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Comment by rebuilder | Hacker News Reader

A hardware wallet allows you to spend coins without exposing the private keys. To spend e.g. a paper wallet, you have to swipe the keys on a computer. Yes, that can be offline, but a HW wallet reduces the amount of possible mistakes in this process.

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What if the hardware gets stolen or destroyed (or simply breaks)? Is there any way to still get the access to that wallet back somehow?

Speaking of Trezor: "a recovery seed is generated when the device is initialized. In case TREZOR gets lost or stolen, all its contents can be recovered using this seed (private keys, bitcoin balance and transaction history) into a new device or another BIP 0039/BIP 0044 compatible wallet." [1] See also the "Security threats" chapter from the official documentation. [2]

[1] https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Hardware_wallet#TREZOR_The_Bitcoi... [2] https://doc.satoshilabs.com/trezor-faq/threats.html#what-hap...

Yes, in the case of the Ledger Nano S for example when you set it up for the first time it gives you a 24 word recovery seed that you write down and keep in the safe place. The seed is created according to a Bitcoin standard (BIP39) If anything happens to your hardware wallet you just buy a new hardware wallet that supports BIP39 and you are back in business.

If you want to be really secure you can engrave your recovery seed into a piece of metal that won't melt in typical house fire temps like brass.

Thanks for the detailed answer, exactly what I needed! Would you recommend the Ledger Nano S? It seems like it's half the price of Trezor for some reason.

I have a nano, it does the job. Build quality feels cheap but like you said it is half the cost of trezor. Keep key is a trezor clone trezor was first in the space and I think there build quality is better

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