Best Crypto Cold Wallets

Imagine you lost all your money, that kinda sucks right?

One major challenge even experienced investors encounter is knowing how best to safely store their digital assets. That’s why crypto cold wallets have been created.

You must have heard about how blockchain projects claim to be immune to hacking. Still, the crypto sector has suffered many attacks over the years, and many exchange wallet breaches have also proven otherwise.

Exchange and decentralised wallets are great, but they don’t stand a chance against severe cyber attacks. However, using a cold wallet to store your private keys is widely known as the best way to safeguard your digital assets from hackers.

Best cold wallet for integrating native wallets: Ledger Nano X

Ledger’s Nano X is currently the best cold wallet from Ledger. Ledger is a company based in France, and they are considered the standard in the cold wallet market.

The Ledger Nano X is Ledger’s flagship product and is more expensive than the previous version, Nano S.

Source: Save your Bitcoin

The Nano X supports over 5,000+ cryptocurrencies and has a CC EAL5+ Certified secure element chip.

Accessibility and supported operating systems

The Ledger device can connect to a personal computer via USB cable and Bluetooth. Ledger works on Windows, Mac, Linux, IOS and Android.

How to manage your Ledger wallet

Using the Ledger Live application, you can manage your coins on a personal computer or a mobile for on-the-go transactions. However, your private keys cannot be accessed from your computer or mobile device, making this safer than simply using a mobile wallet.

Source: Ledger

Ledger cold wallets are highly secure, and there have been no vulnerabilities or exploits on them since their inception.

Although most cryptocurrencies can be managed on the Ledger Live software, many assets have native wallets not yet supported on the Ledger app. However, due to the popularity of Ledger’s cold wallet, many have integrated with it so that you can safely keep your keys.

Pricing

The Nano X is a tad more expensive than the Nano S but is quite similar.

They both come with Bluetooth connectivity, but the Nano X has a larger screen and the ability to hold 100 cryptocurrencies and blockchain networks, unlike the three to six-space storage capacity on the Nano S, which users have reported as a considerable disadvantage as they are unable to store all the coins of their choice.

Price: $149

Supported Coins: 5,000+ (Max 100 at a time).

If you don’t need to store up to 100 cryptocurrencies at a time, the Ledger Nano S is a better solution for a price you can easily afford ($59/£43/€50).

In April 2022, Ledger also released the Ledger Nano S Plus, a significant upgrade from the original Nano S at a very reasonable price point with some high-level features available on the Nano X.

There’s not much separating the different Ledger cold wallets, and most people would probably be contented with the Nano S or S Plus.

Integration with crypto software wallets

Ledger Nano X and Nano S support integration with Web3 wallets like Trustwallet and MetaMask via Walletconnect, allowing you to access various DeFi platforms and services.

Ledger Controversies and The Ledger Recovery Service

Before deciding on buying the Nano X, here are some controversies that arose on Ledger this year:

In early 2023, Ledger announced it was developing a new service called Ledger Recover, a method to recover your seed phrases should anything happen to your wallet and you lose them. While this sounds like a great idea, the announcement wasn’t accepted with arms wide open in the crypto sector.

The Ledger Recover is an ID-based seed-phrase recovery service that would back up your seed phrases and require you to provide a valid government-issued ID for identity confirmation. Despite Ledger’s assurance of high-level security for the service, the crypto community is against its implementation regarding potential security risks and the company’s past data leak in 2020.

The first rule you are taught about storing your coins is NEVER to reveal your private keys and ALWAYS keep them offline.

Ledger’s new service is entirely against this fundamental rule and sparks fears of hackers obtaining private keys or giving the government the power to demand user’s private keys.

Because of this, many crypto community members withdrew from using Ledger to hold their cryptocurrencies.

Due to the rejection received, Ledger decided to rethink and change its strategy, but the damage to its reputation has been done.

Even though Ledger retraced their steps, the company had already disregarded their communities’ concerns and paid deaf ears to outcry from the industry and security analysts who raised concerns.

Ledger also suffered a data breach in 2020, resulting in the theft of contact details and house addresses of over 272,000 customers.

While the crypto-assets were not in danger, the data breach led to spam emails sent out by hackers to users, pretending to be Ledger staff, requesting their private keys and recovery phrases.

The data breach, coupled with the Ledger Recover service proposal, has resulted in Ledger losing the confidence and trust of its customers in the security and reputation of the Ledger cold wallets and the company.

Despite the controversy, Ledger remains the top-selling cold wallet globally.

Setting up your wallet

Best user-friendly cold wallet for beginners: Trezor Model T

The Trezor Model T is the flagship product on offer from Trezor. The Trezor brand belongs to the Prague-based company Satoshi Labs, and its first crypto cold wallet was made in 2013.

Security features

The Trezor Model T uses a Secure Element (SE) chip that is tamper-resistant and provides high security for storing private keys.

The chip helps to:

– Detect hacking and modification attempts.

– Provide a memory for storing private encryption keys.

– Cryptographically secure generation of random numbers.

– Generate keys — for example, pairs of private and public keys for asymmetric and blockchain encryption.

The Trezor Model T also uses a PIN unlock system, which automatically locks the wallet in case of too many wrong attempts, and a Multi-factor Authentication (MFA) system.

Pricing

This cold wallet sells at $219 and supports over 8,000 cryptocurrencies and networks. Multiple third-party cybersecurity researchers audit Trezor and boast an impressive and successful track record.

Price: $219 (€219)

Supported coins: 8,000+

Since Trezor’s first cold wallet, no successful remote hacks have resulted in losing customer funds.

Wallet Management

Trezor is considered the safest crypto cold wallet on the market.

Trezor works with the online Trezor web wallet on desktop or mobile or via the downloadable Trezor suite app on desktop.

Source: Trezor support page

Integration with web3 wallets

You can also integrate your Trezor cold wallet with web 3.0 wallets like Trustwallet and Metamask.

Trezor has also formed a strong partnership and integration with the popular software wallet Exodus, bringing together the convenient features and the user interface of the Exodus software wallet with the advanced security of the Trezor cold wallet.

The Model T vs the Model One wallet

Trezor has two cold wallets: the less robust and cheaper Trezor One and the second option, its latest cold wallet, the Model T.

One of the benefits of the Model T over the Model One is that the Model T supports more coins and sensitive information such as the password and recovery phrases are entered directly on the Model T’s touch screen, safeguarding all sensitive data, unlike the Trezor One.

Another benefit of the Trezor Model T over the Model One wallet is its user-friendly colour touch screen. It is way more efficient than shuffling with the buttons on the Model One device and the Ledger wallets.

Accessibility and compatibility

Trezor is compatible with Windows, Mac, and Linux operating systems and works well with Android for mobile.

Unfortunately, Apple’s IOS, Windows mobile operating systems, and Chrome OS are not yet supported.

Despite the Model T being the premium device Trezor offers, many customers do not feel the value of purchasing it as it is double the price of the Model One.

While both are great options for crypto cold storage, offering advanced security, if you don’t need the additional asset support and are okay with not having a touchscreen, you can pick up the Trezor One for $65.

Trezor is also highly trusted as all the code for the Trezor cold wallets has been audited, released, and completely open source.

Setting up your wallet

Setting up the Model T is quick and very user-friendly. All you need to do is download and install the bridge and ensure the firmware is up to date- that’s it.

Need more help setting up your Trezor cold wallet? Watch this step-by-step video guide below.

Best Hardware Wallet for DApps and DeFi: ELLIPAL Titan

The ELLIPAL Titan is an air-gapped cold storage wallet that works in total network isolation for true offline cold storage.

Source: Ellipal Titan

This cold wallet has one of the largest coin support on this list, and the physical device is sealed to ensure it is dust and water-proof. It also comes with an anti-tamper feature that will erase all the private keys should someone try to break into the device or tamper with it physically.

Security and connectivity

The ELLIPAL Titan is secured with a password, so you should use a strong password with this device and store the cold wallet somewhere safe, as you would with any hardware wallet.

With enhanced security, the wallet is kept completely offline from any network, relying only on QR codes to transfer data.

The ELLIPAL cannot be connected to any via USB, WiFi, Bluetooth, or any connectivity tool, and this protects your cryptocurrencies against remote and network attacks.

Pricing

The ELLIPAL Titan sells for $169, which is higher than the Trezor One and Ledger Nano S, but the huge price tag may be worth the cost for some crypto users.

ELLIPAL impressively supports 46 blockchains and 10,000+ cryptocurrencies and even allows staking to earn interest, including access to a list of DApps and DeFi protocols and even buy or exchange cryptocurrencies through the applications that can be accessed on the mobile app.

Price: $169

Supported coins: 46 Blockchains, 10,000+ coins and tokens.

Challenges with using the wallet

Some cons with the Titan wallet are that the primary Bitcoin address generates the BIP 44 Bitcoin address that begins with three instead of the new BIP 84 Bitcoin addresses that begin with bc. This could lead to more expensive Bitcoin transactions for users.

Another con for some users is that the Ellipal wallet does not give you access to your Xpub keys, leaving the wallet not operable with many apps and not allowing you to import “view only” wallets.

Many crypto payment gateways for eCommerce use Xpubs to generate new payment addresses for checkouts, so this limitation of the Titan wallet should be considered.

Also, Ellipal’s ability to only generate a 12-word seed phrase instead of a 24-word phrase can be a disadvantage, especially for security-minded people. Although, a 24-word phrase can be imported.

The wallet also has no support for testnet tokens for any blockchain network. The inability to add a custom RPC could be a problem if you’re interested in trying out some testnets or testing coins to learn how certain blockchains or networks work.

The added advantage: Dapp functionality

The best thing about the Titan cold wallet is it has the DApp functionality, convenience and access of a hot wallet, including the high security of a cold wallet.

Accessing DeFi on the Titan is much easier than most cold wallets.

Source: Coinbureau

With Titan, you can easily stake and use DeFi protocols like Aave, Compound, Sushiswap, Uniswap, Trader Joe and DODO.

Here’s how to set up your wallet

Are you considering trying out the Ellipal Titan cold wallet?

Most Secure Cold Wallet, Zero Connectivity: NGRAVE ZERO

The NGRAVE ZERO is a powerful new cold wallet in the crypto cold wallet space, ranking as the most safest crypto wallet ever made, and they have a solid track record to back this claim.

This next-generation crypto cold wallet has gained much attention from crypto users and investors such as Woodstock Fund, DFG Group, Morning Star Ventures, and more.

Security features

This cold wallet is super safe because it is 100% air-gapped and is the only one in the world with the highest security certification standard, an EAL7 (vs Ledger’s EAL5) certification.

The Zero also has a tamper-proof photo sensor, biometric scanners, and pin protection, making it the most secure crypto cold wallet.

While you would think a cold wallet with such compact and standard security features would not be very user-friendly, the NGRAVE team have done an incredible job with the user experience and user interface of the device, and many users found it more user-friendly than either my Trezor or Ledger.

Another exciting feature of the ZERO cold wallet is that it is made from military-grade materials with a metal case, making it more robust than the plastic cases common among other brands.

Besides being the safest crypto cold wallet available, the ZERO does something even more impressive than its high-level security and brilliant user experience.

The NGRAVE team have worked with the Interuniversity Microelectronics Centre (IMEC) and The Computer Security and Industrial Cryptography (COSIC), a research group for applied cryptography, to ensure advanced security standards.

Still, their work with Jean-Jacques struck the most attention.

NGRAVE’s “Perfect key”

Jean-Jacques is one of the most famous cryptographers in history. He was the second reference cited in the original Bitcoin Whitepaper and teaches as a cryptography professor.

Working with NGRAVE, Jean-Jacques built a revolutionary private key generation, recovery, and security method and created what they called the “Perfect Key”.

Source: Ngrave

The Perfect Key, alongside the NGRAVE GRAPHENE, makes up the world’s first recoverable recovery phase that works without exposure to third-party risk.

The NGRAVE cold wallet is the only wallet in the world that prevents recovery phrase interception risk from third parties or wallet makers.

Pricing

The NGRAVE Zero is expensive, but you should go for the ZERO if you have the money to spend and want the best.

Another prominent feature of ZERO is that the private keys don’t come pre-installed on the device, unlike the other wallets on this list, and the keys can be randomised upon setup, meaning you’re the only one with access to the key you finally choose.

Price: $398 (398 EUR)

Supported Coins: 15 Coins Supported + 1,500 ERC20 Tokens + 2,200 ESDT Tokens.

The only thing that can dissuade you from ZERO is that it is relatively new to the market, unlike Trezor and Ledger, which withstood the test of time, and only some of the features have been rolled out.

Set up your wallet now

Here’s a quick video on how to set up your wallet

Largest Coin Support List: Safepal S1

The SafePal cold wallet, like the other wallets listed here, has security features such as a self-destruct mechanism, random key phrase generator, multi-layer security sensors, and ELA 5+ independent secure element.

Source: Safepal Store

The cold wallet is also completely offline and offers a fully air-gapped signing mechanism as it does not support Bluetooth, WiFi, USB cable connection, or NFC, just like the NGRAVE Zero wallet.

Safepal is also the first and only crypto-cold wallet supported by Binance Labs.

SafePal provides wallet services to more than 6.5 million people globally through its hot and cold wallets (hardware wallets).

Pricing

Users can manage their cryptocurrencies via the mobile app, which is used to sync all the various crypto wallets.

Its price of $49.99 makes it 5 to 3 times lesser than other wallets with these features in this list.

Price: $49.99

Coins Supported: 100+ blockchains, 30,000+ coins and tokens.

The SafePal hardware wallet can also include accessories like a leather case or SafePal cypher.

If you decide to buy the SafePal hardware wallet with the leather case, it’ll cost $59.98. If you opt for just the SafePal cypher, it’ll cost you $94.98.

Buying the Safepal S1 hardware wallet alongside the cypher and leather case raises the price to $104.97.

While Safepal offers great security plus 30,000+ supported coins and tokens at an affordable price, it still has some cons.

Many customers have complained about the user experience and design, saying it has average usability features and a poor design.

Recently, customers have complained about security, which has resulted in the brand losing customers.

NFT management

Here’s something else to draw your attention- The Safepal S1 cold wallet stores NFTs! Here’s how to utilise this feature:

First, pair a new crypto wallet in your S1 device with the app.

Next, open the Safepal app and hit the NFT icon to go to your NFT management screen.

Source: Safepal support

You’ll see the wallet that you paired your S1 cold wallet to.

Choose the network your NFT is on. For example, you can choose ETH. Next, Tap the ‘Receive’ button.

You’ll see a wallet address that you can use to receive NFTs on the ETH network to your S1 cold wallet.

Additionally, you can use Defi services on the S1 wallet to stake and earn rewards using the cold wallet.

Set up your wallet today

How to keep your crypto cold wallet safe

Crypto cold wallets are mostly safe from cyber attacks, but you must go the extra mile to protect them from physical theft.

Only buy your wallet from a trusted seller.

No matter how encrypted a cold wallet is, the security starts from where you buy the wallet from. It is advised not to buy a cold wallet from any store other than the manufacturer’s.

Purchasing a wallet from an e-commerce platform or any physical store the manufacturer doesn’t register can pose a great risk to your wallet.

These cold wallets could have been infected with malicious viruses or malware to spy on you and steal your private keys. So, it is advised that you always buy your cold wallet from a trusted source or the manufacturer at best.

Here is a summary of safe links to get your own cold wallet:

• Buy the Ledger Nano X
• Buy the Trezor model T
• Buy the NGRAVE ZERO
• Buy the Ellipal
• Buy the Safepal

Never disclose your seed phrase

Sharing your seed phrase or private keys is like putting a big post sign on your head telling hackers, “please, steal my cryptocurrencies.”

You must not share your seed phrase or private keys with anyone or post on any platform.

If you ever get any message or call from anybody posing as an agent of any of the wallet manufacturers asking you to tell them your seed phrase for upgrades or recovery or any reason at all, know that it is false, as these manufacturers will never request for your private keys or seed phrase.

Always use a strong and unique PIN or passphrase.

As a general security measure, using a unique passphrase or PIN is essential for locking away sensitive information or devices.

Don’t use an easy and predictable passphrase or PIN, such as your name, date of birth, a combination of your first and last name, names of any of your family members, a pet’s name, or anything closely related to you. It’s often advised to use a combination of alphanumeric and special characters as passphrases.

But don’t create a passphrase or PIN that you can easily forget, which leads us to the next step.

Write down your seed phrase and keep it in a classified and secure location

To prevent a forgotten passphrase or seed phrase scenario, write your seed phrase, passphrase, or PIN on perhaps a piece of paper or pieces and store them in very secure locations that only you know about.

You can also use a tool like Dashlane that allows you to keep your password and secret notes from everyone.

Some people have been known to store valuables in banks, and I assure you that your seed phrase is just as valuable.

Note: You can also buy a strong safe, store the written seed phrase there, and hide its location.

Regularly update your hardware wallet firmware

Like our mobile phones, cold wallets receive regular security patches, new features, and compatibility.

It is important to always check for these updates to ensure your wallet has the security level and qualities to battle current cyber threats.

What are crypto cold wallets?

A crypto cold wallet is a cryptocurrency wallet that stores your private keys offline or in cold storage. A cold wallet is unlike a hot wallet, which is always online or connected to an internet network.

The cold wallet (hardware wallet) is always offline except in cases where you need to approve a crypto transaction. It connects to the network, authorises the transaction and goes back offline almost immediately.

Some advanced cold wallets don’t even connect to a network at all.

Cold wallets or hardware wallets usually look like USB drives or any other physical item like a token or a mini screen with a few function buttons.

How do crypto cold wallets work?

A cold wallet is commonly misunderstood as simply the opposite of a hot wallet – but this is inaccurate.

While a cold wallet generates and stores your private keys in an offline environment, it also has another essential trait: it never interacts with smart contracts.

You can think of a cold wallet as a miniaturised special-purpose computer that can only perform a few essential functions. In most cases, cold wallets often come with one or two buttons and a display screen in some advanced ones.

As described earlier, the cold wallet holds private keys but not cryptocurrencies.

You see, a cold wallet is unlike every other crypto wallet. It cannot store your digital assets, unlike a hot wallet. Instead, it stores the private keys of your hot wallet offline and away from hackers.

The private keys are like a signature to your hot wallet, which you use to sign and validate transactions.

For example, let’s assume that you want to pay for goods using Ethereum, and you need to use your cold wallet.

The first thing to know is that your cold wallet is a simple device. You need a more sophisticated device like your laptop or phone to prepare the transaction or broadcast it to the blockchain network.

To use your cold wallet, you must first install the application built by the cold wallet’s company to work alongside the cold wallet. The application will serve as a bridge, and this bridge will let you create transactions for the cold wallet to sign.

The cold wallet only has one purpose: to receive the transaction details, sign it with your private keys on the cold wallet to validate the transaction, and send it back to the bridge to be completed.

The only thing that goes through the cold wallet is the unsigned and signed transaction.

The method of connectivity to receive these transactions varies from one wallet provider to the other and from one level of security to the other.

Some cold wallets connect over Bluetooth, and some connect to your computer using a USB-C or USB type A cable. The more sophisticated ones use a built-in camera to scan and sign the transaction details onto the cold wallet.

Because of its simple yet solid security, you can use your cold wallet on any computer without fearing being hacked and your coins stolen.

Additionally, You must always ensure that your crypto transaction being approved on your crypto cold wallet matches what is created and displayed on your hot wallet application.

Importance of crypto cold wallets in 2024

Cyber theft is one of the problems that has ravaged the cryptocurrency sector and hindered the mass adoption of cryptocurrencies. Some major hacks have occurred on various crypto exchanges and Defi platforms, which have scared away investors and left these exchanges bankrupt.

The notion that Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP and other altcoins are unhackable has been proven otherwise by the continuous attacks on exchanges in 2022.

A report from Chainalysis showed that In 2022, over $20 billion worth of crypto was stolen from users via exchanges and software wallets.

In the first quarter of 2023 alone, hackers successfully stole over $320 million from exchanges and low-security wallets.

These continuous attacks have triggered fear of adoption in the cryptocurrency market.

For those still willing to invest in cryptocurrencies, a more secure alternative to custodial and software wallets is a cold wallet that is offline or not connected to any remote network, seeing that hackers can only access your crypto assets through a network.

Your private keys are the most important thing to you as a crypto investor, and keeping them away from the reach of hackers is paramount. It’s safer not to keep them on any device permanently connected to the Internet; otherwise, you’ll risk losing your assets.

A cold wallet does the job of helping you keep these private keys offline and on a device that is not connected to the Internet, and even when you need to validate a transaction, you don’t still need to connect it to any network.

Cold wallets are the best way to keep crypto hackers at bay. Their unique features of storing and accessing your private keys offline make them essential to you as a crypto investor.

The 4 criteria to look for in a crypto cold wallet

1/Security

The main reason you’re using a crypto cold wallet in the first place is the security of your private keys, but these cold wallets need to be protected themselves.

You need to watch out for the security measures employed by cold wallets that keep the wallet secure, not just from cyber attacks but physical thefts.

It would be best to look for wallets that go the extra mile to protect your private keys, like using PIN, passphrases, or biometrics to authenticate access to the wallet.

Ensure the wallet is securely encrypted to prevent hackers from gaining access.

Some cold wallets offer multi-signature support. Multi-signatory cold wallets provide another level of security because they need the user to provide multiple unique signatures to validate transactions.

2/User-Friendly

The longer you try to figure out how to use a particular cold wallet or always need technical support, shows how poor the user experience of the hardware wallet is.

A cold wallet is a very simple device as it only securely performs basic computer functions. It should be easy to use without problems or mistakenly approving a wrong transaction.

3/Compatibility

Suppose you’re buying a crypto cold wallet. In that case, you need to ensure it is compatible with the devices you have at your disposal, compatible with operating systems and can support various hot wallets, Defi platforms, and cryptocurrencies.

Your cold wallet should be able to interface with other wallets of your choice, such as Metamask, Trustwallet, etc.

4/Backup and Recovery

In case of theft or permanent damage to the device, you must ensure that your cold wallet is recoverable. The backup and recovery feature is essential.

The manufacturer usually leaves instructions to back up private keys and seed phrases and recover them when you get a new wallet device.

Frequently Asked Questions

Should I keep my crypto in a cold wallet?

Those interested in keeping their cryptocurrencies in self-custody, a cold hardware wallet for long-term Bitcoin and cryptocurrency storage.

Are cold wallets 100% safe?

Cold wallets are safer than hot wallets or exchanges because they are not connected to the internet, but they are not entirely safe too.

Can a cold wallet be hacked?

Cold wallets aren’t immune to being hacked. While a cold wallet cannot be hacked remotely, if your wallet is stolen, that’s a different case.

For beginners, someone could access your crypto if your PIN or passphrase is stolen along with your cold wallet.

Can you withdraw and trade crypto to a cold wallet?

You’ll need your public address to do this. Paste your public address into the Send field in your crypto software wallet app, input the amount you’d like to transfer, and you’re ready.

How much do cold wallets cost?

Crypto cold wallet prices range from around $49 to $1000, from the cheapest to the most expensive.

How many wallets do I need?

You’ll only require one multicurrency cold wallet; most cold crypto wallets support from 100 to 10,000+ different cryptocurrencies.

Final remark

The importance of crypto cold wallets can not be emphasised enough. In 2022, about $2 billion worth of cryptocurrencies was lost due to cyberattacks. The security vulnerabilities of these software wallets were manipulated using Malwarebytes and Trojan horses.

A cold wallet is currently the best bet against these cyber attacks on crypto users.

Even though the hacker manages to access the software wallet, their transactions cannot be approved without the user’s private keys in the hardware wallet.

Until a more advanced solution is developed, using a cold wallet is advised to safeguard your Bitcoin and crypto assets.