In July of last year, Swiss privacy tech company Proton (makers of Proton Mail) announced it would be launching its own bitcoin wallet — Proton Wallet.
I (along with about 100,000 other users) was given early access to the wallet to test it out and was impressed with the wallet’s user interface. I particularly liked that it allows you to link a user’s email address to their bitcoin address so that you only need to input the email address when sending bitcoin.
You can read my review of the wallet here.
Now that the wallet is available to the general public, I will recommend it to anyone I know who’s finally ready to move their bitcoin out of the hands of an exchange and into their own custody. I’ll also recommend it to anyone looking to make semi-regular bitcoin payments on-chain with a relatively small amount of bitcoin.
My reasons for recommending the wallet are as follows:
- It’s free to use (users can create up to three wallets and have up to three accounts in each wallet, which is sufficient for most users — more on that here; to create more wallets or accounts, Proton charges a fee)
- It’s easy to set up (you aren’t required to write down the 12-word seed phrase when you set up the wallet; however, it’s good practice to do so!)
- Like Proton Mail, Proton has no access to Proton Wallet user data, nor does it have access to its users’ private bitcoin keys
- Using an email address (which doesn’t have to be a Proton Mail address) to send bitcoin reduces the likelihood of inputting the wrong bitcoin address into the recipient field of a transaction
- You can select the priority speed of a transaction when sending bitcoin
- You can purchase bitcoin via Ramp or Banxa using Proton Wallet, enabling the bitcoin you purchase to be transferred directly into your custody
The only downsides to the wallet is that it doesn’t support Lightning transactions (consider the Breez SDK, Proton team!), and it doesn’t let you manage your UTXOs (loose change from bitcoin transactions, in layperson’s terms).
The latter isn’t super important, though, as, again, I’d recommend this wallet to those new to bitcoin self custody. UTXO management is more of a practice for moderate to advanced Bitcoin users.
All in all, Proton has created yet another fine product here for its 100 million users and counting, and it’s one that I’ll be recommending to Bitcoin newbies moving forward.
This article is a Take. Opinions expressed are entirely the author’s and do not necessarily reflect those of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine.