Create a Bitcoin wallet
Create an Electrum wallet
Before you start
-
You first need to download and install Electrum. You can download it from here. If you are on Windows, you should use the installer version, not the portable version.
-
You will need a pen and a notebook (recommended) or a piece of paper to write down the seed mnemonic. The notebook will have to be kept in a safe place once you have finished the setup process, so it cannot be a notebook you use every day.
Creating the wallet
To create a new wallet file, you need to launch the wallet creation wizard. When you start Electrum for the first time and it finds no wallet file on your computer, it displays the new wallet wizard. Alternatively, you can trigger it explicitly via the File > New/Restore menu or by other means.
Note: if you are on macOS or Ubuntu, the application menus are in the top-left corner of the screen and not in the application window itself.
The wallet creation wizard looks like this:
Enter a name for the wallet and go to the next step.
Click Next to display the wallet type selection window:
As you can see, Electrum supports different types of wallets. If you are a beginner, simply select "Standard wallet".
In the next step, Electrum asks you to choose where the wallet secret will come from.
The seed is a secret that unlocks all your bitcoins. When creating a new wallet, you want to let Electrum generate a seed for you.
Electrum presents the seed as a 12-word mnemonic. At this point, it is important to write the seed down in a notebook. You must put it on paper. Do not keep it on your computer!
Also write "Software: Electrum" in your notebook, under the seed mnemonic. You would be surprised how many users forget which software they used!
Electrum will then ask you to check that you have written the seed down correctly by typing it in again:
You can also set a password to protect your wallet file from other people who might have access to your computer. This is optional:
Electrum will then generate your addresses and display your wallet window:
Your wallet has been created. You should put the notebook in which you wrote the seed in a safe place. If you forget your wallet password, or if your computer breaks down and you lose your wallet file, you can always recover access to your wallet using your seed.
This also means that anyone else can access your bitcoins with your seed alone. So keep it in a safe place.