5 Best Crypto Cold Storage Options For Investors In 2023

Safety is a primary concern for traders and investors who manage large portfolios or plan to invest in cryptos for the long term. In such instances, you cannot trust the safety features of your registered broker alone. Looking at the hacking attempts and loss of investors’ funds over the past year alone, it’s evident that you’d want to look for alternatives safer than your hot wallets.

If not hot wallets, what’s the safest option to store your digital assets? The answer is cold wallets. These wallets are your safest route to storing your cryptocurrencies. But what are cold wallets? How are these storage options so effective? Let’s learn about this wallet type as we know about cold wallets in our latest blog.

Top Cold Crypto Storage Options For 2023

Looking at the pros and downsides, many beginners might choose to settle with cold wallets. However, being a beginner, you might need clarification on the options available to users.

So to help you better, we’ve compiled a list of the top five cold wallets to add to the safety of your funds.

#1 ELLIPAL Titan Mini

Type of wallet: Cold Wallet

Dimensions: : 75mm × 71mm × 10.5mm

Weight: 100 gm

Incorporated Exchange: Yes

Purchase Cost: $79

Kicking off our list of the top cold wallets is the ELLIPAL Titan Mini, a storage option that is designed keeping portability in mind. This wallet is portable, easy to use, and has robust user security features. In addition, this fully metal seal design is air-gapped, protecting your digital assets from online and offline threats.

The wallet leverages a mobile application to allow users to get started within three minutes. Additionally, the application will enable users to check balances and transact up to 10,000+ tokens across 34 Blockchains.

The box contents of the ELLIPAL cold wallet include one cold wallet, USB-A to USB-C cable, a magnetic adapter, an instruction manual, and two recovery seed cards.

#2 Trezor Model T

Type of wallet: Cold Wallet

Dimensions: : 64 mm x 39 mm x 10 mm

Weight: 22 gm

Incorporated Exchange: Yes

Purchase Cost: $219

Second, we have the Trezor Model T cold wallet, a product from one of the most renowned brands in the market. The Model T wallet is designed to provide robust security to users via its full metal body, touchscreen functionality, and security factors like 2FA (Two Factor Authentication).

The wallet supports various cryptocurrencies, including names like EOS, ADA, XRP, XMR, and XTZ. Additionally, its added layer of security via the micro SD card feature makes Trezor Model T an excellent option for beginners.

Talking of Trezor cold wallet’s in-box contents, the package comes with the Trezor Model T wallet, a manual, a cover for the wallet, and a USB cable to transfer funds.

Note: Don’t throw away the manual box; it has a pamphlet containing your seed phrase.

#3 SafePal S1

Type of wallet: Cold Wallet

Dimensions: 72mm x 18.6mm x 11.75mm

Weight: 124 gm

Incorporated Exchange: Yes

Purchase Cost: $49

Next, we have the SafePal S1 cold wallet, which is relatively new compared to the other wallet options on our list. Launched in 2019, the wallet is designed for flexibility to its users. You can easily store over 10,000+ tokens and transact them over 19 Blockchains using the wallet.

The wallet is designed for users at every step of their learning curve. The design is simple and allows users to store and transact their tokens over the platform easily. However, that’s not all. SafePal S1 includes elements like 2FA, recovery seed, and pin code to incorporate added safety, making it a better option than many others in the market.

Talking of its box contents, the SafePal S1 comes with a USB-A to Micro-USB cable, a cleaning cloth, three recovery sheets, and one quick start guide. But since the wallet has a powerful 400mAh battery, you won’t need to be worried about carrying your charger often.

#4 Keystone Pro

Type of wallet: Cold Wallet

Dimensions: 112mm x 65mm x 18mm

Weight: 115 gm

Incorporated Exchange: No

Purchase Cost: $169

Fourth on our list of cold wallets is the most robust option. The Keystone Pro is an air-gapped cold wallet with a four-inch touchscreen, fingerprint sensor, and open-source firmware. In addition, the wallet is designed to provide 360-degree safety against any possible attacks.

Keystone Pro leverages the BIP 32/39/44 compliant security, allowing users to transact safely without hassle. The wallet also allows options to integrate QR codes to sign transactions.

Talking of its in-box contents, the 115 g cold wallet comes with a 304-grade stainless steel cold wallet, a charging cable, an AAA battery holder, and a rechargeable battery. The detachable batteries avoid corrosion inside the Keystone Pro wallet.

#5 Atomic Wallet

Type of wallet: Software-based Cold Wallet

Dimensions: –

Weight: –

Incorporated Exchange: Yes

Purchase Cost: Free

Concluding our list of the top cold wallets is Atomic Wallet, a unique software-based storage option trusted by over 4 million users globally. While the wallet doesn’t come in hardware or a USB-styled device, it’s an excellent option for users who want flexibility in accessing their funds.

This software-based wallet is non-custodial and decentralized, providing investors with complete control of their digital assets (including withdrawals). In addition, the software wallet also offers support to numerous cryptocurrencies, including ADA and XRP.

What’s more? Atomic Wallet also comes with an in-built crypto exchange, providing users with a complete ecosystem for buying and selling their cryptos. Overall, Atomic Wallet is a reliable, well-designed wallet that is free and makes investing seamless.

Comparison Of The Best Cold Crypto Wallets

What Is A Cold Wallet?

As the name suggests, a cold wallet is an offline medium for storing Bitcoins, among other cryptocurrencies. Originally known as cold storage, a cold wallet stores your digital assets offline, thereby protecting it from cyber hacks, unauthorized access, or any other vulnerabilities to which a system connected to the internet is susceptible.

Interestingly, individual investors alone aren’t only the ones to leverage this storage option. Several Bitcoin exchanges and other businesses in the field also employ this kind of wallet to keep track of backup records, inactive data, and information needed for regulatory compliance.

So now that we have an idea of cold storage let’s look at how these wallets operate.

How Does Cold Storage Work?

Internet connectivity is one of the primary drawbacks of using a hot crypto wallet. When using such mediums to store your assets, hackers can steal your investments by scraping data to locate your private keys present over the exchange. However, things are different over cold storage options.

Cold wallets resolve issues by signing the transaction with the private keys in a controlled, offline environment. Since cold storage cannot communicate with other electronic devices (unless plugged physically), it stores your digital assets in a no-internet zone.

However, when any transaction is initiated, it temporarily transfers to an offline wallet over devices such as a CD (Compact Disk), USB drive, hard drive, paper, or offline computer. Once done, it is digitally signed before being transmitted to an online network. Here, since the private keys don’t come in contact with an internet-connected server, even if there is a hacking attempt, hackers won’t be able to access the private keys used for the transaction.

Sadly, in exchange for a safety cushion to your assets, this process also adds to the burden of transferring funds to and from your hardware wallet. For instance, if you’re an investor with tokens stored on a hardware wallet, here’s what a transaction might look like:

Step I: You must first connect your offline wallet to an internet-enabled computer.

Step II: Once connected, you’ll need to select the option to receive the tokens. Here, the device generates an online address to facilitate the transaction.

Step III: Ask your sender to initiate the transaction on the shared wallet address.

Step IV: After completing the transaction, you must disconnect your hardware wallet. This way, your digital wallets, private and public keys, and other transaction information is stored offline.

Cold Vs. Hot Wallets: What’s The Difference?

Choosing between a hot and a cold wallet can be a real struggle, especially when you’re an investor or trader who prefers flexibility and safety. However, depending on their usage and demand by the user, both options are good in their ways.

Hot wallets are more flexible, come with a clean UI, and are connected to cryptocurrency exchanges. This allows users to transfer their digital assets compared to cold wallet options seamlessly. In addition, these wallets are generally safe for users who don’t have an extensive portfolio or are using hot wallets to store assets for a day or two.

On the contrary, cold wallets are hardware devices (much like a USB) with no internet connectivity, making them a safe and secure option. Furthermore, they’re easy to carry and can be trusted to store a large sum of crypto assets, making them the go-to option for users who want better privacy and protection.

Interestingly, that’s not all. When it comes to it, there are numerous benefits of choosing between hot wallet vs cold wallet options. Let’s look into the different aspects of choosing these options in the section below:

• Cost: Hot wallets generally win out when it comes to cost factors. Most hot wallets in the market today are free to use. On the contrary, cold wallets range from free (in the case of paper wallets) to paid ones, generally ranging between $100-200 for different wallets.
• User experience: Since they’re already connected to the internet, hot wallets tend to deliver a better user experience. Users don’t generally require to go through additional steps to facilitate transactions. However, cold wallets need users to move their tokens from offline to online and initiate a transaction.
• Security: Cold wallets are more secure than hot wallets since they aren’t connected to the internet. No connectivity leaves hackers with no way to access wallets’ private keys and passwords. However, hot wallets aren’t entirely insecure. Thanks to the various cryptographic protection, today we have also added security to hot wallets.

Here’s an overview of the pros and cons of choosing between the options:

Summary

This brings us to the end of our blog on the best cold wallet options currently available. However, before you purchase any token, it should be understood that the list is limited compared to the massive list of available options.

Besides, considering that the list might not be the exact option you’re looking for, we suggest researching before going with any option. All the best!

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