The popular wallet application BRD Wallet is shutting down. As a result of an acquisition, the BRD Wallet team will now focus on the development of another wallet. In this article you can read how you can easily migrate your funds from BRD Wallet to another wallet application.

In November it was announced that Coinbase had acquired the company behind BRD Wallet. As a result, development of BRD Wallet is being discontinued and the team will be working on a wallet application from Coinbase from now on. BRD Wallet features will be rolled out incrementally over the coming weeks. As of March 4, BRD Wallet users will no longer be able to make transactions.

Users of the BRD Wallet will therefore have to migrate their funds to another wallet application. Fortunately, that is quite simple. There are two ways to do that:

• you create a new bitcoin wallet through another wallet application and send your funds there
• you use the recovery phrase to import your bitcoin wallet into another wallet application

Send funds to new bitcoin wallet

The easiest and most secure way to switch to a new wallet application is to simply create a new bitcoin wallet through another wallet application and send your funds there from BRD Wallet.

First install a new wallet application of your choice and indicate after installation that you want to create a new bitcoin wallet. Make a good physical backup of the 12 or 24 words you get when creating the new wallet and keep and protect the backup properly. Once you have done that, you can generate a receiving address from the new wallet and send the funds from BRD Wallet to it. If you want to be careful, you can test it out with a small amount first.

Once the funds have been sent to the new wallet, you no longer need the old bitcoin wallet and the old wallet application. Check everything carefully before uninstalling anything and also check whether you have correctly saved the recovery phrase of the new wallet. It doesn’t hurt to save the old recovery phrase just to be sure.

This method costs a little bit, because you make a bitcoin transaction and pay the associated miner’s fees. Also, this method does not transfer the transaction history from your old bitcoin wallet to the new wallet application. BRD Wallet does offer the option to export your transaction history to a .CSV file via the settings.

The advantage, however, is that you do not have to use the recovery phrase of your old bitcoin wallet in this way. There are always inherent security risks associated with entering a recovery phrase digitally and the most reliable way to protect it against digital threats is if you never enter it digitally.

Import recovery phrase into a new wallet application

You can also choose to import the same bitcoin wallet into another wallet application. A bitcoin wallet is virtual and only exists on the blockchain, independent of wallet applications and devices. A wallet application is only a tool that provides access, provided you have the correct access code: the so-called ‘recovery phrase’. It is sometimes referred to as recovery seed , seed phrase , master seed or similar in other applications.

It is a sequence of 12 or 24 English words from which the bitcoin wallet is generated. With BRD Wallet it is 12 words. You received them when you created the bitcoin wallet and you should have backed them up. It is usually recommended to do this on paper.

Have you lost the words? That’s not good, but in this case you’re lucky because in the settings of BRD Wallet under the heading ‘security center’ you can request the ‘recovery phrase’. Make a good physical backup this time (for example on paper, not digitally!), because not all wallet applications offer this option.

Entering the words into another wallet application will import your existing bitcoin wallet (including transaction history) into the new wallet application.

NB! Once you enter a recovery phrase into a computer, smartphone or other device, there is always an inherent risk of it being acquired by a malicious person via virus, spyware or other means. The aforementioned method is therefore safer. Is that not possible because BRD Wallet has disabled functions or do you still want to use the recovery phrase for other reasons? Then only use a device that you know is safe. To be on the safe side, consider sending the funds to a new wallet via the aforementioned method, so that you get a brand new recovery phrase.

Importing the recovery phrase into a wallet application is easy. You simply install a new wallet application and when asked whether you want to create a new bitcoin wallet or import/restore an existing wallet, choose the latter. Then fill in the 12 words. After that, your bitcoin wallet is transferred to the new wallet application. You can read a more detailed explanation in an earlier article. After checking if it worked you can uninstall the old BRD Wallet.

You can choose from various wallet applications, but it must be one that supports recovery sentences of 12 words. Does the new wallet application you choose not support this? Then the recovery phrase is unfortunately not compatible and you can possibly use the aforementioned method or choose another wallet application.

Do proper research

Which wallet application suits you best depends on personal preference. In any case, we recommend that you do proper research before making a choice. User experiences and reviews on the internet can serve as a guideline. Feel free to try different options before you decide and if in doubt, play it safe.

Is Bitcoin still relatively new to you? Then read our concise starter guide Getting started with Bitcoin.