Help me buy bitcoin

[zxcv1]

I am surprised at how extraordinarily difficult it is to buy Bitcoin. Worse, it's 10x more difficult to buy Ethereum, not to mention understanding it.

I am extremely tech savvy. I've been a developer for 15 years and I have built computers and web servers from scratch. I code in several languages, and also speak several languages. In fact, some years ago I started mining bitcoin. Therefore, I am smart enough to understand technical things. Although I am kicking myself for not getting crazy into bitcoin like I planned back then, I was going to build mining rigs, etc.

Yet, I am completely overwhelmed by information. I don't know who to trust, what apps to trust, how to trade, what to do. I just want to throw some freaking money in Bitcoin and Ethereum, and do so without getting robbed, charged high fees, scammed, or otherwise ripped off! Why is this so hard to do? If it's hard for me, who is tech savvy, it's basically impossible for most people.

Fortunately I found an app called Samouri which partially solved the problem for bitcoin, by making it very easy to create a bitcoin wallet, and even by downloading the apk directly from their website. But they do not have any way for me to convert a fiat currency like USD to BTC. It's only a wallet to send/receive BTC, although I'm grateful for this half of the battle.

The same type of app is not so available for Ethereum. I got HyperPay setup, but I don't know if I can trust it. It comes from China, after all, and the interface is extremely complex and confusing, bad user experience for someone relatively completely new as I haven't done anything with Bitcoin in years and everything is new and different.

I saw that one way to avoid all the third parties was to go through Local Bitcoins. The $1,000 limit is fine to start, but I was surprised by the astounding amount of requirements. For example, someone in Venezuela with 100% feedback wants me to send my ID, a selfie, and an absurd amount of personal information. The cash in escrow isn't enough?

Zelle for example is a great way to transfer cash, and it can't be reversed like Paypal. Who the hell in their right mind thinks I'm going to agree to that amount of privacy violation - I wouldn't even do that for Wells Fargo! Much less some person I've never met from a country that has been demoted to third-world status due to Communism. Are you kidding me?!

There are so many different apps, and I don't know what to use. I don't have time to read 20 books on Bitcoin, much less to waste the time if/when none of them really helps me.

I wish there was simply a list of steps:
1. download this app, this is the one you need.
2. here is how to add money from your bank.
3. success! money is now in your wallet. Refresh and it will show up.

No such luck! Why is it so hard for anyone to just make a simple step by step easy way to just send it, I don't care about all this, all I want is just to add some money to Bitcoin that I'm happy to lose if there's a crash, but that could profit if it goes up, without having to worry about getting scammed or ripped off. Is that too much to ask?

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[MusaMohamed]

I am surprised at how extraordinarily difficult it is to buy Bitcoin. Worse, it's 10x more difficult to buy Ethereum, not to mention understanding it.

You don't need to understand the Whitepaper of bitcoin or ethereum to buy them.

It is very easy to buy BTC or ETH. How did you see the buying process is difficult, extraordinary difficult?  

The difficult is choose a good wallet to store your bitcoin after you buy it. The difficult is know a good exchange to buy bitcoin or ethereum. It is difficult for newbies and without any guide. With a good and simple guide, you can buy it very easy.

I wish there was simply a list of steps:
1. download this app, this is the one you need.
2. here is how to add money from your bank.
3. success! money is now in your wallet. Refresh and it will show up.

As a senior developer, you would know the importance of verification for applications you downloaded.

Bitcoin wallets
- Choose non custodial wallets: Bitcoin Core, Electrum or Wasabi.
- Verify those wallets. How to Safely Download and Verify Electrum
- Use coin control feature
- Use Segwit address (Bech32 type, begin with bc1)
- Check settings and make sure the Replace by Fee option for your bitcoin transactions is chosen (enabled). It helps you to bump your transactions if you need to have quicker confirmation.
- Back up your private key or mnemonic seeds, depends on wallets you use.
- Apply this How to lose your Bitcoins with CTRL-C CTRL-V.

[zxcv1]

I am surprised at how extraordinarily difficult it is to buy Bitcoin. Worse, it's 10x more difficult to buy Ethereum, not to mention understanding it.

You don't need to understand the Whitepaper of bitcoin or ethereum to buy them.

It is very easy to buy BTC or ETH. How did you see the buying process is difficult, extraordinary difficult?  

The difficult is choose a good wallet to store your bitcoin after you buy it. The difficult is know a good exchange to buy bitcoin or ethereum. It is difficult for newbies and without any guide. With a good and simple guide, you can buy it very easy.

I wish there was simply a list of steps:
1. download this app, this is the one you need.
2. here is how to add money from your bank.
3. success! money is now in your wallet. Refresh and it will show up.

As a senior developer, you would know the importance of verification for applications you downloaded.

Bitcoin wallets
- Choose non custodial wallets: Bitcoin Core, Electrum or Wasabi.
- Verify those wallets. How to Safely Download and Verify Electrum
- Use coin control feature
- Use Segwit address (Bech32 type, begin with bc1)
- Check settings and make sure the Replace by Fee option for your bitcoin transactions is chosen (enabled). It helps you to bump your transactions if you need to have quicker confirmation.
- Back up your private key or mnemonic seeds, depends on wallets you use.
- Apply this How to lose your Bitcoins with CTRL-C CTRL-V.

It's easy after you konw
* which app to use
* which providers to use
* how to do the trades
* etc.

But before that, it's extraordinarily difficult and basically requires knowing the Whitepaper of Bitcoin and Ethereum to proceed.

As I mentioned, I already have a wallet for Bitcoin, and that was easy as Samouri made it easy. I didn't say there was a problem with verifying the wallet.

Coin control feature? What's that.
I still don't understand what Segwit vs Segwit32 etc are. I figure just use the bc1. Why make it so difficult? Even that was a roadblock although not too hard with the Samouri if you just consider using the default.

The wallet is not the part I'm saying is hard. It's tedious, not hard to write down the mnemonic and 5 passwords and pin for the HyperPay app. What's hard is the getting the money from my bank account into the bitcoin wallet without either getting ripped off by some exchange or broker, or getting my identity stolen by some criminal in Venezuela in order to avoid the brokers.

[akirasendo17]

It is not that hard to buy ethereum and bitcoin

Here are the things you need Accounts from any of the following exchange
Binance
Poloniex
kucoin and others
in the link you see all the exchanges that may be available to your country:
https://www.investopedia.com/best-crypto-exchanges-5071855

if you want to have a wallet:
https://www.myetherwallet.com/ this is for ethereum and erc20 coins
https://www.blockchain.com/ - you can create your own wallet here for bitcoin

Now if all those are prepared, what is the last one you need?
ATM or Debit card in short need money to buy bitcoin and ethereum
There are just the things you need to buy crypto the last one is the most important.

since I think you are just new in the forum and in crypto, I just want to advise you that don't talk to people who will send you personal
a message saying to invest or they are selling crypto, you might get scam so be aware, good luck and welcome to the forum.

[MusaMohamed]

As I mentioned, I already have a wallet for Bitcoin, and that was easy as Samouri made it easy. I didn't say there was a problem with verifying the wallet.

Samourai, not Samouri.
Did you use this wallet?  https://samouraiwallet.com/

Wasabi wallet is better than Samourai: https://wasabiwallet.io/

Coin control feature? What's that.

How to spend specific UTXOs in Electrum. Coin control helps you to use changed address too.

I still don't understand what Segwit vs Segwit32 etc are. I figure just use the bc1.

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/List_of_address_prefixes

The wallet is not the part I'm saying is hard. It's tedious, not hard to write down the mnemonic and 5 passwords and pin for the HyperPay app.

Don't believe in apps. You must back up and save your private key safely. Apps can be broken, devices can be broken or lost, but you will still have your bitcoin if you have private key.

What's hard is the getting the money from my bank account into the bitcoin wallet without either getting ripped off by some exchange or broker, or getting my identity stolen by some criminal in Venezuela in order to avoid the brokers.

Bitcoin and bitcoin transactions. Bank and bank transfers. They are different. You can use fiat in your bank account, debit cards to buy bitcoin. If you use OTC trading or P2P trading, you have to know how to mark your payment as Paid, to avoid scammers run with your fiat and you won't receive bitcoin.

Many questions of yours can be answered with available resources on 2 websites:
https://bitcoin.org/en/resources
https://www.lopp.net/bitcoin-information.html

[zxcv1]

As I mentioned, I already have a wallet for Bitcoin, and that was easy as Samouri made it easy. I didn't say there was a problem with verifying the wallet.

Samourai, not Samouri.
Did you use this wallet?  https://samouraiwallet.com/

Wasabi wallet is better than Samourai: https://wasabiwallet.io/

Coin control feature? What's that.

How to spend specific UTXOs in Electrum. Coin control helps you to use changed address too.

I still don't understand what Segwit vs Segwit32 etc are. I figure just use the bc1.

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/List_of_address_prefixes

The wallet is not the part I'm saying is hard. It's tedious, not hard to write down the mnemonic and 5 passwords and pin for the HyperPay app.

Don't believe in apps. You must back up and save your private key safely. Apps can be broken, devices can be broken or lost, but you will still have your bitcoin if you have private key.

What's hard is the getting the money from my bank account into the bitcoin wallet without either getting ripped off by some exchange or broker, or getting my identity stolen by some criminal in Venezuela in order to avoid the brokers.

Bitcoin and bitcoin transactions. Bank and bank transfers. They are different. You can use fiat in your bank account, debit cards to buy bitcoin. If you use OTC trading or P2P trading, you have to know how to mark your payment as Paid, to avoid scammers run with your fiat and you won't receive bitcoin.

Many questions of yours can be answered with available resources on 2 websites:
https://bitcoin.org/en/resources
https://www.lopp.net/bitcoin-information.html

Yes, I meant Samourai. Why is Wasabi better? Is it also private and secure?

"Don't believe in apps" what I meant is I don't even trust using an app from China. I would need further advice on whether HyperPay can be trusted. I'm not saying trusted to store my keys, I know that this needs to be written offline in a safe place. I'm saying I need to know if it's trusted to use at all.

"Segwit": of course I can read white papers, website, and wiki pages on it, but as I mentioned don't want to have to do that, it's needlessly tedious. I get the general point with it, but I'm just saying it's needlessly complicated.

"Bitcoin vs fiat" I understand the different between crypto like BTC and fiat like USD. This is super basic and obvious.

"If you use OTC trading or P2P trading" my point is how would I do that without giving some 3rd world country enough info to steal my identity, which is a far worse problem than not having crypto. It's ridiculous they want all that info especially when the site itself already holds it in escrow. Sounds more like an identity theft scam to me.

I just want to change USD into BTC. Simple and easy without getting ripped off with fees or violating my privacy with 3rd world countries. Is that too much to ask?

[zxcv1]

It is not that hard to buy ethereum and bitcoin

Here are the things you need Accounts from any of the following exchange
Binance
Poloniex
kucoin and others
in the link you see all the exchanges that may be available to your country:
https://www.investopedia.com/best-crypto-exchanges-5071855

if you want to have a wallet:
https://www.myetherwallet.com/ this is for ethereum and erc20 coins
https://www.blockchain.com/ - you can create your own wallet here for bitcoin

Now if all those are prepared, what is the last one you need?
ATM or Debit card in short need money to buy bitcoin and ethereum
There are just the things you need to buy crypto the last one is the most important.

since I think you are just new in the forum and in crypto, I just want to advise you that don't talk to people who will send you personal
a message saying to invest or they are selling crypto, you might get scam so be aware, good luck and welcome to the forum.

As to the previous post, yes I know not to accept any messages "invest in bitcoin". Good tip for naive noobs though.

Just telling me the names of a couple exchanges doesn't solve my problem, anyone can google "crypto exchanges", and a list of all of them is even more useless. The problem is which ones can be trusted? Why are those better? Are they free? Do they have high transaction fees? Inactive account fees? Are they private? Special features? Easy to use? Secure? Etc.

Can someone give me one or two of the very best options with the lowest fees, most features, or whatever is most important?

[RickDeckard]

Hey zxcv1! Welcome to the forum !

Woah, that's a lengthy post. It seems to me, after reading your post, that you're somewhat baffled and a bit frustrated by all the amount of information that you are finding regarding BTC. Rest assured that it doesn't mean that you are somewhat incapable of understanding it, I just think that now, more than ever, everyone wants to talk about BTC and shares guides about it, each Youtuber points to the exchange that matters him the most, and so on. I will try to my best give you some answers.

Yet, I am completely overwhelmed by information. I don't know who to trust, what apps to trust, how to trade, what to do. I just want to throw some freaking money in Bitcoin and Ethereum, and do so without getting robbed, charged high fees, scammed, or otherwise ripped off! Why is this so hard to do? If it's hard for me, who is tech savvy, it's basically impossible for most people.

In order for you to buy any crypto there's a flowchart that you must follow : Choose exchange -> transfer money to exchange -> Buy Crypto -> Transfer crypto to cold wallet (optional step).

Choose exchange - As many have mentioned before me, the main thing that you should loo for in an exchange is how trustful it is, how reliable it is, and the fees that it charges. Regarding fees you can check out this website that compares the fees in almost all known exchanges - https://www.cryptofeesaver.com/exchanges/fees/coins/bitcoin

The general ones that are being used are : Coinbase , Kraken, Binance and Bitvavo.

Transfer money to exchange - Well this is self explanatory. You won't face any fee here, only if your bank somehow charges you for your transaction

Buy Crypto - When you get your fiat (money) in your exchange account, then it's just a matter of choosing what you want to exchange it for. If you want BTC, then you just click on BTC/USD and buy whatever quantity that you want of BTC. Using the previous website (cryptofeesaver) and choosing Binance as example you can see that they charge 0,1 % in the trade. This means that if you want 1.000 USD of BTC, you'll pay Binance 1 USD

Transfer crypto to cold wallet - In order to be fully secure, i.e. controlling your private keys, you should transfer your newly purchased BTC to a wallet that only you control. For this I would recommend hardware wallets, and from the recommended list (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1631151.0) I would say Trezor is a good one.

I think that covers most of your question. Let me/us know if we can help you with anything else mate.

Welcome to the world of crypto, it's full of possibilities !

[Rengga Jati]

If you want to focus on buying Bitcoin, I think that I can only suggest Binance.
And they also provide enough information from registering, depositing, trading, withdrawing very easy steps by steps.
Here you can find the information completely:
https://www.binance.com/en/support/faq

You can buy on Binance market or event P2P Binance with fiat. Just open the link above, you may not need to read all links (if you have no enough time) but you can choose the information that you need.

[nakamura12]

Binance would also be a start to own bitcoin by buying. If it's about creating a wallet then it is not that hard to create a wallet and there is even a thread of how to keep your wallet safe and what you must do to avoid it like clipboard hijacking also known as copy and paste scheme.

[Igebotz]

I wish there was simply a list of steps:
1. download this app, this is the one you need.
2. here is how to add money from your bank.
3. success! money is now in your wallet. Refresh and it will show up.

The first step to get a bitcoin is getting a wallet address similar thing with banking; you must open an account before you make a deposit or make transactions.

• Go to the google play store and download Electrum wallet(simplest to use).
• Signup and get your address. (the seller will request it)
• Time to buy your first bitcoin.

These are some trusted marketplace to buy bitcoin.;

Bitcointalk forum: This is one of the safest places to buy bitcoin as there are several high reputation members selling bitcoin here via bank transfer and another mode of payment.
Buy here brainbossXchange service

Binance p2p: this is another trusted p2p site where you can buy bitcoin.

Remitano: This is a p2p service too where you can get bitcoin, I don't know if remitano is supported in your country.

[GreatArkansas]

Choose exchange - As many have mentioned before me, the main thing that you should loo for in an exchange is how trustful it is, how reliable it is, and the fees that it charges. Regarding fees you can check out this website that compares the fees in almost all known exchanges - https://www.cryptofeesaver.com/exchanges/fees/coins/bitcoin
(....)

OP should also consider the country where he/she came from since there are some exchanges that are very strict for which country you from, just like if you are from United States. That's why selecting an exchange is very important or finding some alternative, like using P2P or some decentralized exchange.

I wish there was simply a list of steps:
1. download this app, this is the one you need.
2. here is how to add money from your bank.
3. success! money is now in your wallet. Refresh and it will show up.

One of the reasons why this is somehow difficult to implement on some exchange/wallets is because of the law or jurisdictions of some countries, that's why I said above. There are already some exchanges that already like this. And to be honest, Binance is one of the examples of it, since Binance allowed some banks from my country and you can really easy to buy and sell Bitcoin with just few clicks.

[RickDeckard]

Choose exchange - As many have mentioned before me, the main thing that you should loo for in an exchange is how trustful it is, how reliable it is, and the fees that it charges. Regarding fees you can check out this website that compares the fees in almost all known exchanges - https://www.cryptofeesaver.com/exchanges/fees/coins/bitcoin
(....)

OP should also consider the country where he/she came from since there are some exchanges that are very strict for which country you from, just like if you are from United States. That's why selecting an exchange is very important or finding some alternative, like using P2P or some decentralized exchange.

That is also correct, thank you for reminding me of that. Indeed OP you should see if your exchange is accepted on your country and then, given the pool that you would have to choose from, just choose the one with most reputable track history. Again, take it slowly and I'm sure you'll be able to get into the crypto world.

[ololajulo]

The open post sound like he is promoting a wallet. As much as I know the difficult will only depend on the currency of trade, if it is not available for most top fiat to cryptocurrency market that is available. There are many exchanges and I dont think they demand for gas fee, even for ethereum. They make provision for the ethereum address for purchase then you can move to other address as it pleases but at your expense.

[blockbed]

In order for you to buy any crypto there's a flowchart that you must follow: Choose exchange -> transfer money to exchange -> Buy Crypto -> Transfer crypto to cold wallet (optional step).

I wish I could've read this two years ago when I was just learning about crypto. I was fumbling for weeks wondering how to get the fiat to crypto process down.

Choosing the exchange can be tricky, though. And I understand the poster's frustration. It's not easy to trust a KYC check from a website or company that you've only known about for a few days. It took me a while to trust Coinbase with my photo ID, etc. I think before I got started with crypto, Paypal was the only company that asked me for a copy of my ID. And even then, I was still not sure if I'm being duped.

[tranthidung]

• Go to the google play store and download Electrum wallet(simplest to use).

Electrum or any wallet application in crypto, you should not search to find them in Google Play.

Why?
Google Play are bad to screen fake apps, and you will find many of fake apps on their store if you use Search box.

The safest way to download wallet applications are:

• Going to official websites, and get links to download.
• Verify wallets.

With Electrum wallet

• Official website (Download page): https://electrum.org/#download
• How to Safely Download and Verify Electrum
• https://electrum.readthedocs.io/en/latest/gpg-check.html

Notice the warning at top of the page

Warning: Electrum versions older than 3.3.4 are susceptible to phishing. Do not download Electrum from another source than electrum.org, and learn to verify GPG signatures.

• Signup and get your address. (the seller will request it)

Sign up, what is this?

Electrum wallet is a non-custodial wallet and you don't have to sign up any account.
Create your wallet (but remember to back up your mnemonic seed), and get your receiving address.

• TUTORIAL: How to use Electrum (for beginners)
• TUTORIAL: How to use Electrum (for advanced users)