How can I move my bitcoin to Native Segwit?

Table of Contents

Method A: Quick & easy Method B: More control with Coin Control

If you insure your Bitcoin account with Bitsurance, all your bitcoin need to be held on “Native Segwit” addresses. The BitBoxApp automatically checks if your Bitcoin account fulfills this requirement. In case you hold bitcoin on old “Wrapped Segwit” or very new “Taproot” addresses, it will show a warning, including a link to this guide on how to fix this. This is what probably brought you here.

The solution is simple: just send your bitcoin to a native Segwit address in the same account. There’s a quick way (send everything to a new address) and a more nuanced way. This guide explains both options step-by-step.

Method A: Quick & easy

The simplest option is to send all your bitcoin from the insured account to a new bitcoin address in the same account. This makes sure that all your bitcoin are secured on a Native Segwit address that Bitsurance can insure.

This approach combines all your individual coins on a new address. That can be a good thing: too many small coins on many addresses (for example created by regular “dollar-cost-average” buys) can cause very high fees in the future. But combining your coins also decreases your privacy a bit, as your total bitcoin balance in this account can be seen by someone that you pay in the future. We have a dedicated blog article about “UTXO consolidation” that goes into more details. In the end, it’s your decision what aspect you value higher.

A1. Go to the Bitcoin account

Open the BitBoxApp
Connect and unlock your Bitbox 02
Go to the insured Bitcoin account

A2. Get a Segwit receive address

Click on “Receive” and “Verify address on BitBox02".
Make sure that the address starts with “bc1q…” to use a native Segwit address.
Copy the address into your clipboard and paste it into a text editor.
Print out this text document, or write down a few notable characters from the address on a piece of paper, something like “paadg4”, to compare it again later.
Verify the address in the text editor and your printout or hand-written note with the address shown on your BitBox02 to make sure it has not been altered by malware on your computer.
Confirm the receive address on the BitBox02 and click “Back” in the BitBoxApp to go back to your Bitcoin account.

A3. Prepare Bitcoin transaction to the new address

Click on “Send” in the insured Bitcoin account
Copy and paste the Bitcoin address you created in step A2 into the “Receiver address” field
Click “Send all” to send all bitcoin of your account to your new Bitcoin address
Select “Priority”: if you’re not in a hurry, choose “Economy”.
Add a note to your transaction, e.g. “Send to Segwit for Bitsurance”
Click on “Review”

A4. Verify and send the transaction

Loading the transaction on the BitBox02 can take a while, depending on the number of coins that are combined.
Once ready, verify the Bitcoin address against the characters of your printout. You can scroll through the address by using the bottom touch slider of the BitBox02. If everything is ok, touch the top-right corner of the BitBox02 to move to the next screen.
Check the total amount of Bitcoin and the network fees against the information shown in the BitBoxApp. Depending on how many coins you are consolidating, the network fees can be significant.
If everything looks fine, confirm the Bitcoin transaction by holding the upper and lower right corners of the BitBox02 simultaneously.

A5. Verify incoming transaction

The transaction is sent to the Bitcoin network.
It should appear in the BitBoxApp as an incoming transaction after a few seconds.
Depending on the “Priority” you’ve chosen in step 3, it can take a few minutes or many hours for the transaction to be confirmed on the blockchain.
No need to wait: You can unplug the Bitbox 02, close the BitBoxApp, and check the transaction status anytime later again.

That’s it, you’ve made it!

Method B: More control with Coin Control

If you don’t want to combine all your bitcoin on a new address, you can control which coins to send to new addresses. This is more work and can cause higher fees overall, but if you know what you’re doing it can help maintain a better level of privacy.

The basic process is the same as before, but you’re manually selecting Bitcoin UTXO (individual coins, technically called “unspent transaction outputs”) to send via a feature called “Coin Control”.

The simplest option is to send all “Wrapped Segwit” and “Taproot” coins to a new “Native Segwit” address in one transaction, consolidating them in the process. This is almost the “quick and easy” method but does not touch existing “Native Segwit” coins. For this, use Coin Control and select all addresses that start with either a “3” (Wrapped Segwit) or “bc1p” (Taproot). Do not select Native Segwit addresses starting with “bc1q”.

You can also select arbitrary coins (just one, or consolidating just a few) and send them to multiple new Native Segwit addresses. For this, just execute steps B3, B4, and B5 multiple times.

B1. Enable Coin Control

In the BitBoxApp, go to Settings / Advanced Settings, and “Enable Coin Control”.
While you’re here, you can also “Enable Custom Fees” to manually control transaction fees.

B2. Go to the Bitcoin account

Follow the instructions of step A1 of the “Quick & easy” method.

B3. Get a Segwit receive address

Follow the instructions of step A2 of the “Quick & easy” method.

B4. Prepare Bitcoin transaction to the new address

Click on “Send” in the insured Bitcoin account
Copy and paste the Bitcoin address you created in step 2 into the “Receiver address” field
Click on “Toggle coin control” to select the coins (UTXO) to send.
Click “Send selected coins” to send them to your new Bitcoin address
Select “Priority”: if you’re not in a hurry, choose “Economy”.
Add a note to your transaction, e.g. “Send to Segwit for Bitsurance”
Click on “Review”

Method A: Quick & easy

Method B: More control with Coin Control

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