Seed phrase storage: where should I keep mine?

Every decision about storing a seed phrase is a trade-off between two risks:

• Loss. Fire, flood, damp, fading ink, a house move, a clear-out by someone who didn't know what it was. Lose every copy of the phrase and lose the device, and the crypto is gone for good.
• Theft. Anyone who reads the words can take everything, from anywhere, without your device or PIN. Every extra copy, and every extra person who knows where it is, is another way in.

More copies protect against loss but add to the theft risk. Fewer copies do the opposite. The right balance depends on how much you hold and who you live with, but the aim is always the same: enough protection against loss that one bad day cannot wipe you out, and no more exposure than you need.

The card that comes in the box with your device is a perfectly good first backup, as long as you treat it properly.

• Use a pen with permanent ink, not pencil, which smudges and fades.
• Write clearly and number every word. Use block capitals if your handwriting is anything less than perfect. The person reading it may not be you.
• Check the spelling against the official word list. Every word on the list can be identified by its first four letters, so a word that isn't on the list is a mistake.
• Keep it dry. A sealed freezer bag inside a folder or envelope protects against damp and spills.

Paper's weakness is that it burns, floods and fades. That is fine for a small amount or a short time. For anything you would be upset to lose, move to metal.

A metal backup is a plate or capsule onto which you stamp or engrave the words. Done well, it survives house fires, flooding and years in a drawer.

What to look for:

• Stainless steel or titanium. Thick plates of either have held up well in independent fire, crush and acid tests. Avoid aluminium and brass, which can melt in a house fire.
• Words stamped or engraved deeply, not printed, painted or lightly scratched. Faint markings are what fail.
• A simple design. Plates you stamp yourself have few parts to go wrong. Designs that use loose letter tiles can scatter if the case is damaged, and screws can seize after a fire, making the plate hard to open even when the words survive.
• First four letters is enough. Many plates only have room for four letters per word, and that is all a wallet needs to identify each word.

Buy from the maker or a reputable retailer. And never buy a metal backup that arrives with words already on it, or that asks you to register, scan or photograph anything.

1. Do it in private, away from other people and cameras, including phones, laptops and video doorbells.
2. Copy from your paper backup, one word at a time, in order.
3. Check every letter as you go, against the paper and the official word list.
4. Test the metal copy, not just the paper one, using your device's built-in backup check. See How to test your recovery phrase backup safely.
5. Decide what happens to the paper. Keep it as a second copy in a separate place, or destroy it completely, by shredding and burning, not just binning.

Keep the backup and the device apart. Someone who finds both together has everything they need. A burglar who finds only the device still needs your PIN; one who finds only the backup still has to know what it is.

At home:

• Somewhere private and dry, not in an obvious place like a desk drawer next to the device.
• A safe helps, especially one bolted down. Fire-rated safes are rated for paper documents, and a metal backup inside one survives far more.
• Think about who shares your home, and who visits: cleaners, builders, lodgers, teenagers.

Away from home, for a second copy:

• With someone you trust completely, sealed so you would know if it had been opened.
• In a private safe deposit box. Most UK high street banks have stopped offering them, but private vault companies still do, for an annual fee.

Wherever it is, the right person needs to be able to find it, and know what it is for, if you die or cannot act for yourself. A backup no one can find is the same as no backup at all.

• One copy is a single point of failure: one fire or one mistake and it is gone. It is the most private option, but rarely the right one for a meaningful amount.
• Two copies in two different places suits most people: one at home, one elsewhere. One disaster cannot destroy both.
• More than two adds little protection against loss and adds to the theft risk.

If you hold a large amount, or want no single copy to be enough on its own, there are setups designed for that. Multisig requires several keys, kept in different places, to move funds. Some Trezor devices can create a multi-share backup, where you need several of the shares, not all of them, to recover. Both remove the risk of one backup being the whole story, but they are more complex to set up and to pass on. Neither is necessary for most people.

If you have added a passphrase (sometimes called a 25th word), it needs its own backup, and that backup must never be stored with the seed phrase. The whole point of a passphrase is that someone who finds your seed phrase still cannot get in. Keep them in separate places, and make sure the right person can find both.

• Don't store it digitally. No photos, scans, screenshots, notes apps, password managers, cloud drives, emails to yourself or printouts. Anything on a connected device can be copied without you knowing.
• Don't split the phrase into halves kept in different places. Lose either half and you have lost the wallet, and each half on its own gives a thief a head start.
• Don't invent your own code or cipher. Home-made schemes are easy to forget and easy to get wrong, and the person who inherits it may never work it out.
• Don't write it on the device's box, in a book everyone knows you read, or anywhere labelled "crypto".
• Don't keep it with the device, in the same drawer, safe or bag.

In England and Wales, a will becomes a public document once probate is granted. Anyone can order a copy online for a small fee. If your seed phrase is written in your will, it will be readable by anyone who looks.

Your will, or a separate letter of wishes, can still say that you hold crypto and where your executor will find instructions. Just never put the words themselves in it. Speak to a solicitor about how to make sure your executors can find and use the backup. For more on planning for your family, see crypto inheritance and family access.

A backup is only as good as the last time you checked it. Once a year, and after a house move, a leak or a fire:

• Is it still where you think it is?
• Is every word still clear?
• Does it still pass your device's backup check?
• Would the right person still know where to find it?

KeyCompass can review how your seed phrase is stored, where it is kept, and whether the right people could recover it, without ever seeing your words. You finish with a written list of anything worth changing and a clear note of what is already fine.

KeyCompass never asks for your recovery phrase, a photo of it or any part of it. Anyone who does, whatever they claim to be, is attempting to steal from you.

How a security review works, and what it costs

If you think your phrase is already lost, read I've lost my recovery phrase. What now?