What happens if my Wi-Fi Internet stops working during a transaction?

[Thomas29]

Sorry if this might seem like a stupid question but I am still learning when it comes to Bitcoin. I am using a Laptop that uses Wi-Fi which stops working sometimes.

I am also wondering if I accidentally were to unplug the Hardware Wallet before I Receive the Bitcoin when someone is Sending it during half-way through Confirmation of the transaction. Would that mean I won't end up Receiving the Bitcoin if the Hardware Wallet is still disconnected when the Bitcoin transaction finishes.

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[trumpman]

Sorry if this might seem like a stupid question but I am still learning when it comes to Bitcoin. I am using a Laptop that uses Wi-Fi which stops working sometimes.

I am also wondering if I accidentally were to unplug the Hardware Wallet before I Receive the Bitcoin when someone is Sending it during half-way through Confirmation of the transaction. Would that mean I won't end up Receiving the Bitcoin if the Hardware Wallet is still disconnected when the Bitcoin transaction finishes.

Confirmations "happen" on the blockchain not your wallet. You have nothing to worry about, your bitcoins will come  to your wallet regardless if you are connected, or not to the internet. Losing your wifi is also no problem.

[o_e_l_e_o]

trumpman's answer is correct. Further to that, your hardware wallet doesn't need to be connected at any point during the "receiving" process. It doesn't need to be connected for someone to initiate a transaction to you, or for the transaction to complete. All that person needs to know is one of your addresses. If they send to one of your addresses, then you will see the transaction show up next time you plug in your hardware wallet, whether that's a minute later or a month later.

If you are sending a transaction and your Wi-Fi cuts out before it has been broadcast, then you will need to reconnect and rebroadcast the transaction. If your Wi-Fi cuts out after you have broadcast the transaction but before is has confirmed, you have nothing to worry about. Once the transaction is broadcast, the network will take care of it, regardless of whether or not your wallet is still connected.

[bob123]

At worst, your transaction won't be broadcasted, because it's corrupted. But rebroadcast / recreate a transaction is trivial task, so you don't need to worry about it.

OP is worried about not receiving his coins when someone else sends a transaction to his address.

@OP
As pointed out already, that is not an issue.
Your wallet does not store any coins. It only stores the private keys which are necessary to send the BTC associated to your public keys.

Whenever someone sends you some BTC, he is 'transfering ownership' of them to your public key. This is being recorded in the blockchain.
And once you want to access/send them, you need to sign a new transaction using the corresponding private key.
Your wallet does not have to be online at all when receiving coins.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

P.S. consider buy decent USB WiFi receiver, it's not that expensive and will save your time.

Agreed, although even the best ones can't pick up faraway signals and I've had trouble with some of them.  Obviously it depends on where the wi-fi signal is coming from.

Anyway, this isn't a stupid question, OP.  When you're new, these are the things that aren't obvious to you and it's good that you asked about it.  I think you got your question answered, but the bottom line is that as long as you got the transaction broadcast and it's in the network, it doesn't matter if you lose internet connectivity or experience a power outage.  Once you send crypto, the blockchain takes care of it and your computer or device no longer has anything to do with it.

[Pmalek]

Anyway, this isn't a stupid question...

I agree. I prefer seeing similar questions asked over and over again rather than seeing a thread where it is pretty obvious that a newbie was tricked into downloading a fake software or an extension and he lost his funds. And all that was needed was for the user to take a moment to reconsider his steps or ask someone for guidance before doing something he will later regret.

[GreatArkansas]

(....)
I think you got your question answered, but the bottom line is that as long as you got the transaction broadcast and it's in the network, it doesn't matter if you lose internet connectivity or experience a power outage.  Once you send crypto, the blockchain takes care of it and your computer or device no longer has anything to do with it.

Speaking of this. Does have any Bitcoin wallet existing that can they queue a transaction to be broadcast if the client is not yet connected to the internet and broadcast the transaction once already connected to the internet?

Like for example, I will send a particular amount of BITCOIN to this address but I don't have yet internet connection, so I am expecting once I will connect to the internet it will automatically broadcast my transaction made while I'm offline or the time I don't have internet connection.

[The Cryptovator]

This is prefect question, others could learn from this question. However, I will express my experience that happened with me lately. Since I am working abroad, I were moved my living place few days back. And I am using portable wifi (via mobile operator). So signals is very poor on my current residential are where I am living now especially after evening. Before two weeks, I was going to send fund (for signature participants), and during broadcast transaction, signal were disconnected. I were used electrum software, so there were shown error that network disconnected(or something like that can't remember exactly). It was impossible to know actual status without wifi. So after couple of minutes when connected to network again then I checked transaction history, and realized transaction were broadcasted on the blockchain before disconnected internet. So transaction had been confirmed without any issue.

Same thing happen on last week (Friday), but when I checked history there was not any transaction and my balance was fine as it was. That means network has been cut before broadcast transaction on the blockchain. So as usual I made new transactions.

So that's not any issue and nothing to worry about. Your fund will definitely will go appropriate destination or will remain with you.

[Pmalek]

Speaking of this. Does have any Bitcoin wallet existing that can they queue a transaction to be broadcast if the client is not yet connected to the internet and broadcast the transaction once already connected to the internet?

I haven't seen a wallet be able to do exactly what you are asking. But, it is possible to create a transaction, move it to your offline device, sign it there, and move it back and broadcast it via your computer that goes online.

With the the needed hardware you can also broadcast bitcoin transactions over satellite. Check out Blockstream Satellite > https://blockstream.com/satellite/   

[erikalui]

My internet connection was lost while sending coins to an exchange with Ledger Nano but still surprisingly the coins still went through even though it was stuck and the wallet showed the coins were not sent and still present in the wallet. The wallet took time to sync with the blockchain network but it's mostly if you confirm a transaction, it dose go through. Even if sometimes it happens that the transaction doesn't go through but coins are debited, they will appear once you are connected to the internet so it's never lost which usually happens while making payments on ecommerce websites.

[Pmalek]

Even if sometimes it happens that the transaction doesn't go through but coins are debited, they will appear once you are connected to the internet so it's

You either managed to broadcast the transaction and the funds have successfully left your wallet and are in the mempool waiting for confirmations, or the coins never left your wallet and weren't broadcast successfully in which case they should still be in your wallet once you get your connection back.
 
I never had such internet-related issued while sending payments, crypto or non-crypto. Have you experienced such issues firsthand with ecommerce sites that your money is gone but it never arrived at its destination?

[erikalui]

You either managed to broadcast the transaction and the funds have successfully left your wallet and are in the mempool waiting for confirmations, or the coins never left your wallet and weren't broadcast successfully in which case they should still be in your wallet once you get your connection back.
 
I never had such internet-related issued while sending payments, crypto or non-crypto. Have you experienced such issues firsthand with ecommerce sites that your money is gone but it never arrived at its destination?

Internet got disconnected so I could see the coins still present in my wallet when I was trying to resend them. It was when I checked my exchange that I found that the coins have already been deposited and then I had to sync my Ledger which took time to show my balance was 0. The coins were already confirmed in about 5 minutes.

[NeuroticFish]

Since the money is on the blockchain and not in the wallet, the only important thing is to broadcast the signed transaction.
After that the wallet can closed or the internet can be down, it doesn't matter.

Internet got disconnected so I could see the coins still present in my wallet when I was trying to resend them.

The wallet has done the broadcasting, but most probably didn't get to receive the "acknowledge" for that operation and so on.

Sorry if this might seem like a stupid question

This is actually a good question (!) because I don't think that the answer can be found in so many places. And as long as you learn, you have to research and ask.