Bitcoin wallet offline

by Shawn Wilkinson

What is a Hot Wallet?

In the previous tutorials we created something called a hot wallet. The textbook definition of a hot wallet is a Bitcoin wallet that is online and connected in some way to the Internet. This is like having cash on your person, easy access but the most susceptible to theft or loss. Nearly all bitcoin thefts have been from hot wallets.

Cold Storage

To guard against this you can place your Bitcoin in something called cold storage. Cold storage basically means that we generate a Bitcoin wallet offline. This can be on an offline computer or a paper wallet. Most Bitcoin companies place user funds in cold storage.

Cold storage makes it impossible to hack or steal your Bitcoins since they are not accessable from online. Well unless the hackers hired Tom Cruise...

Downloading

First and foremost, you will need a computer that you don’t mind keeping disconnected from the internet. Such a computer does not have any particular resource requirements: pretty much any computer that boots into Windows or Linux, can run Armory in offline-mode.

Minimum ingredients:

• Offline computer/laptop, 256MB RAM
• USB drive (or other rewritable media)

If you haven't done so already you need to head over to the official Bitcoin Armory website, to download the lastest version of the software. You can also go directly to the download page here.

Installing

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Offline Armory

Make sure you click on the shortcut for "Bitcoin Armory (Offline)" or Armory will try to connect to the internet. You should see something like this:

Vouilà

No syncing needed. We now have a full functional Bitcoin Armory.

Donations

Please let us know in the comments section what info you have found useful and how we can improve this guide. We want to add more content this site and additional guides on advanced features, such as cold storage. Please consider a small donation if you would like to support our efforts.