Changing Hardware Wallets

[Solo6R]

I'm about to switch from a Tangem wallet to a Coldcard Q. Tangem was my first ever HW wallet, so I don't have any experience "changing wallets". Is it better practice/security to generate a new seed phrase with the new wallet, and then send my BTC over from Tangem (testing with a smaller amount of course), or should I just restore my seed phrase from when I created the Tangem wallet? Appreciate any input, thanks!

[OmegaStarScream]

No, you should definitely not use the same seedphrase. It's better to just restore a new one, just in case. So just create a new wallet and then send the funds as you normally would.

[mocacinno]

If you restore the wallet, you double the attack vector... If there was a vulnerability in your first hardware wallet (or your OPSEC), you might end up losing your funds after switching. If there's a vulnerability in your new hardware wallet, you'll potentially lose your funds anyways.

So, if you re-use the seedphrase, you have 2 "chances" of losing your funds (vulnerability or bad OPSEC in your old setup + vulnerability or bad OPSEC in your new setup). If you start over you only have 1 "chance" of losing your funds (vulnerabilty or bad OPSEC in your new setup).

The only real cost are the transaction fees anyways.. And at the moment they're quite low... Maybe it's even a good moment to consolidate your inputs while moving to a new hardware wallet???
If you want to test your new hardware wallet, maybe you can find out if they support testnet? It's usually a good idear to test if you can actually spent inputs funding addresses generated by a new (hardware) wallet, and the testnet is usually a good starting point (at least, that's how i usually test out new wallets)

[Catenaccio]

I'm about to switch from a Tangem wallet to a Coldcard Q. Tangem was my first ever HW wallet, so I don't have any experience "changing wallets". Is it better practice/security to generate a new seed phrase with the new wallet, and then send my BTC over from Tangem (testing with a smaller amount of course), or should I just restore my seed phrase from when I created the Tangem wallet?

Don't reuse your wallet addresses, use change addresses.
Don't resuse your wallet seed phrase when you change from one wallet brand to another wallet brand or software.

Create a new wallet, with new wallet seed phrase on a new brand or software, and move your bitcoin from current wallet to this new one.

https://bitcoin.org/en/secure-your-wallet#backup

[Solo6R]

Appreciate all the replies folks. Sounds like the popular consensus is to create a new seed phrase, which is what I'll do! Cheers!

[Charles-Tim]

Don't reuse your wallet addresses, use change addresses.

There is nowhere OP asked about reusing address. He only asked of using a new seed phrase or to import the seed phrase of the old wallet.

Also what you meant is not change address but to use another receiving address. Change address is the address your change (UTXOs) would be sent to on your wallet. It is better to use another receiving address and which a good wallet will display for you after using the address it displayed for you at first, then it display another one if you request for another address or after you send coins to the first one.

You can also use change address but it is better you stick to using receiving addresses only for privacy reasons, but not reusing the same receiving address for another transaction.

[satscraper]

I'm about to switch from a Tangem wallet to a Coldcard Q. Tangem was my first ever HW wallet, so I don't have any experience "changing wallets". Is it better practice/security to generate a new seed phrase with the new wallet, and then send my BTC over from Tangem (testing with a smaller amount of course), or should I just restore my seed phrase from when I created the Tangem wallet? Appreciate any input, thanks!

Wise decision as Coldcard Q  has a robust (more reliable) entropy source  when compared with Tangem.

I use Tangem solely for the quick  on-the-go payment. For long term storage I use Passport 2 the formfactor of which is more preferable for me that that one for Coldcard Q. Regarding security Passport 2 and Coldcard Q are comparable devices but I think Passport 2 is more user-friendly.

Regarding SEED. It is a good practice to generate new SEED on your new device.

[EluguHcman]

No big deal in generating new seed phrases.
To be more security concious, you basically do not know how compromised you must have exposed your recent wallet securities and Privacies so, better generate new seed phrases the same time you are generating a new wallet network address to avoid every loopholes or links to your your new wallet.

Looking for a low transaction fee? You just have to considering the current transaction congestion volume and carefully access the networks with their fees which may suit your amount of transaction as the varies.

[dkbit98]

I'm about to switch from a Tangem wallet to a Coldcard Q. Tangem was my first ever HW wallet, so I don't have any experience "changing wallets". Is it better practice/security to generate a new seed phrase with the new wallet, and then send my BTC over from Tangem (testing with a smaller amount of course), or should I just restore my seed phrase from when I created the Tangem wallet? Appreciate any input, thanks!

I wouldn't recommend anyone to use Tangem or Coldcard devices because first one is closed source and Coldcard is source viewable, and it only supports Bitcoin if that is important to you.
You can import seed words to any other hardware wallet of your choice (if you didn't expose them before) but I would strongly recommend using open source devices like Trezor, Passport, Keystone, Satochip etc.

[cryptorecovery.io]

I'm about to switch from a Tangem wallet to a Coldcard Q. Tangem was my first ever HW wallet, so I don't have any experience "changing wallets". Is it better practice/security to generate a new seed phrase with the new wallet, and then send my BTC over from Tangem (testing with a smaller amount of course), or should I just restore my seed phrase from when I created the Tangem wallet? Appreciate any input, thanks!

If I were you, I’d definitely look into using an open-source device like Trezor or Passport. The way to go is to have a hot wallet (or a few) for your daily stuff and a cold wallet like Trezor for the bigger crypto stash. For hot wallets it depends what you need, but you can check out options like MetaMask, Electrum or Trust Wallet (which is partially open-source).

[Publictalk792]

You have the option of restoring your old seed phrase on new wallet but it is generally considered less secure. If your old seed phrase is compromised your new wallet will be affected too. So I will recommend to do these works.

1. Generate new seed phrase on your Coldcard Q Wallet.
2. Transfer small amount of BTC from your Tangem wallet to test it is processing or not.
3. Once you verified transfer remaining funds to your new wallet.

Remember that always follow best practices to handle seed phrases and private keys to ensure security of your funds.

[_act_]

You have the option of restoring your old seed phrase on new wallet but it is generally considered less secure. If your old seed phrase is compromised your new wallet will be affected too. So I will recommend to do these works.

The probability that your old seed phrase can be compromised is the same for your new seed phrase to be compromised because if you do not have the new seed phrase, you will continue to use the old seed phrase. But the main reason to generate the seed phrase from the new hardware wallet is to reduce the probability of attack. Read what people post before you post. Mocacinno explained the reason the seed phrase should not be used and he is right.

[KiaKia]

That's not a good move OP, these are not the same HD wallets, they are made differently, just create a new address on the new HD wallet and move your BTC from Tangem wallet, by the way Tangem is very secured why bother using a new HD wallet? Do not import your recovery seed into any crypto wallet no matter how strong they look, importing is dangerous on its own.

I know people that use more than one hardware wallet but they tend to have lots of money to fill the wallets up with Bitcoin and other alternative coins, it is not a must to have more than on HD wallets unless your current one is bad or you have a lot of digital assets you want to split around to avoid putting all your eggs in one basket.

[Lucius]

If I were you, I’d definitely look into using an open-source device like Trezor or Passport. The way to go is to have a hot wallet (or a few) for your daily stuff and a cold wallet like Trezor for the bigger crypto stash. For hot wallets it depends what you need, but you can check out options like MetaMask, Electrum or Trust Wallet (which is partially open-source).

Trezor was never in the category of cold wallets, and it is not even today - because you still have to connect it online to be able to perform certain actions. It is possible that you got confused, because what we can consider a cold wallet is another device that you mentioned (Foundation Passport).

Also, anyone can make a free cold wallet if they have an old computer that they will make sure does not have the possibility of connecting to the internet, on which they can then install a wallet like Electrum. On such a computer, you can then sign the transaction and transfer it via SD card or USB stick to an online computer and broadcast it.

[m2017]

I'm about to switch from a Tangem wallet to a Coldcard Q. Tangem was my first ever HW wallet, so I don't have any experience "changing wallets". Is it better practice/security to generate a new seed phrase with the new wallet, and then send my BTC over from Tangem (testing with a smaller amount of course), or should I just restore my seed phrase from when I created the Tangem wallet? Appreciate any input, thanks!

Restoring your crypto wallet using the seed phrase on the Coldcard Q will make the replacement from a Tangem completely meaningless and in your case, the best solution would be to transfer the contents of the Tangem wallet to a new created wallet on the Coldcard Q. That is, generate a new clean seed phrase on Coldcard Q, to which all your cryptocurrencies will be sent.

I would like to ask, what exactly is the reason for your switching from one device (Tangem) to another (Coldcard)?

And what will you do with Tangem? After all, you can use this wallet to store a small amount of cryptocurrencies, for example.