to an amazon locker.

It's good that I can use multiple ledger devices to manage the same account.

As for the selling and buying of a second hand Ledger, surely it is only good practice to restore it/enter the pass code wrong 3 times to get it back to factory settings with a new pass phrase? The same should be said for any wallet, right?!

Resetting to factory values should be enough so that no one can take possession of your seed anymore, but since there is always some small chance that someone will find a way to get that information out of the device (theoretically only), I personally would never sell or gave someone the hardware wallet I used.

When you say "any wallet", I guess you mean hardware wallets - so even though I can't say 100% that this is the case, all these devices should more or less work on the same principle. I suggest you avoid buying used devices, there is too much risk for too little savings you can get.

Can you explain the ledger hack and how you were exposed?  I'm interested because I purchased the nano x and want to make sure to protect  myself.  

Also, I'm no expert, but if you got hacked, why would you want to buy from Amazon and not directly from ledger?

My ledger live app is telling me i need to update firmware on the device.  Is that safe to do?  How do I know thats not a hack in itself to get your orivate key?  

I have crypto, if I update firmware, is it ok to update while coins are attached to the wallet?

Stick your email address into https://haveibeenpwned.com/ and see how many breaches you've been in.

As for your other questions... I'm not the best person to ask being a newbie myself!

You can have a read through threads on the forum such as this one: Ledger SMS phishing campaign – New Leak (believe it or not) (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5294323.0). You’ll see references to:

Leak 1:
-   a breach in their customer email database (1M++ exposed)
-   a breach in their marketing database (phone, address, email, full name) -> 272K++ leaked -> not the initial 9,5K stated by Ledger.

Leak 2:
-    a breach in their marketing database through an API with Shopify -> 292K++ leaked (theoretically, a superset of the 272K).

Concerning Ledger Live, if it’s the original source you downloaded the software from, then you should be ok. Regardless, anytime you perform a firmware upgrade, you should probably make sure you’ve got your mnemonic handy in case anything goes wrong.

Depending on when you purchased it, and whether or not your purchased it directly from Ledger or from a third party, you may or may not have had your personal details exposed. The data breach does not affect the integrity of your Ledger device itself.

Somewhat ironically, people who purchased through third party resellers such as Amazon (which the general advice was not to do) have been protected from this data breach since Ledger never had their personal details in their database.

You can verify Ledger Live using the hashes and public key available here: https://ledger-live-tools.now.sh/lld-signatures

The firmware can be updated. Then you may need to install applications again. All coins will be in your wallet.

If you have the opportunity, then buy a wallet for cash in a store so as not to give your personal data to anyone.

Here all the stolen data is in text format, you can search for this and your loved ones to warn them

What is a mnemonic?  You mean the word seeds?

Yes.

The only way to update the firmware on the hardware device is via Ledger Live, and Ledger Live verifies the firmware it downloads before it pushes it to your hardware device. Therefore, if you verify Ledger Live as I have said above, then that is the closest you can get to verifying the actual firmware itself. The hardware device itself will also verify the firmware is genuine prior to installation.

Exactly. During the firmware installation, Ledger will show an identifier in Ledger Live that you need to compare with the code displayed on the screen of your hardware wallet. That is all you can do in terms of verifying what you are installing. But even if you don't verify the code, you still can't install a malicious third party firmware on your device, in the same way that you can't install a fake app either.