Are cold wallets safer than online exchanges?

[tranthidung]

Cold storage is 100% safer than storing your Bitcoin on an online exchange. Look what has happened in the past with Mtgox, Celsius, FTX plus many more. It’s boring & it gets repeated all the time but in crypto nothing is everas true as ‘Not your keys, not your coins.’

People who intend to store cryptocurrency on centralized exchange account and consider it as their storage wallet, might change their minds after knowing about stories of Mt.Gox, Celcius, FTX and more stories in Exchange graveyard.

These exchanges rest in peace but people, their customers, who lost money by storing it on these RIP exchanges, would surely not have had peaceful and comfortable experience. It's painful experience for them.

[legendbtc]

I believe that individuals who prioritize the secure storage of their digital currencies often opt for cold wallets. However, in the case of traders, it is common practice to allocate approximately one-third of their assets to a reputable exchange, while keeping the remainder in a cold wallet for added security.

Essentially, cold wallets are much more secure than centralized exchanges, and storing assets on cold wallets is in line with the cryptocurrency industry's criteria for decentralization. But that depends on each person because as you said. If we want to make money by being traders then we need to leave our money on exchanges because that is the only option we have so far. But if we are long-term holders, cold wallets will definitely always be the choice because the exchange is too risky and we do not have full control over our assets when stored on it.

In addition, the safety of our assets will depend largely on us and not entirely on cold wallets. I mean even if we use cold wallets, if we don't know how to store the seed phrase safely then our assets will not be safe.

[Antotena]

If you had a large amount of cryptocurrency would you prefer to keep it on an offline cold wallet or an online cryptocurrency exchange?

Both have pros and cons.

I'm interested to hear the thoughts of others.

I hope you understand that there is a difference between Hardware wallet, cold wallet and exchange wallet/custodial wallet. The least place you want to keep your money is an exchange wallet because you don't have the private keys to that wallet and that means you can't authorize a transaction from the wallet since you don't own the private keys or seed phrase, this is why it's not advisable to store your coins on online exchange.

Cold wallets or hardware wallets are considered the best wallet to keep your coins because they are both offline and all your keys are managed offline but because hardware wallets sometimes are used to interact with Defi such as the web3, there is high possibility of your wallet been comprised with some malicious things that can make you lose your coins, not necessarily your private keys but somethings can make you sign some transactions which can make your wallet zero, this is why cold storage are the best since you don't sign anything on web3 or have to interact with a smart contract that will steal your coins, it's strictly offline.

[Bravut]

I  choose cold wallet over online exchanges, if not for anything Security reason and against Fraud or hacking of my wallet because you do not really control it as anything can happen while in exchange. I have seen cases, People's wallet are hacked, compromised in exchanges and the exchange give silly excuses, if we really understand the necessity of Self-Custody then, Cold wallet is the right option to choose from OP.

Cold wallet over exchanges, so you have your seed phrase with you and take charge of your wallet, not entrusting it to any external factor which is also one of the fundamental reasons Bitcoin was created.

[Cryptomultiplier]

If you had a large amount of cryptocurrency would you prefer to keep it on an offline cold wallet or an online cryptocurrency exchange?

Both have pros and cons.

I'm interested to hear the thoughts of others.

A cold storage wallet is by far safer than a hot on online wallet as we know and for large investments, it is much more safer and lesser to be attacked by scammers or hackers wanting to steal ones funds without their prior notice.
Unless you are a trader who does so frequently, an offline or cold wallet is best suited for long term holdings and with the keys or seed phrases, it makes it easier to be etched on steel on stored on hard drives where no one can easily detect it and steal it.

[moneystery]

if i have a lot of cryptocurrency i will choose a cold wallet over an online exchange, that's because cold wallets have good security and i don't have to worry about losing my assets when the online exchange goes bankrupt.  because cold wallets are designed to provide extra security to users who don't want their assets to be lost and buying it when you have a lot of assets is the best investment.

[Fivestar4everMVP]

If you had a large amount of cryptocurrency would you prefer to keep it on an offline cold wallet or an online cryptocurrency exchange?

Both have pros and cons.

I'm interested to hear the thoughts of others.

Keeping such amount of cryptocurrency in an offline cold wallet will always be my first and only available option, and I do agree that storing crypto on online exchanges and offline cold wallet both have their pros and cons, but if you are well experienced in this space, you will agree with me that the pros of choosing to store your crypto on an offline cold wallet very much outweighs it's cons (if actually there is any con in choosing this option).

Over time in crypto, "Not your keys, not your crypto" have become a very popular slogan, which also have become the number one golden rule in cryptodom, this slogan teaches us that which ever wallet that you choose to keep your crypto on, which you are not in custody of the private keys or seed phrase to that wallet, it simply means that you have just successfully handed someone else your crypto to keep for you, and that person may decided to do anything with it, he or she may sell it, use it to do business, make huge profit through it and not pay you a dime as interest, or worst of it all, he or she may decide to run away with this funds, by simply moving the funds to another wallet that you have absolutely no access to.
So, it's always better to keep your crypto in a wallet where you and you alone have access and control the keys, and the best option in this regard is offline cold wallet.

[HelliumZ]

If you had a large amount of cryptocurrency would you prefer to keep it on an offline cold wallet or an online cryptocurrency exchange?

Both have pros and cons.

I'm interested to hear the thoughts of others.

Undoubtedly, exchange wallets are much more risky than cold wallets. In particular, the access to the cold wallet can only be taken by the owner of the wallet, no other third party can take access to the cold wallet. So there is no risk in keeping Cryptocurrency in cold wallet. But if you keep cryptocurrency in the exchange wallet, the exchange authority can take access to that wallet apart from the user, so the cryptocurrency remains at risk for the user. So I am currently more interested in using cold wallets than exchange wallets.

[dansus021]

Are cold wallets safer than online exchanges? Totally one of the crypto motto "Not your keys not your coin"

If you have a ton of coins, then a cold wallet is a must rather than plain put in an exchange. I mean cold wallet nowadays is pretty much cheap and can be bought anywhere. The pros is pretty much everything the cons is that your coins is idle there but crypto has significant growth so don't bother with and up and down.

The only use for online exchange is to bought the coins and that it

[Woodie]

If you had a large amount of cryptocurrency would you prefer to keep it on an offline cold wallet or an online cryptocurrency exchange?

Both have pros and cons.

I'm interested to hear the thoughts of others.

Like you said both have their strengths and weakness, and depending on how you choose to grow your money will tell how you  can store your coins...
If say you are a trader trading on the charts most likely an exchange will be appreciate, or say you are into p2p trading an exchange will be ideal as you want coin's  readily available for your business without having to waste your small profits on transaction fees, and if you aren't into trading and going for the old Skool way of letting price grow your portfolio.. then you can hodl in a cold wallet to have a peace of mind without worrying of an exchange closing or getting hacked.

[Marvell1]

If you had a large amount of cryptocurrency would you prefer to keep it on an offline cold wallet or an online cryptocurrency exchange?

Both have pros and cons.

I'm interested to hear the thoughts of others.

Undoubtedly, exchange wallets are much more risky than cold wallets. In particular, the access to the cold wallet can only be taken by the owner of the wallet, no other third party can take access to the cold wallet. So there is no risk in keeping Cryptocurrency in cold wallet. But if you keep cryptocurrency in the exchange wallet, the exchange authority can take access to that wallet apart from the user, so the cryptocurrency remains at risk for the user. So I am currently more interested in using cold wallets than exchange wallets.

Cold wallets also have risks. Your cryptocurrency can still be attacked by hackers if you don't know how to preserve your cold wallet's private key/seed phrase. If your seed phrase is leaked, someone will also have access to your cold wallet, or worse, you will lose access to your assets if you lose your seed phrase. Everything has its own risks and the safety of your assets is up to you, not just using a cold wallet means your assets become inviolable.

But using cold wallets will be a more perfect choice because we have full control over our assets, whereas if we store them on centralized exchanges, we will lose some authority over our assets making it unsafe.

[shield132]

If you had a large amount of cryptocurrency would you prefer to keep it on an offline cold wallet or an online cryptocurrency exchange?

Both have pros and cons.

I'm interested to hear the thoughts of others.

I prefer to hold large amounts of coins on a Cold wallet because I know how to create a cold wallet safely, how to back up seed phrases and store them in a secure way. In overall, I know how to keep my cold wallet safe. For a person like me, it's better to use cold wallet instead of online exchange. If you are a person who doesn't know how to create and use cold wallet, how to keep seed phrases safely and other details, then it's better to use online exchange. Many will argue with me cold wallet is better but in this case when person doesn't know how to create a cold wallet and how to keep Bitcoins safely, such a person will lose access to his bitcoins anyway, so in such a scenario, using an online exchange is a better choice but long-term, this will lead to the lose of your coins because exchanges often get hacked.

To sum up, learn how to create a cold wallet, how to keep your seed phrases safely and stick with cold wallet. If you don't know how to do it, then use an online exchange until you'll understand how to create and keep a cold wallet.

[God bless u]

If you had a large amount of cryptocurrency would you prefer to keep it on an offline cold wallet or an online cryptocurrency exchange?

Both have pros and cons.

I'm interested to hear the thoughts of others.

I would definately prefer cold wallets because they can be more secure and as we can see now days the online wallets are being hacked and people are going through in everyday almost.
Not only wallets but blockchains are also being hacked and hijacked. We can see multiple incidents in the past and this arises a question that are our assets safe? Thats why cold storage is more likely prefered.

[Kialara33]

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[bettercrypto]

If you had a large amount of cryptocurrency would you prefer to keep it on an offline cold wallet or an online cryptocurrency exchange?

Both have pros and cons.

I'm interested to hear the thoughts of others.

If it's a really large amount of money, I would prefer to put it in cold wallets compared to the exchange because you have more full control over your assets, while in the exchange you don't. Because the risk in the exchange, especially if it is centralized, is that it can shut down anytime, and when that happens, you have no choice but to wait, just like what happened with Ftx.

But if in the cold wallet way there is nothing like that, instead you really have control over your assets and there is no KYC that needs to be given, but it depends on the trust you give to the exchange or how reputable it is, like Binance, Bitget, and Bybit. In short, do it at your own risk.

[dkbit98]

If you had a large amount of cryptocurrency would you prefer to keep it on an offline cold wallet or an online cryptocurrency exchange?

Cold wallets should not be compared with exchanges, this are two totally different things.
You should never keep anything on centralized exchanges long term, and if you do this you have to know that this are not really your coins because you don't own the keys.
Only trader would have some excuse if they are trading all the time, but they should never trade with all their coins.

[Stablexcoin]

Exchange is dangerous and it is not good that a large amount of assets should be kept there. The disadvantage of keeping them there is that if anything happens to the exchange all funds can be lost and you do not have any way to get them back since it is controlled by a central authority which is the owner and the dev. Also, a high number of attacks from crypto scammers were done through centralized exchanges compared to wallets.

[darkangel11]

The only con of holding money in a hardware wallet is that you need some time to sell if you decide to do so. You can't sell bitcoin from a hardware wallet during crashes, which makes you vulnerable if you want to trade it and take advantage of volatility. That said, people who are like that should keep their money on exchanges the whole time.because hardware wallets aren't made for traders. You either put your money at risk in order to get a daily or weekly profit and realize that every single week, or you use bitcoin as a safety fund and a cold storage and you don't care about 5% swings.

[Saint-loup]

I didn't know this page. The number of exchanges is insane. It doesn't mean that customers haven't been able to withdraw their funds or to get back them from another procedure though. In addition it doesn't explain how they've found the actual reason of those closings and how especially how they've decided which ones are exit scams/rug pulls and which ones are honest closing. More details would be welcomed to be able to get a relevent idea of the phenomenon IMO.
 

[Zoomic]

None is safe as even the cold wallet can still be attacked if you are very careless with it. But considering the pros and cons of both wallets, the cold wallet is safer. This does not mean that one should be careless with his cold wallet and still expect his bitcoins to be intact. As long as you are in possession of bitcoins, you are a potential target to scammers and they are always seeking for means to steal.
The rule still remains, save your bitcoins in cold wallets and send only what you need to the hot wallets so as to avoid losing everything you've laboured for. While you are trying to play safe with your choice of wallet, be vigilant too and keep your cold wallets safe.