What is a seed phrase?

Your phone broke? Your wallet can come back, as long as you kept the right words.

When you create a wallet that uses a seed phrase, it usually shows you 12 or 24 words in a specific order. You’ll also see it called a recovery phrase or mnemonic phrase. The software uses them to derive the private keys with which you approve transactions. You don’t pick a favorite sentence yourself: the phrase must be generated securely by the wallet.

Think of it as the mold from which your keys can be recreated. If your device is lost, you enter the phrase into a compatible wallet and regain access. Your crypto doesn’t move from the old phone to the new one: it stays recorded on the blockchain. What you restore is the ability to manage it.

Why it matters

With self-custody, you’re responsible for access. If you lose both access to the wallet and the recovery backup, there’s usually no support service that can help you. Conversely, anyone who gets hold of the phrase can, as a rule, control the corresponding funds without having your device.

The password that unlocks the app isn’t the same thing. It protects local access, but it doesn’t neutralize a stolen seed phrase. We consider this distinction essential for anyone starting out with their own wallet.

What to watch out for

Keep the words offline, in the correct order, somewhere protected from theft and damage. Photos, email and cloud storage create extra ways for them to leak. Don’t send them to “support” and don’t type them into pages that promise wallet verification or an airdrop.

Recovery requires compatible software and may need the right settings. Some wallets support an additional secret passphrase, separate from the seed phrase. If you’ve enabled it, you need it too in order to access that specific wallet; the words alone aren’t enough.