Bitbox02

What is special about the Bitbox02

Hardware wallets are considered the safest way to store cryptocurrencies. A Swiss manufacturer is producing the Bitbox02, a hardware wallet that doesn’t have to hide behind the old stalwarts Ledger and Trezor. On the contrary: In many respects, the concept of secure storage of Bitcoin & Co. has been rethought and improved. They manage the balancing act of being both beginner-friendly and a good option for advanced users with high demands on security and privacy.

In our test of various hardware wallets, the following points about the Bitbox02 stand out particularly positively:

Bitbox02 comes with user-friendly software for both desktop and mobile. This makes setting up the hardware wallet child’s play, even for beginners. Only the input on the hardware wallet via ‘Tap, Slide and Hold’ using touch is a bit unusual, but quickly learned.

So far, there have been two main security concepts for hardware wallets. Ledger installs a secure element (special chip) and therefore cannot be 100% open source. Trezor does without this secure element and instead follows a complete open source philosophy. Bitbox02 manages to combine both concepts and has both a secure element and is 100% open source.

As the only hardware wallet, Bitbox02 contains a micro SD card on which backup seed words are stored. This is convenient. However, it does not replace an analog backup on paper or metal in the long run.

Despite its small size, the Bitbox02 has one of the best displays with 5 lines in which, for example, Bitcoin addresses can be displayed completely.

The Bitbox02 version is intended to keep the software’s attack surface to a minimum. The Bitbox02 has a very high reputation in the Bitcoin community. Other features like Coincontrol and the multisig implementation underline the focus on the Bitcoin target group.