How do I transfer from paper wallet to Electrum cold storage?

[Thursday]

I have an old paper wallet (pre-fork) I would like to transfer to an offline computer running Electrum. I believe this is known as cold storage. I would like someone to walk me through this step by step. I have downloaded Electrum to my now offline machine and am ready to do the next step, but I don't know what the next step is. I will pay someone willing to hold my hand and help me through this entire process in a safe way.

[1714871836]

1714871836

[1714871836]

1714871836

[1714871836]

1714871836

[1714871836]

1714871836

[1714871836]

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[Coding Enthusiast]

Some initial steps that you should have taken before:
- Make sure you have downloaded and installed the real Electrum. You can do this by verifying the signature using PGP key.
- Make sure you are really on a clean computer which is (have been and will be) actually offline
- Make sure you have back up of your SEED phrase, like writing it down on a piece of paper.

Lets begin:
Step 1. Making a transaction online to later sign offline.
Install Electrum on your online computer (this is a separate OS/machine). We are going to use this to create a raw unsigned transaction.
After installation instead of letting Electrum create a new wallet with seed, create a new wallet with your Paper wallet address. If you forgot just go to File > New/Restore and create a new wallet. Give it a name and from the 4 options choose "Watch only bitcoin address" and click Next and give it your "Address".

Note that this is your address not private key. It starts with 1 or 3

Let Electrum sync. It needs to download 30+ MB of block_headers for the first time and also your transaction history.

Now use one of the addresses from your cold storage (you may need to prepare this first or go back to get it).
Go to your Send tab, enter that address in "Pay To" text box and set the amount and fees appropriately. Make sure to select RBF (you may need to change some stuff from Tools > Preference).
Select "Preview", this opens a window. Double/triple check everything to see if they are fine, then click "Save". This will save a .txn file containing your transaction which you need to sing in next step. Take the file and proceed.

Step 2. Sign the transaction offline.
Go to your cold storage. Open Electrum and from Menu go to File > New/Restore and create a new wallet. Give it a name and from the 4 options choose "Standard Wallet", Next, "Use Public or private keys", Next, enter your paper wallet private key here.

Note that this is your private key that you will only use in the cold storage. It starts with 5 or L or K.

Go to Tools > Load transaction > From file
Give it the file from previous step, you will now see a very similar window but now the "Sign" button is enabled. Check to see if things are OK and Click it. Now you have your transaction signed and ready to be broadcast.

Step 3. Broadcast the transaction online
Back to the online system again carrying the file from previous step which is now signed.
Go to Tools > Load transaction > From file
Give it the file from previous step, you will now see a very similar window but now the "Broadcast" button enabled. Check to see if things are OK and Click it.
Wait for it to confirm.

You are done.
P.S. In case the transaction was not confirmed after a long time and you needed to "bump" the fee, you need to take the same 3 steps, the difference is that this time you just right click the transaction in your step 1 watch only wallet and click "bump fee" set a higher fee and get a .txn file ready to move to next step.

Some additional information with some pictures: http://docs.electrum.org/en/latest/coldstorage.html

[HCP]

I wouldn't think that you need to even bother with creating, signing and sending the transaction.

If you're just wanting to hold the BTC and have no intention of spending them for a while, a simple "import" of the paper wallet key into Electrum would achieve the same thing, but without incurring any transaction fees and no chance of your coins getting "stuck" if you don't get the fees right. You use the selection options: "File -> New\Restore -> Import Bitcoin addresses or private keys"

However, for this to be "safe", you really, really, really, REALLY, REALLY need to make sure that you have followed the initial setup suggested by Coding Enthusiast:

Some initial steps that you should have taken before:
- Make sure you have downloaded and installed the real Electrum. You can do this by verifying the signature using PGP key.
- Make sure you are really on a clean computer which is (have been and will be) actually offline
- Make sure you have back up of your SEED phrase, like writing it down on a piece of paper.

It should also be noted that doing this will not put your coins in a "seeded" wallet (with the 12 word recovery phrase/seed mnemonic)... it will instead create a simple wallet with one private key and one address (essentially a digital "clone" of your paper wallet).

You would still be able to create the "watching only" wallet on your online computer... in the latest version of Electrum, the path is actually "File -> New\Restore -> Import Bitcoin addresses or private keys"... and just enter the address (NOT the private key).

[Spendulus]

I have an old paper wallet (pre-fork) I would like to transfer to an offline computer running Electrum. I believe this is known as cold storage. I would like someone to walk me through this step by step. I have downloaded Electrum to my now offline machine and am ready to do the next step, but I don't know what the next step is. I will pay someone willing to hold my hand and help me through this entire process in a safe way.

What you have right now with the paper wallet is cold storage.

With cold storage with Electrum, you may have higher risk but you would be capable of making transactions. The paper wallet can only be restored in it's full amount, while Electrum or Trezor would allow moving smaller amounts out of cold storage.

Is that what you want to be able to do? Because if not, you're fine as is.