Cold storage vs Paper wallet

[sumit513]

Which one do you prefer?

[1714799839]

1714799839

[1714799839]

1714799839

[1714799839]

1714799839

[1714799839]

1714799839

[mocacinno]

Which one do you prefer?

Personally, i prefer a hardware wallet...
Both your choices are ok, but they have a different use case:
- a paper wallet can be used to deposit BTC without withdrawing... It's cheap and easy to make, but once you sweep it, you have to make a brand new one.
- cold storage (i assume you mean using an airgapped pc) is more expensive (since you need a dedicated offline pc), but it can be used to deposit and withdraw

A hardware wallet almost offers the security of an airgapped PC, but is much cheaper...

[OmegaStarScream]

Paper wallets are a form of cold storage, from the bitcoin wiki:

-On a USB drive or other data storage medium in a safe place (e.g. safe deposit box, safe)
-On a paper wallet
-On a bearer item such as a physical bitcoin.
-Use a offline Bitcoin Hardware wallet

I personally find hardware and paper wallets the most convenient.

[DoublerHunter]

Which one do you prefer?

I prefer hardware wallet because it is usable in any moment we want but the paper wallet is just only for storing and if you withdraw your coins then you cannot use that paper wallet again while in hardware wallet it is just like the normal wallet (desktop, web wallet and many more..) you just need to connect it to your computer to start transactions without having any security issues.

[BurstIncomeAsset]

But paper wallet is one way of cold storage

What is really your doubt?

[Iranus]

Paper wallets are a form of cold storage, so it's hard to tell exactly what you're talking about.

It really depends on what you're trying to achieve.  Personally, I would feel comfortable storing quite a significant amount in hardware wallets as long as I've secured them properly, and this way you can use them for everyday transactions as well.

Paper wallets are inconvenient in that you can't regularly spend from them like you can with hardware wallets.

I say treat paper wallets like a "savings account", and a hardware wallet like a "current account".  If you're not absolutely rich, hardware wallets can be a "savings account" too, and can be hidden pretty easily.

[krishnapramod]

Which one do you prefer?

Cold storage is when private keys are stored in a secure offline environment and paper wallets are one of the means to achieve it. I am assuming that your definition of cold storage involves using vault facility of third party websites like Coinbase and Xapo to store bitcoins. These sites claim to keep 98% of stored bitcoins offline, but still it is not worth trusting them with a substantial amount.

As far as cold storage is concerned, hardware and paper wallets are the best option. You can also use a dedicated offline computer to store your bitcoins, but it is less convenient and require some technical knowledge.

[AGD]

A paper wallet can be a cold storage, so there is nothing to compare here. https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Cold_storage
/thread

[deeperx]

Paper wallets can be understood from by just looking the top surface and hardware stored wallets can not be understood content unless you connect them to correct environment. This difference can be important at some cases.

[meliodas]

Both are good storage of bitcoins or any other altcoins but i dont preffer me myself and i dont see myself using even one of that,yeah they are good but i think hardware wallet is still alot safer i think

[User365]

If you want to use your BTC to buy stuff, you should propably use a hardware wallet, since it offers a good security and is more or less convinient.

If you plan on saving your BTC (like for a few years) you should consider unsing a Paper wallet, since it is cheaper and you don´t need to withdrawl often.

[chocolah29]

Paper wallet is also a form of cold storage like hardware wallet.

As for me, I prefer hardware wallet coz it securely sign transaction in the same offline. I use trezor for this.

[cafucafucafu]

Which one do you prefer?

Okay, i see a lot of replies that really don't make sense and don't help at all. Mocacinno's response was probably the best, although I think that he assumed that cold storage meant an airgapped PC, which isn't correct imo.

What I interpret cold storage as is any sort of storage device that is able to store your bitcoin private keys without an internet connection, thus having the maximum security. So paper wallets would be a subset of cold storage. Hardware wallets aren't really cold storage, even though they are really secure because whenever you plug it into a PC you are still connected to internet. Correct me if i'm wrong though because I do see people using both terms interchangeably.

I wouldn't recommend using a paper wallet, instead, look at Cryptosteel. They can cost quite a lot but i think it's worth it if you're storing for the long term. Completely offline and secure, immune to water and fire damage unlike paper wallets as well.