Why Backing Up Your Seed Phrase is Important

[retreat]

This is just a quick story about how I nearly lost my Bitcoin yesterday because my BlueWallet app crashed and wouldn't open.

So, I'm using an iPhone, and the memory is already very low, with only 1 GB left of its 128 GB. Since I only use my iPhone for storing photos and Bitcoin, I didn't bother clearing it.

Last night, I checked my phone and saw that my free memory was 3 GB left, compared to 1 GB I remembered. I also noticed that several apps had been deleted, including the BlueWallet app I'd previously installed. I tried tapping the app, and a download notification popped up. I waited for it to finish, but the app crashed. I tried tapping it repeatedly, but it kept crashing. I then turned off my phone and tried opening the app again, but it still crashed. I was a bit stressed because the app kept crashing. Even though this wasn't my main wallet, I still had money in it, and unfortunately, I forgot to back up the seed phrase.

So I tried checking tutorials on YouTube and asking chatGPT, but none of them worked. Already stressed, I took the risk of uninstalling the app and letting my assets disappear. But my friend said that if you delete the app, some data might still be left behind. There was hope, I thought. So I tried reinstalling the BlueWallet app, and thank God, my wallet was still accessible, and I immediately backed up the seed phrase.

This should be a lesson for all of us to not take wallet security too lightly. Apps can crash for one or two reasons. But the most important thing is to back up your seed phrase. So, if the app crashes, we don't need to panic because we still have a backup that can be imported into another wallet app.

[Merit.s]

You're lucky, if not you should have lost your funds and learn in a hard way. I don't know why a high rank member like you will do such a silly thing not to backup your seed phrase after creating your wallet.

This minor instructions can lead to heavy losses incase, any mistake happens that will deprive you access to your wallet. I hope that you have also duplicated your seed phrase. This is what we keep on saying here daily.

[Emeraldo]

Backing up your seed phrase is very important for safety purposes because anything that happens to your seed phrase when you are not login to the wallet on your phone or system can be a total lost. This is the first thing Bitcoin investors need to understand especially when they don't keep their coin on exchange. I prefer to keep my Bitcoin in my non custodian wallet so that I can access it anything that I like having access to it alone. Once you lose your seed phrase it means total lose of asset.

[Livingleged]

This should be a lesson for all of us to not take wallet security too lightly. Apps can crash for one or two reasons. But the most important thing is to back up your seed phrase. So, if the app crashes, we don't need to panic because we still have a backup that can be imported into another wallet app.

It’s been said over and over on this forum to take your seed phrase as important as your life protects it and have it backed up on a physical external device. And if you don’t, then you should be ready to handle your losses.
As the saying goes “not your keys not your coin”

[Awaklara]

I also experienced something similar with my Safepal wallet. I replaced my mobile device and performed a factory reset on the old device. But I forgot that I still had some assets in my Safepal wallet. However, the reset had already happened.

Actually, I had written down the recovery seed for my wallet manually. It's just that at that time, I lost it and forgot where I stored it. It took quite a while until I found the paper that contained my wallet's recovery seed. It was in a stack of books while I was tidying up the cabinet.

Not only should we back up the Seed Phrase, but we also need to pay attention to how we store it.

[Karl_3000]

I have three backups. The first one are paper backups kept in two different places, but they are inside the same house. I wish I can have another location that is different from my house for another backup but I do not have any, this make me to have a third backup which is my memory. If anything happen to the house and nothing happened to me, I will set up new two paper backup again. I neither rely on my memory.

[348Judah]

To back up our seed phrase in not as important as the way we use in backing it up, because some can be this careless and be vulnerable while doing this, allowing a third party to have access to our seed phrase where it was kept shows a negligence from our end in securing it,  also, we shouldn't have only a single means to hold it, instead, we can device two alternative storage for our seeds and always have what to fall on to whenever there's an issue with one.

Other helpful threads on how we could safely device a means to secure our seed phrase.

storing seed phrase with washers
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5389446.0

seeds backup tools
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5263482.0

additional security to your seed phrase
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5230920.0

[justinlamode]

This is just a quick story about how I nearly lost my Bitcoin yesterday because my BlueWallet app crashed and wouldn't open.

A hero member of Bitcointalk lost Bitcoin because he failed to back up his seed phrase, which means you did not even learn the basics of what we are doing here. I will not call that carelessness because you can't know the consequences or losing your seed phrase and still allow yourself to lose it. I don't even know if I should feel sorry for you or not because you have been around this space, read read about how people lost Bitcoin and still go ahead to ignore. Well, your losss is an important lesson for others that no matter how confident you might be, the moment you ignore doing the right thing, there is a heavy price to pay.

[Charles-Tim]

because some can be this careless and be vulnerable while doing this, allowing a third party to have access to our seed phrase where it was kept shows a negligence from our end in securing it

To make seed phrase not vulnerable to offline attackers, the best way is to extend the seed phrase with passphrase. The passphrase should be at least of long characters in a way that no one can easily brute force it.

Another thing is that there is no third party about it, you are the owner of your noncustodial wallet, anyone or organization are not holding the coins for you.

[Hypnotizer]

So, I'm using an iPhone, and the memory is already very low, with only 1 GB left of its 128 GB. Since I only use my iPhone for storing photos and Bitcoin, I didn't bother clearing it.

Well, it cleared itself

Last night, I checked my phone and saw that my free memory was 3 GB left, compared to 1 GB I remembered. I also noticed that several apps had been deleted, including the BlueWallet app I'd previously installed. I tried tapping the app, and a download notification popped up. I waited for it to finish, but the app crashed. I tried tapping it repeatedly, but it kept crashing. I then turned off my phone and tried opening the app again, but it still crashed. I was a bit stressed because the app kept crashing. Even though this wasn't my main wallet, I still had money in it, and unfortunately, I forgot to back up the seed phrase.

You know, because the storage is running low on your iPhone and you didn’t do anything about it, the Iphone clears the applications you haven’t recently used for sometime to clear the space, so seems like you store the money in the wallet without seed phrase backup and you don’t still use the app by checking it frequently..


You can off the feature in setting to prevent something like that in the future, but since the data of the app are still stored you don’t need to bothered you can simple just delete and reinstall the app.

So I tried checking tutorials on YouTube and asking chatGPT, but none of them worked. Already stressed, I took the risk of uninstalling the app and letting my assets disappear. But my friend said that if you delete the app, some data might still be left behind. There was hope, I thought. So I tried reinstalling the BlueWallet app, and thank God, my wallet was still accessible, and I immediately backed up the seed phrase.

It’s really good you got to recover the wallet at last, but you learnt your lessons about seeds backup..

This should be a lesson for all of us to not take wallet security too lightly. Apps can crash for one or two reasons. But the most important thing is to back up your seed phrase. So, if the app crashes, we don't need to panic because we still have a backup that can be imported into another wallet app.

Seed phrase backup is very paramount for securing our investment and we should store it very safe.

He didn’t lost any of his bitcoin, it was a near to loss scenario but he recovered it at last..

[TokenTikas]

So, I'm using an iPhone, and the memory is already very low, with only 1 GB left of its 128 GB. Since I only use my iPhone for storing photos and Bitcoin, I didn't bother clearing it.

You are really lucky that you were able to get back your previous wallet. As I was reading about the frightening incident that happened to you, I even felt tense myself, because people who store bitcoin hardly make this kind of mistake. No matter the device we use in our daily life, it is very important to safely keep the security code and the seed phrase of the wallet where we store our Bitcoin.

When you found no other way, you went to ask YouTube and ChatGPT but they could not really give you the kind of help you needed. The type of output they would provide could not finally recover the lost funds. From my point of view, it seems like you were using an iPhone and that may be the reason you were able to get your wallet back. iPhone gives a very high level of security support that is not easily found on other devices. However, you should never make such a careless mistake again in the future, and it is better to stay cautious from now on.

Those who use an iPhone and also use different crypto wallets should be mindful of keeping enough free storage on their phone if the storage is low. This is because the crypto wallets we use need adequate space to function properly, otherwise the apps can drain and not work smoothly.

[Zlantann]

I have three backups. The first one are paper backups kept in two different places, but they are inside the same house. I wish I can have another location that is different from my house for another backup but I do not have any, this make me to have a third backup which is my memory. If anything happen to the house and nothing happened to me, I will set up new two paper backup again. I neither rely on my memory.

Your thoughts are highly valid. I hear people give the excuse that they have one backup because they have one safe location. They fail to understand that keeping more than one in different areas of the house is good if you have just one safe location. In case there is an emergency like a fire outbreak or flooding,  one can easily access a location in the house that is safe. I am fortunate to have two safe locations.

[Hatchy]

This should be a lesson for all of us to not take wallet security too lightly. Apps can crash for one or two reasons. But the most important thing is to back up your seed phrase. So, if the app crashes, we don't need to panic because we still have a backup that can be imported into another wallet app.

Many people still do this, so I won't be surprised.. we take the security of our funds as something less important until it dawns on us. Basically I can say that more that 50% of today Investors don't make proper back up of their keys. Some even still use Google or third party softwares or password managers to keep their seeds all in the name of trying to play smart..
Your keys are a vital part of bitcoin investment and if many don't know, that's where your coins are stored, the wallet app you have on your phone it's just a way for you to communicate with the Blockchain and carry out transactions.. without your keys you simply don't own any coin.. lets try to do the right thing at all time.. you might have been lucky on this though and it should be a good lesson for you..

[Zaguru12]

So I tried checking tutorials on YouTube and asking chatGPT, but none of them worked. Already stressed, I took the risk of uninstalling the app and letting my assets disappear. But my friend said that if you delete the app, some data might still be left behind. There was hope, I thought. So I tried reinstalling the BlueWallet app, and thank God, my wallet was still accessible, and I immediately backed up the seed phrase.

At least I know something that not all third party apps on iPhone you can erase everything even after deleting because most of the apps are usually backed up on your iCloud and that’s why when you uninstall and later install those apps you see some of them still have same settings.

This is also another warning that things you keep on device and later deleted are not totally deleted and some companies have access to this data, this is why storing seed phrase again on online devices and is also dangerous as third party can still have access to them.

Also seed phrase should be backed up properly before even updating any app or hardware wallet firmware because they can still crash and need seed phrase been actually imported again.

A hero member of Bitcointalk lost Bitcoin because he failed to back up his seed phrase, which means you did not even learn the basics of what we are doing here. I will not call that carelessness because you can't know the consequences or losing your seed phrase and still allow yourself to lose it. I don't even know if I should feel sorry for you or not because you have been around this space, read read about how people lost Bitcoin and still go ahead to ignore. Well, your losss is an important lesson for others that no matter how confident you might be, the moment you ignore doing the right thing, there is a heavy price to pay.

Account sometimes doesn’t matter when it comes to negligence, I feel he neglected backing up the wallet because it is not his primary wallet, but still a bad thing.

 But you also need to read properly he later didn’t lose the wallet/bitcoin as said

[livingfree]

Backing up the seed phrase or recovery phrases are very important. I think in the creation of new wallets for every wallet that we use, they're always giving that reminder.

I guess that this is too much confidence and don't wait to learn with an expensive lesson that if someone hasn't backed up yet, don't wait it happen to you.

It's a good reminder by OP that others might have been taking screenshots of their back ups as well that are saved on their phone.

While you think that it's safe, no its not until some bad guys have stolen your device.

[JunaidAzizi]

You have good luck, you almost got your wallet back. So yeah, it's very necessary to back up your seed for any future issues or problems coming to us. We don't know what will happen , phones can get stolen, apps can crash, or any other issues can arise that can put our money at risk. So it is great to store our phrase to make sure our money is safe and can be regained if any unpleasant thing happens to us.

[FirmWars]

Bitcoin wallets of now have a disclaimer that always ask users to make sure that they back up their private keys and secret phrase offline and that very straight forward, a sensible person would know that the introduction that the wallet is given to them is valid that's why it is always at the header of the page. Your experience will only serve as a lesson to those people that will create a Bitcoin address without backing up the secret phrase offline but in this current smart world, only a foolish person would want to joke with their hard earned money and so would not want to follow instructions that is clearly asking them to have an offline backup of their address key.

Learn to grow smart as the world is fast growing too or live to regret why they refused to hearken to due to self ignorance. I wonder how someone will see an instruction boldly written and then will ignore it. They will either learn to be smart or learn from bad experience.

[promise444c5]

You forgot to create a backup for your seed .. that should even be the first thing to do when you create your wallet, there’s a reason the button to close it has it text to be. “Ok, I wrote it down” , it assumes everything is set.

Main or not you shouldn’t even gamble with your wallet.

Probably Blue wallet should also force user to verify seed before allowing you to even access it  just like how Electrum does it .

[AVE5]

Glory to the end that you were able to get access to the app again giving you another chances to backup the seed otherwise, you as an experience user is the space Wasn't supposed to make such mistake to keep it at the back of your mind that once you installs a software wallets app and generated wallet address along, the next thing to do even before doing other things like transacting with it was to backup your seed phrase first before any other thing because anything expected is possible to happen out of malfunctioning of your device.
Well, like you said, let it be treated as a lesson not just to you but newbies who don't find it necessity to also treats their backup phrases crucial just in case of necessity.

[Finestream]

Backing up your seed phrase is highly essential. You don't hold the future events or circumstances that may compromise your wallet so its best to secure it before anything bad happens.

Your seed phrase is the master key to your digital assets, if you lost them due to uncontrollable instances, that means losing your bitcoin forever. So as early as today learn to secure even your highly reliable type of wallet. Start backing up, or you will lost access to your wallet forever if undesirable things happen beyond your control.