Legacy to Segwit Wallets

[Bright Light]

I have a Legacy Wallet by Electrum and want a Segwit Wallet to run on my computer,
Can I have both? How do I add a Segwit Wallet to my device?

[BIT-BENDER]

I have a Legacy Wallet by Electrum and want a Segwit Wallet to run on my computer,
Can I have both? How do I add a Segwit Wallet to my device?

Be very careful with the type of sensitive questions you ask, now you can be exposing yourself to real scam, not everyone is legit here, some can claim to help you and get some information on the sigwit wallet you want to create,
+Never let anyone else know your seed phase
+Never let anyone else know your password
To your question yes it is very possible.

Most times to open a wallet is self guiding, and if you need help further research and watch directional videos, -but don't let anyone use your account for tutorial or explanation-

[NeuroticFish]

You can create a new wallet with Electrum.
When you want to use the legacy one, load up that one, when you want to use the SegWit one, load that up.
I advise you backup your seed safely to paper, just in case, until you do the creation and verify they both load up.
Write the new wallet seed also on a paper for safe keeping.

[BlackHatCoiner]

How do I add a Segwit Wallet to my device?

You can have a segwit wallet with electrum, if you have the latest version.

• New/Restore
• Name your wallet and click Next
• Create a new seed

Segwit is by default selected as you can see:

If you continue electrum will derive you Bech32 addresses (starting with bc1) and not p2sh (starting with 3). In order to derive p2sh addresses you'll need to enter your mnemonic on "I already have a seed" --> (leave it blank if you don't want a passphrase) --> choose p2sh-segwit.

Can I have both?

On the same wallet? Yes.
In order to have different type of addresses on electrum you'll have to

• Create New/Restore
• Import Bitcoin addresses or private keys

Enter these before the private keys for whatever address type you want:
p2pkh: (starting with 1)
p2wpkh-p2sh:(starting with 3)
p2wpkh: (starting with bc1)

[Charles-Tim]

I have a Legacy Wallet by Electrum and want a Segwit Wallet to run on my computer,
Can I have both? How do I add a Segwit Wallet to my device?

Why do you need both segwit and legacy addresses? Before you make your decision, you will pay more fee why using legacy address for payment.

Legacy have the high transaction fee
Nested segwit (3-prefix addresses) can reduce the fee up to 26%
Native segwit (bc1- prefix addresses)  can reduce the fee up to 42%

Also know that you can transfer bitcoin to any of the addresses, you can transfer from segwit to legacy or from legacy to segwit. But using segwit will safe you fee while making Bitcoin transactions. The reason best for you to just send your bitcoin to native segwit addresses.

On electrum, you can just create the native segwit. Open the newly downloaded wallet (download from electrum.org and verify the GPG signature)
Click on 'Next'
Click on 'Standard wallet'
Click on ' Create a new seed'
Click on 'Segwit' just as instructed above by BlackHatCoiner, and safe fee while making transactions.

Do not forget to backup the seed phrase, and offline backup is recommended.

[hosseinimr93]

Nested segwit (3-prefix addresses) can reduce the fee up to 26%
Native segwit (bc1- prefix addresses)  can reduce the fee up to 42%

Just a small correction:
Using native segwit addresses, the transaction fee can be decreased even by more than 42%.

The transaction fee is decreased by 26% when there are 1 P2SH input and 2 outputs.
The transaction fee is decreased by 42% when there are 1 bech32 input and 1 output.

For example, size of a transaction including 10 bech32 inputs and 1 output would be about 722 vbytes and 1524 bytes. That's more than 52% reduce in transaction fee.


P.S.
Credit for the calculations goes to bitmover. I used bitcoindata.science.

[Charles-Tim]

For example, size of a transaction including 10 bech32 inputs and 1 output would be about 722 vbytes and 1524 bytes. That's more than 52% reduce in transaction fee.

I found it surprising that segwit to segwit with 10 input and 1 output to have around 52% reduction truly if compared to legacy to legacy. But, I do not think the more reduction in fee is beyond 10 inputs as I calculated for 20 inputs, 80 inputs, even 2000 inputs, while the output remain constant at 1, the results are still around 52% reduction. I hope I am correct.

[SquirrelJulietGarden]

I have a Legacy Wallet by Electrum and want a Segwit Wallet to run on my computer,
Can I have both? How do I add a Segwit Wallet to my device?

You can create a wallet file that store different addresses and in different types for you as BlackHatCoiner said.

Alternative
- With a same seed, you can create two types of addresses in Electrum: Legacy and Segwit. You can choose Legacy for your first wallet file (you can name the file as Legacy) and the second file as Segwit (name it as Segwit).
- If you import a seed from wallet with BIP39, you will be able to create three types of wallets: Legacy, Segwit, native Segwit (with addresses start with 1, 3 and bc1). You one of three types and make a name for your wallet file. With same BIP39 seed, you will have 3 wallets if you want.

There are currently three invoice address formats in use:

P2PKH which begin with the number 1, eg: 1BvBMSEYstWetqTFn5Au4m4GFg7xJaNVN2.
P2SH type starting with the number 3, eg: 3J98t1WpEZ73CNmQviecrnyiWrnqRhWNLy.
Bech32 type starting with bc1, eg: bc1qar0srrr7xfkvy5l643lydnw9re59gtzzwf5mdq.

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

[NeuroticFish]

Can I have both?

On the same wallet? Yes.

I would add that if OP goes on this path the wallet will not create for him change addresses, hence he will have (even more) reduced privacy.
I think that this should be explained. And I think that the best for OP would be to have SegWit wallet for the daily use for reduced fees.

[o_e_l_e_o]

the results are still around 52% reduction. I hope I am correct.

The best you can reach is around a 54% reduction. A P2PKH input is 148 vbytes, while a P2WPKH input is 68 vbytes, for a difference of 80 vbytes. 80/148 = 0.54. There are of course other differences between the size of outputs and the size of the transaction header, but these are very small compared to the size of inputs.

- With a same seed, you can create two types of addresses in Electrum: Legacy and Segwit.

You will need different seed phrases to do this. Unlike BIP39 seed phrases, Electrum seed phrases have a version byte built in to them, which specifies whether the seed phrase will generate a Legacy wallet or a Segwit wallet.

[Charles-Tim]

- With a same seed, you can create two types of addresses in Electrum: Legacy and Segwit. You can choose Legacy for your first wallet file (you can name the file as Legacy) and the second file as Segwit (name it as Segwit).

From the same seed, you can generate address for legacy, nested segwit and native segwit as it is explained above, but about creating another wallet from electrum, you will need to generate another seed phrase.

You click on wallet
Then click on new
Enter wallet name, for the new wallet you want to create
Click on next
Then click on standard wallet
Click on create a new seed
Click on Segwit or Legacy
It will generate new seed phrase for your second wallet.

You can manage legacy wallet on the first and segwit on the second, but these are two wallets entirely with different seed phrase, but on the same electrum wallet app.

[SquirrelJulietGarden]

- With a same seed, you can create two types of addresses in Electrum: Legacy and Segwit.

You will need different seed phrases to do this. Unlike BIP39 seed phrases, Electrum seed phrases have a version byte built in to them, which specifies whether the seed phrase will generate a Legacy wallet or a Segwit wallet.

Sorry. I mentioned BIP39 seed, not Electrum opt-in seed but I did not write it. Absolutely right that Electrum seed only allows to create 2 wallet types: Legacy and Segwit. Electrum use their UTF8 normalized seed phrase, not BIP39.

With BIP39 seed, I can import 3 wallet with Electrum: 1, 3, and bc1.

BIP39 was introduced two years after Electrum.

For these reasons, Electrum does not generate BIP39 seeds.

https://electrum.readthedocs.io/en/latest/seedphrase.html

- With a same seed, you can create two types of addresses in Electrum: Legacy and Segwit. You can choose Legacy for your first wallet file (you can name the file as Legacy) and the second file as Segwit (name it as Segwit).

From the same seed, you can generate address for legacy, nested segwit and native segwit as it is explained above, but about creating another wallet from electrum, you will need to generate another seed phrase.

You click on wallet
Then click on new
Enter wallet name, for the new wallet you want to create
Click on next
Then click on standard wallet
Click on create a new seed
Click on Segwit or Legacy
It will generate new seed phrase for your second wallet.

You can manage legacy wallet on the first and segwit on the second, but these are two wallets entirely with different seed phrase, but on the same electrum wallet app.

Your post is unnecessary. Do you think I don't know how to create a wallet (2 types)?