Bitcoin Forum

So I am well aware of why people do test transactions as they like to verify the address. Nobody wants to lose their funds.

However, I have always been perplexed by this notion given the near perfect track record of the blockchain itself. Why would you need to do a test transaction when you know if you are sending to the correct address, the funds will get there safely?

Give me your 2cents.

Even if you are sure of what it is, everything that you are doing for the first time needs a test. Vaccines, Car manufacturing, food at the restaurants, etc. It has become a human thing to always test it out first before going in full speed and crypto transactions are no different because like you said, it's about funds and you can't be too sure until you are sure  ;D 

The protocol itself might be working fine, totally understandable but you can't say the same for the wallet client.

The address has a checksum and can be valid. However, the problem lies if the client somehow generates a nonstandard address. For example, if your wallet client uses a non-compressed public key to generate a Bech32 address, the network considers it nonstandard. You need a miner to be willing to manually include it in a block that they mine. Or, worse off, if the transaction is valid but the developers accidentally makes the transaction reuse the r value. The latter is quite unavoidable and can happen after several iterations of the wallet but it is a good way to tell if the wallet is suitable from your first try.

It should not happen with most wallets, provided that the developers are competent at the very least.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but in such a case you would have no problems sending coins to such an address, and the problem would only be manifested when you tried to spend the coins on that address. The vast majority of people who make a test transaction simple wait for the coins to show up in their wallet before sending the rest of their stack, and so a test transaction achieves nothing in this case.

Again, how many people making a test transaction even know what the r value is, let alone how to check if it has been reused? If anything, making a test transaction from one address to another before making a main transaction between the same two addresses puts you at risk of the sending wallet reusing the same r value with the same private key, someone being able to deduce that and double spend your main transaction before it confirms (highly unlikely, I know, but possible).

I have never once made a test transaction and I have never once lost any coins. Care and due diligence in your wallet selection and transaction details are all that is required.

People are not concerned about blockchain issues but they worry of possibility that they made a mistake entering address for sending their coins.
When sending to other people and friends there is no reason for doing this, but when using centralized exchanges people tend to be extra careful to avoid losing their coins and getting scammed.
Nothing strange about this, but best thing is double checking addresses before sending any coins.

Yes. That is correct. You need to spend funds from that address. I'm under the impression that OP meant sending and spending. Nothing is achieved by just sending a small amount.

It is honestly better than nothing. There are loads of bots which monitors the network for any r value reuse. If they detect any, then they will attempt to push a competing transaction and thus stealing your funds. That has been the case for quite a couple of years... Especially since that Blockchain.info and those Android wallet vulnerability.

I would probably recommend people to use more well known wallets, but if they can't then it would be a good idea to check if it works in the first place. Using a wallet that isn't well tested is a security risk nonetheless.

Imagine you're about to deposit 1 BTC to exchange that you never used before, and imagine they have some bug with deposit addresses. If you deposit 0.001BTC first, wait for transaction to confirm and then see that the balance wasn't updated, you would stress much less than just blindly sending the whole sum and ending up in this situation. There can be other hypothetical situations, so when you're doing large transfers and the fees are low, it won't hurt to make a test transaction just in case. People do the same with banks too.

Most people are unaware that bitcoin addresses contain a checksum, and the chances of making a small mistake such as one incorrect characters, swapping two characters, adding or dropping a character, etc., still resulting in a valid address are about 1 in 4.3 billion. The only way to actually make a mistake which would result in a valid address is by either copy/pasting the wrong address or being victim of clipboard malware, but the addresses will be noticeably different and a simple double check should reveal the mistake.

Whenever I see people talking about test transactions, I usually see them talking about sending a small amount first, checking that it shows up, and then sending the full amount. Doing this achieves pretty much nothing. It doesn't protect against the receiving wallet generating non-standard addresses, reusing r values, or anything else, and in the case of depositing to a centralized exchange or service it doesn't protect against the exchange scamming you, locking your account, not crediting your funds, etc. It only protects against the most basic failure of a wallet or exchange showing you an address which doesn't belong to you, and any wallet or exchange which does that probably has 100 other red flags regarding why you shouldn't use it in the first place.

Excellent point!

This is one of the many reasons why people really do test transactions especially if you are dealing with new exchange or it is your first time to use such exchange. You want to use small amount of money just to see if their system is working, no bugs or any of that sort. Because even if it is your first time to use Binance for example, are you confident to send large amount of funds at the very first transaction? Knowing that their reputation is top-notch. Still, your worries may not be on their side, but more on your end, as you are thinking that you might make a simple mistake along the line. So if in case you made wrong move, at least only small amount is wasted. I guess, most of us went thru the same dilemma.

Sending to exchanges means that the principle that past experience doesn't determine your future experience applies. If anything occurs during your transaction, the onus is on Binance or whatever exchange you're using to solve it. There is pretty much nothing that could go wrong as long as you are sure you're sending to the correct address as shown. Even with less established exchanges, you never know if they'll pull a quick one on you after you send a larger amount.

If anything, sending it once and doing multiple checks is more ideal than sending it multiple, thus increasing the room for error as well as the fees.

If you are using a reliable wallet and you are 100% certain the recipient address, amount to be sent and transaction fee are correct, then there is no real need to make a test transaction.
The only risk is if the receiver (for some reason) gives you a wrong address.

Honestly, it wouldnt really be needing those test transaction for you to ensure that the fund that you had sent would be surely received and as long the address is correct then you would definitely recieve those funds.
and this is how blockchain works and even with that typical fiat transactions where you should ensure about their account name or numbers for you to be sure that those money will be recieved by the right
recipient and not would go into other person but there are always difference between crypto and fiat when it comes to security and of course with that irreversible and transparent transactions.
Test transactions on this market is something a non-sense thing to talk about.