Viper Staking

Cardano Staking Calendar [Epoch Dates for 2022]

2022-01-25T00:00:00-07:00

The calendar below lists the dates for each epoch occurring in 2022. Also included are the dates for each stake snapshot and rewards payouts. See our Staking Rewards Timeline post for an explanation of the Cardano payout process.

Epoch	Start Date	Stake Snapshot for Epoch	Rewards Paid for Epoch
312	Fri 31 Dec 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	313	310
313	Wed 05 Jan 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	314	311
314	Mon 10 Jan 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	315	312
315	Sat 15 Jan 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	316	313
316	Thu 20 Jan 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	317	314
317	Tue 25 Jan 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	318	315
318	Sun 30 Jan 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	319	316
319	Fri 04 Feb 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	320	317
320	Wed 09 Feb 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	321	318
321	Mon 14 Feb 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	322	319
322	Sat 19 Feb 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	323	320
323	Thu 24 Feb 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	324	321
324	Tue 01 Mar 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	325	322
325	Sun 06 Mar 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	326	323
326	Fri 11 Mar 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	327	324
327	Wed 16 Mar 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	328	325
328	Mon 21 Mar 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	329	326
329	Sat 26 Mar 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	330	327
330	Thu 31 Mar 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	331	328
331	Tue 05 Apr 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	332	329
332	Sun 10 Apr 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	333	330
333	Fri 15 Apr 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	334	331
334	Wed 20 Apr 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	335	332
335	Mon 25 Apr 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	336	333
336	Sat 30 Apr 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	337	334
337	Thu 05 May 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	338	335
338	Tue 10 May 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	339	336
339	Sun 15 May 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	340	337
340	Fri 20 May 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	341	338
341	Wed 25 May 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	342	339
342	Mon 30 May 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	343	340
343	Sat 04 Jun 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	344	341
344	Thu 09 Jun 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	345	342
345	Tue 14 Jun 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	346	343
346	Sun 19 Jun 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	347	344
347	Fri 24 Jun 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	348	345
348	Wed 29 Jun 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	349	346
349	Mon 04 Jul 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	350	347
350	Sat 09 Jul 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	351	348
351	Thu 14 Jul 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	352	349
352	Tue 19 Jul 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	353	350
353	Sun 24 Jul 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	354	351
354	Fri 29 Jul 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	355	352
355	Wed 03 Aug 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	356	353
356	Mon 08 Aug 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	357	354
357	Sat 13 Aug 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	358	355
358	Thu 18 Aug 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	359	356
359	Tue 23 Aug 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	360	357
360	Sun 28 Aug 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	361	358
361	Fri 02 Sep 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	362	359
362	Wed 07 Sep 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	363	360
363	Mon 12 Sep 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	364	361
364	Sat 17 Sep 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	365	362
365	Thu 22 Sep 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	366	363
366	Tue 27 Sep 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	367	364
367	Sun 02 Oct 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	368	365
368	Fri 07 Oct 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	369	366
369	Wed 12 Oct 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	370	367
370	Mon 17 Oct 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	371	368
371	Sat 22 Oct 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	372	369
372	Thu 27 Oct 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	373	370
373	Tue 01 Nov 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	374	371
374	Sun 06 Nov 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	375	372
375	Fri 11 Nov 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	376	373
376	Wed 16 Nov 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	377	374
377	Mon 21 Nov 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	378	375
378	Sat 26 Nov 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	379	376
379	Thu 01 Dec 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	380	377
380	Tue 06 Dec 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	381	378
381	Sun 11 Dec 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	382	379
382	Fri 16 Dec 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	383	380
383	Wed 21 Dec 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	384	381
384	Mon 26 Dec 2022 (21:45:00 UTC)	385	382

Which Wallet Should I Use for Cardano (ADA)? [2022 Comprehensive Comparison]

2022-01-23T00:00:00-07:00

Whether you need to access your funds from a PC, browser, or mobile device, there are many options available to store and stake your Cardano (ADA). The best choice of wallet application will highly depend on the features you value - be that security, hardware wallet support, ability to exchange with other currencies within the app, multi-asset support, etc. In the sections below, we summarize the features and limitations of every application that supports Cardano. At the end, we provide a handy table comparing all of the significant features and provide recommendations for various types of users.

tl;dr: Our top pick for most users is ccvault for having the most features, customizability, and ability to stake, vote, and use smart contracts.

Important: Only download or access these wallets from their official websites.

Daedalus

Daedalus is the official Cardano wallet built by IOHK. This open-source wallet runs a full Cardano node on your PC, which means it maintains a full copy of the Cardano blockchain on your computer and can independently validate the blockchain’s integrity. Daedalus can be installed on Windows, macOS, or Linux. Because it maintains its own copy of the blockchain, it can take a couple of hours to synchronize with the blockchain the first time the software is opened. This also requires sufficient disk space on your computer (approximately 10 GB, currently). A feature unique to Daedalus is the automatic redemption of staking rewards whenever transactions are sent from your wallet, saving you the transaction fee required to redeem the rewards manually. Daedalus also supports voting in the Catalyst fund. For a tutorial on staking your ADA using Daedalus, check out our guide.

Daedalus PC application

Important: There is no mobile app for Daedalus. Do not download unverified mobile apps, or you will lose your ADA.

Pros:

Daedalus is the only wallet option that runs a full blockchain node
Highest level of software wallet security
Supports Ledger Nano (S/X) and Trezor Model T hardware wallets
Uses Cardano recovery seeds (i.e., can be simultaneously used with other wallets that support Cardano-formatted seeds)
Fully supports stake delegation, governance (e.g., Catalyst voting), and multi-asset transactions
Staking rewards are automatically claimed

Cons:

Requires several GB of hard drive space
Takes a couple of hours to download the blockchain during installation
Takes several minutes to synchronize new/restored wallets

Recommended for:

PC users who want the increased security of running a full Cardano node on their own system

Yoroi

Yoroi is the official Cardano wallet built by Emurgo. This wallet runs in a browser or as a mobile application. Since it doesn’t run a full Cardano node, it does not require synchronizing with the blockchain or storing it on your device. While this means you can get up-and-running faster, the wallet relies on the integrity of the Emurgo server it communicates with to validate transactions. Yoroi’s web application fully supports the use of hardware wallets, including hidden wallets, while the mobile app only supports the Ledger Nano X. Yoroi also supports voting in the Catalyst fund. For a tutorial on staking your ADA using Yoroi, check out our guide. In addition to Cardano, Yoroi also supports the Ergo blockchain.

Yoroi web application

Yoroi mobile wallet

Pros:

Stores wallet information in a local account via browser extension (i.e., wallets don’t need to be recovered every time you wish to access them)
Supports Ledger Nano (S/X) and Trezor Model T hardware wallets (mobile version only supports Ledger Nano X)
Uses Cardano recovery seeds (i.e., can be simultaneously used with other wallets that support Cardano-formatted seeds)
Fully supports stake delegation, governance (e.g., Catalyst voting), and multi-asset transactions

Cons:

Takes several minutes to sync new/restored wallets
Staking rewards must be manually claimed (requires paying a transaction fee each time)

Recommended for:

Web or mobile users who also hold Ergo
Web or mobile users who want quick access to their funds from the device(s) they use regularly

ccvault

ccvault is a lite wallet with an intuitive, feature-rich interface. Wallets sync and update very quickly. Users who manage multiple wallets can sort them into folders and upload custom icons for each wallet. ccvault provides much more data about the ADA and assets in your wallet than any other application we’ve seen and also provides a great deal of options that advanced users can tweak, such as single or multi-address mode, token batching, and auto-withdrawal of rewards. Users can setup an address book storing frequently-used sending addresses. If you want to receive a transaction anonymously, you can grab an enterprise address from the Receive tab, which does not include a stake key and cannot be linked to other addresses in your wallet. Multi-account support allows users to delegate to multiple stake pools from the same wallet. The UTXOs tab even lets you see the full set of unspent transaction outputs (UTXOs) in your wallet. ccvault supports setting collateral for using DEXes and smart contracts. A very nice Tokens tab makes it easy to view and search the tokens and NFTs in your wallet. You can even add and view messages stored in the metadata of transactions you send/receive. Catalyst voting is also supported. We strongly recommend this wallet for most users, as it provides the most features, data, and customization out of all of the Cardano wallet options.

ccvault browser extension

Pros:

Stores wallet information in a local account via browser extension (i.e., wallets don’t need to be recovered every time you wish to access them)
Supports Ledger Nano (S/X) and Trezor Model T hardware wallets (mobile version only supports Ledger Nano X)
Uses Cardano recovery seeds (i.e., can be simultaneously used with other wallets that support Cardano-formatted seeds)
Fully supports stake delegation, governance (e.g., Catalyst voting), and multi-asset transactions
Data- and feature-rich user interface
Great deal of customization
Multi-wallet and multi-account support
Supports setting collateral for use with smart contracts/DeFi platforms

Cons:

None that we can think of!

Recommended for:

Essentially all lite wallet users

Nami

Nami is an asset-focused lite wallet with a very slick and easy to use interface. Switching between multiple wallets is easy, and hardware wallets are supported. Nami will only work in single-address mode. While this makes sending/receiving tokens simpler, it means that users cannot easily switch between Nami and other wallets that use multiple addresses, like Daedalus and Yoroi. Setting collateral for using smart contracts and DeFi services is easy. One point of frustration is this browser extension opens as a pop-up within your browser window. If you click off of the extension (for example, to copy your wallet password from a password manager), the application will close and you’ll have to start over with whatever you were doing.

Nami browser extension

Pros:

Stores wallet information in a local account via browser extension (i.e., wallets don’t need to be recovered every time you wish to access them)
Supports Ledger Nano (S/X) and Trezor Model T hardware wallets (mobile version only supports Ledger Nano X)
Uses Cardano recovery seeds (i.e., can be simultaneously used with other wallets that support Cardano-formatted seeds)
Supports stake delegation and multi-asset transactions
Slick user interface
Supports setting collateral for use with smart contracts/DeFi platforms
Single-address mode make working with tokens/NFTs easier

Cons:

Single-address mode makes it difficult to switch between Nami and other wallet applications
No voting support
Popup-only browser extension can be a pain to use
Simple user interface lacks details that advanced users might be looking for
Does not allow users to choose their own stake pool for delegation.

Recommended for:

New users who want a simple interface to purchase tokens/NFTs and use smart contracts

Typhon

Typhon is an easy to use lite wallet with lots of features for users who hold tokens/NFTs. Typhon features a very nice asset interface that makes it easy to browse and search the assets in your wallet. Multi-account support allows users to delegate to multiple stake pools from the same wallet. Additionally, users can choose whether they’d like to use single- or multi-address mode for their wallet, enabling compatibility with Nami wallet. Typhon allows users to write and view messages contained in transactions they send and receive. Voting is also supported. While Typhon saves wallet information between sessions, only a single wallet can be stored at a time. So users with multiple wallets will likely want to use a different wallet application.

Typhon browser extension

Pros:

Stores wallet information in a local account via browser extension (i.e., wallets don’t need to be recovered every time you wish to access them)
Supports Ledger Nano (S/X) and Trezor Model T hardware wallets (mobile version only supports Ledger Nano X)
Uses Cardano recovery seeds (i.e., can be simultaneously used with other wallets that support Cardano-formatted seeds)
Single- and multi-address modes supported
Supports stake delegation and multi-asset transactions
Multi-account support enables multi-delegation
Fully supports stake delegation, governance (e.g., Catalyst voting), and multi-asset transactions

Cons:

Only supports the use of one wallet at a time.

Recommended for:

Single-wallet users who want to easily manage their tokens and NFTs in a lite wallet.

AdaLite

AdaLite is an open-source, client-side Cardano wallet built by VacuumLabs. This wallet runs solely as a browser application. Like Yoroi, it doesn’t run a full Cardano node. Unlike Yoroi, AdaLite does not save your wallets within a browser extension; you must restore your wallet with a recovery phrase (or link your hardware wallet) each time you open the application. AdaLite fully supports hardware wallets, including hidden wallets. A feature unique to AdaLite, multiple accounts can be utilized within a single wallet - your funds can be split across multiple addresses derived from your base wallet account, which can use used to delegate to multiple pools from the same wallet (such as a portfolio from adafolio). AdaLite does not yet support voting. Another unique feature AdaLite provides is the ability of stake pool operators to pledge their ADA without requiring the use of command-line utilities.

AdaLite web application

Pros:

Supports multiple accounts within a single wallet (can be used to delegate to multiple pools from the same wallet)
New & restored wallets synchronize within seconds
Supports Ledger Nano (S/X) and Trezor Model T hardware wallets
Uses Cardano recovery seeds (i.e., can be simultaneously used with other wallets that support Cardano-formatted seeds)
Fully supports stake delegation, governance (e.g., Catalyst voting), and multi-asset transactions

Cons:

No local storage of wallets in the browser (i.e., wallets need to be recovered every time you wish to access them). This can be a pain if you don’t use a hardware wallet.
Staking rewards must be manually claimed (requires paying a transaction fee each time)

Recommended for:

Web users who want quick access to their ADA from multiple devices without requiring account setup
Stake pool operators who would like to use a software wallet rather than command-line utilities to manage their pledge

Medusa

Medusa AdaWallet is a project developed by members of the Cardano community that runs as a web application based on the open-source cardano-wallet software. A unique feature of the Medusa wallet is its use of one-time passwords (OTP) for account management. You create an account by linking an OTP provider, such as Google Authenticator, which provides a unique, single-use password each time you log in. This account stores any wallets you have created or recovered. Like Daedalus and Yoroi, it takes several minutes to synchronize new wallets the first time they are created/restored. The Medusa team is working on a major update that will include multi-asset support, so this is a wallet to keep an eye on in the near future.

Medusa web application

Pros:

Web-based accounts using OTP passwords
Uses Cardano recovery seeds (i.e., can be simultaneously used with other wallets that support Cardano-formatted seeds)
Staking rewards are automatically claimed

Cons:

No hardware wallet support
No governance support
No multi-asset support

Recommended for:

Web users who access their funds on untrusted devices and would like to take advantage of Medusa’s OTP feature.

Atomic

Atomic is a wallet and exchange that supports several cryptocurrencies, including Cardano. This wallet comes as a desktop (Windows, macOS, Linux) or mobile (iOS, Android) application. It does not run a full Cardano node and does not support hardware wallets or voting. For a tutorial on staking your ADA using Atomic, check out our guide.

Atomic PC application

Pros:

Supports multiple cryptocurrencies

Cons:

Proprietary recovery seeds
No hardware wallet support
No governance support
No multi-asset support

Recommended for:

Users who do not plan to hold their ADA long-term and are interested in trading to/from the other currencies supported by Atomic

Exodus

Exodus is a wallet and exchange that supports several cryptocurrencies, including Cardano. This wallet comes as a desktop (Windows, macOS, Linux) or mobile (iOS, Android) application. It does not run a full Cardano node and does not support voting. Its hardware wallet support is currently limited to the Trezor Model T. A unique feature of Exodus is the ability to trade for other cryptocurrencies that Exodus supports.

Exodus PC application

Exodus does not allow you to choose the stake pool to which you’d like to delegate. For this reason, we would generally not recommend using the Exodus wallet.

Pros:

Exodus offers a slightly higher return on stake (ROS) on staked ADA than stake pools actually payout (at least for now)
Supports the Trezor Model T hardware wallet
Supports multiple cryptocurrencies

Cons:

Proprietary recovery seeds
Can’t choose which stake pool your wallet is delegated to
No support for Ledger hardware wallets
No governance support
No multi-asset support

Recommended for:

Users who do not plan to hold their ADA long-term and are interested in trading to/from the other currencies supported by Exodus

Infinito

Infinito is a mobile-only wallet that supports several cryptocurrencies, including Cardano. It is available for iOS and Android. It does not run a full Cardano node and does not support hardware wallets or voting.

Infinito mobile application

Pros:

Supports multiple cryptocurrencies

Cons:

Proprietary recovery seeds
No hardware wallet support
No governance support
No multi-asset support

Recommended for:

Mobile-only users who do not plan to hold their ADA long-term and are interested in trading to/from the other currencies supported by Infinito

Cardano Wallet Features Compared

Wallet	Staking	Governance Voting	Full Node	HW Wallet Support	Multi-Asset Support	Desktop App	Browser App	Mobile App	Multi-Account	Multi-Wallet Storage
Daedalus	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	Yes
Yoroi	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
ccvault	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
Nami	Yes* (locked stake pool)	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	Yes
Typhon	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	Yes	No
AdaLite	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	No	Yes	No (no local storage)
Medusa	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	No	No
Atomic	Yes	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	Yes	No	No
Infinito	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes	No	No
Exodus	Yes* (locked stake pool)	No	No	Yes* (Trezor only)	No	Yes	No	Yes	No	No

Which wallet should I choose?

If you use a hardware wallet (and you really should), we would recommend using Daedalus, ccvault, Nami, or Typhon.
If you are a stake pool operator or would like to delegate your ADA to multiple stake pools, we recommend AdaLite.
If you have a PC and don’t mind waiting on the Cardano node to sync, we recommend using Daedalus.
If you are a mobile-only user, we would recommend Yoroi.

Pro Tip:

You don’t have to choose a single wallet application - you can use more than one at the same time, even on different devices! Below we show the same wallet accessed by all four of these wallets simultaneously. Your recovery phrase can be used to access your ADA on as many devices and wallet applications as you’d like! (Note: This can’t be done with wallets that use proprietary recovery phrases, like Atomic and Exodus. Additionally, wallets that only use single-address mode, like Nami, can be difficult to use with other applications.)

Note: Do not attempt to use an older Byron-era wallet (15-word recovery phrase) with multiple wallet applications at the same time. You could end up losing your funds. If you’re still using a Byron-era wallet, it is strongly recommended that you create a new wallet and move your funds over. Byron-era wallets do not support non-ADA assets/NFTs or smart contracts.

If you have a question we didn’t answer in this post, feel free to join our Telegram channel. Follow us on Twitter and Reddit to be notified of future posts!

Cardano Staking Calendar [Epoch Dates for 2021]

2021-03-21T00:00:00-06:00

The calendar below lists the dates for each epoch occurring in 2021 (2022 calendar here). Also included are the dates for each stake snapshot and rewards payouts. See our Staking Rewards Timeline post for an explanation of the Cardano payout process.

Epoch	Start Date	Stake Snapshot for Epoch	Rewards Paid for Epoch
239	Thu 31 Dec 2020 (21:45:00 UTC)	240	237
240	Tue 05 Jan 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	241	238
241	Sun 10 Jan 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	242	239
242	Fri 15 Jan 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	243	240
243	Wed 20 Jan 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	244	241
244	Mon 25 Jan 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	245	242
245	Sat 30 Jan 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	246	243
246	Thu 04 Feb 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	247	244
247	Tue 09 Feb 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	248	245
248	Sun 14 Feb 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	249	246
249	Fri 19 Feb 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	250	247
250	Wed 24 Feb 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	251	248
251	Mon 01 Mar 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	252	249
252	Sat 06 Mar 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	253	250
253	Thu 11 Mar 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	254	251
254	Tue 16 Mar 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	255	252
255	Sun 21 Mar 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	256	253
256	Fri 26 Mar 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	257	254
257	Wed 31 Mar 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	258	255
258	Mon 05 Apr 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	259	256
259	Sat 10 Apr 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	260	257
260	Thu 15 Apr 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	261	258
261	Tue 20 Apr 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	262	259
262	Sun 25 Apr 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	263	260
263	Fri 30 Apr 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	264	261
264	Wed 05 May 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	265	262
265	Mon 10 May 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	266	263
266	Sat 15 May 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	267	264
267	Thu 20 May 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	268	265
268	Tue 25 May 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	269	266
269	Sun 30 May 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	270	267
270	Fri 04 Jun 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	271	268
271	Wed 09 Jun 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	272	269
272	Mon 14 Jun 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	273	270
273	Sat 19 Jun 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	274	271
274	Thu 24 Jun 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	275	272
275	Tue 29 Jun 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	276	273
276	Sun 04 Jul 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	277	274
277	Fri 09 Jul 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	278	275
278	Wed 14 Jul 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	279	276
279	Mon 19 Jul 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	280	277
280	Sat 24 Jul 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	281	278
281	Thu 29 Jul 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	282	279
282	Tue 03 Aug 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	283	280
283	Sun 08 Aug 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	284	281
284	Fri 13 Aug 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	285	282
285	Wed 18 Aug 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	286	283
286	Mon 23 Aug 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	287	284
287	Sat 28 Aug 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	288	285
288	Thu 02 Sep 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	289	286
289	Tue 07 Sep 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	290	287
290	Sun 12 Sep 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	291	288
291	Fri 17 Sep 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	292	289
292	Wed 22 Sep 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	293	290
293	Mon 27 Sep 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	294	291
294	Sat 02 Oct 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	295	292
295	Thu 07 Oct 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	296	293
296	Tue 12 Oct 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	297	294
297	Sun 17 Oct 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	298	295
298	Fri 22 Oct 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	299	296
299	Wed 27 Oct 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	300	297
300	Mon 01 Nov 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	301	298
301	Sat 06 Nov 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	302	299
302	Thu 11 Nov 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	303	300
303	Tue 16 Nov 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	304	301
304	Sun 21 Nov 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	305	302
305	Fri 26 Nov 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	306	303
306	Wed 01 Dec 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	307	304
307	Mon 06 Dec 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	308	305
308	Sat 11 Dec 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	309	306
309	Thu 16 Dec 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	310	307
310	Tue 21 Dec 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	311	308
311	Sun 26 Dec 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	312	309

Cardano Staking Basics [FAQ]

2021-03-21T00:00:00-06:00

Staking your ADA can be confusing when you first start. Below we’ll answer many of the common questions newcomers ask when they delve into delegating their ADA.

Which Cardano wallet should I use to hold my ADA?

The best wallet to use will depend on several factors and your specific needs. We have a detailed wallet comparison here.

Can I use more than one software wallet at the same time?

Yes! You can access the same ADA wallet address from multiple software wallets (e.g., Daedalus and Yoroi) at the same time. You can do this by choosing to “recover” your wallet within each application and enter the recovery phrase you wrote down when you first created your ADA wallet.

What about hardware wallets? Do I really need to use one?

Yes! Hardware wallets are the safest option to store your ADA, and you can still earn staking rewards from a hardware wallet. See our hardware wallet guide for more information.

What is an epoch and how long does it last?

An epoch is a unit of the accounting period used by Cardano and each epoch lasts 5 days. Staking rewards are earned during each epoch and rewards are paid out as explained in our post on the Staking Rewards Timeline.

How do I choose a stake pool?

There are many factors to consider when choosing a stake pool, including pool performance and fees, supporting decentralization and open communication, pool size, etc. Please see our detailed guide on How to Choose a Stake Pool. To compare stake pools, check out sites like PoolTool, AdaPools, and adafolio.

Is my ADA locked when I delegate to a pool?

No, you are free to spend your ADA at any time (although you will stop earning staking rewards on anything that you spend).

Is my staked ADA safe? Can I ever lose funds by staking?

Your staked ADA is completely safe! Your staked funds remain solely in your control - stake pools never have access to your funds or rewards. Additionally, you can never lose funds by staking them. Pools take their fees from the total rewards earned by the pool, prior to distruting them to delegators. If a pool doesn’t make any blocks, it doesn’t take any fees. Fees are not charged directly to delegators.

I staked my wallet and was charged 2.17 ADA. Why?

When you first delegate your wallet, you are required to pay a 2 ADA deposit. You will get your deposit back when you undelegate your wallet. You were additionally charged ~0.17 ADA to cover the transaction fee for registering your wallet for delegation. You must pay a transaction fee any time you transfer funds on the Cardano blockchain.

What fees do stake pools charge? What do “fixed fee” and “margin” mean?

There are two types of fees stake pools charge: fixed fee and margin (also called variable fee). The fixed fee is an amount of ADA taken from the total rewards the pool produces in an epoch (epochs last 5 days). There is a minimum fixed fee of 340 ADA, which all pools must charge. Note: this is not a fee charged to each delegator. Margin, or variable fee, is a percentage taken from the pool’s total rewards each epoch after the fixed fee has been deducted. These fees go to the pool’s operators to cover the costs of running their pool. See this post for more details.

What is “pledge” and why is it important?

Pledge is the amount of ADA the pool operator(s) have staked in their own pool. This effectively lets delegators know how invested the operators are in the success of the pool. Pledged ADA earns rewards just like if it were staked, so if a pool goes down, its operator will not only miss out on collecting fees for the missed blocks, but they will also lose rewards on their pledge. Pledge also has a small effect on the rewards earned by the pool’s delegators. This is called the pledge influence factor. See this post for more details.

Do I need to claim my rewards every epoch?

No, earned rewards are automatically included in your staked balance. Rewards only need to be claimed when you plan to move them out of your wallet.

I staked my ADA but haven’t received any rewards. How long will it take before I get my first payout?

It takes 15 to 20 days before you receive your first rewards payout. After that, you’ll receive payouts every epoch (5 days). See this post for a full explanation.

If I add ADA to my wallet, do I need to re-stake it to earn rewards?

No, when you stake your ADA you are delegating your entire wallet - not a specific amount. Any funds you add or remove will automatically adjust your staked amount. See this post for a full explanation.

Will I miss out on rewards if I move my staked ADA to another wallet?

No, but you will need to be mindful of where your rewards will be paid out. We fully walk through this scenario in this post.

How much ADA can be staked in a single pool? What does “pool saturation” mean and how is it controlled?

Pool saturation is the maximum amount of stake that is eligible to earn rewards in a single stake pool. If a pool contains more than the maximum amount of stake, it will pay out reduced rewards to everyone delegating to the pool. The saturation point is determined by the k parameter, which is currently set to 500. This means that the Cardano network is designed to support 500 pools that are exactly at the saturation point. In practice, there will be many more than 500 pools in operation, and most of them will not be at the saturation level. The saturation level is defined as the total amount of staked ADA divided by the k value and is currently approximately 64 million ADA. See this IOHK whitepaper for a full explanation.

If you have a question we didn’t answer in this post, feel free to join our Telegram channel. Follow us on Twitter and Reddit to be notified of future posts!

(Cardano Staking Rewards Timeline) When Will You Receive Your First Rewards?

2021-03-21T00:00:00-06:00

The infographic below outlines the five steps of the stake delegation process:

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1. Initial delegation to a stake pool

In order to stake your ADA, you’ll need to move your funds to a wallet that supports staking, such as Daedalus, Yoroi, or AdaLite. You’ll then need to decide on a stake pool to delegate your wallet to. With hundreds of active stake pools, choosing the best pool for you can be daunting. Our guide on Choosing a Stake Pool can help you through the process. When you delegate to a stake pool, you are delegating your entire wallet, not a specific amount of ADA. Whenever you add or remove funds from your wallet, your staked balance that is eligible to earn rewards will be updated.

A 2 ADA deposit is required to delegate your wallet. You can get this deposit back if you undelegate your wallet. There will also be a transaction fee for registering your wallet to stake (about 0.17 ADA), which you will not get back. This fee will also be assessed any time you choose to move your stake to another pool.

Your newly delegated stake will be included in your chosen stake pool at the beginning of the next epoch, as we explain next.

2. First stake snapshot

The accounting periods on the Cardano blockchain are called epochs. These occur every five days, and are the periods of time in which pools produce blocks and delegators earn rewards. The number of blocks a pool is eligible to produce is a random process governed by the amount of active stake in the stake pool. Active stake is the amount of ADA delegated to a stake pool during the stake snapshot that occurred at the beginning of the previous epoch.

Your funds are never “locked” when delegating to a pool and are solely under your control. You are free to spend your ADA whenever you’d like, and the stake pool does not have access to your funds. There is no risk of losing ADA when delegating your wallet.

3. Rewards are earned

Once your stake has been included in a stake snapshot, it will become active during the following epoch, which means it is eligible to earn rewards. You will earn a share of your stake pool’s rewards based on the amount of stake you have in the pool. The more blocks the pool produces during the epoch, the more rewards you will earn.

4. Rewards are calculated

After each epoch has concluded, the rewards for each of the stake pool’s delegators will be calculated based on the number of blocks produced by the pool.

5. Rewards are paid!

The rewards you earned during an epoch will be paid out at the beginning of the next epoch (1 full epoch after the rewards were earned). These rewards will be automatically included in your staked balance (and hence you will earn compounding returns on your delegation!), so you don’t need to manually claim your rewards every epoch in order to have them included. It will take 15 to 20 days between the time you first delegate your ADA and when you receive your first reward payout. After this, you will receive rewards every epoch (5 days) which were earned by your active stake from 2 epochs prior.

Common Scenarios

Below we will walk through concrete examples of common scenarios that can be confusing to delegators. These examples will use our Cardano Staking Calendar. Please refer to the excerpt below as we walk through each scenario:

Epoch	Start Date	Stake Snapshot for Epoch	Rewards Paid for Epoch
239	Thu 31 Dec 2020 (21:45:00 UTC)	240	237
240	Tue 05 Jan 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	241	238
241	Sun 10 Jan 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	242	239
242	Fri 15 Jan 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	243	240
243	Wed 20 Jan 2021 (21:45:00 UTC)	244	241

Example 1: When will I receive my first rewards after staking my ADA?

If you first staked your ADA on January 1, 2021, your funds would be included in the Epoch 241 stake snapshot at the beginning of the next epoch, 240, on January 5th. You would earn rewards for the following epoch, 241. The rewards you earned in Epoch 241 would be calculated in Epoch 242. And finally, your Epoch 241 rewards would be paid in Epoch 243, on January 20th. From then on, rewards will be paid out every epoch for the rewards you earned 2 epochs prior (as shown in the “Rewards Paid for Epoch” column), e.g., on January 25th (Epoch 244) you will receive the rewards you earned in Epoch 242. In summary, it will take 15 to 20 days before you receive your first staking rewards (depending on when the next epoch starts).

Example 2: What happens if I add more ADA to my wallet that has already been delegated to a pool?

If you’ve previously staked your ADA and now you add funds to your wallet, your staked amount will be automatically increased. However, it must follow the same snapshot cycle as when you first staked your wallet. As in the previous example, if you added funds on January 1, 2021, the increased balance will be included in the Epoch 241 stake snapshot, which occurs at the beginning of Epoch 240. You will earn increased rewards in Epoch 241. The rewards you earned would be calculated in Epoch 242, and your first payout of increased rewards would be paid out in Epoch 243. In the meantime you would continue to receive rewards from your initial balance during epochs 240, 241, and 242 (as those rewards were earned in epochs prior to the increased stake).

Example 3: How do I move my staked ADA to a new wallet? Will I miss out on rewards?

If you’ve staked your ADA and decide to move your funds to a new wallet (e.g., perhaps you’ve wisely purchased a hardware wallet and would like to move your ADA to it), you will still need to be mindful of the 2 epoch delay in rewards payouts. Also, in order to claim rewards, you must have enough ADA in your wallet to cover the transaction fee (~0.17 ADA). Therefore, here is the process we would suggest (assuming you moved your funds on January 1, 2021):

Epoch 239

[1 Jan 21] Move your ADA to the new wallet, but leave at least 1 ADA in the old wallet to cover a transaction fee.
[1 Jan 21] Stake your new wallet. This balance will be included in the Epoch 241 stake snapshot. Note that you will have to pay a 2 ADA deposit to stake this new wallet, which you will get back when you undelegate the wallet.
Your old wallet’s balance was “snapshot” at the beginning of Epoch 239. Therefore, it will earn rewards in the next epoch on this balance, even though you’ve moved the funds!

Epoch 240

[5 Jan 21] The Epoch 241 stake snapshot occurs. The staked balance in your new wallet will now earn rewards in the next epoch (241).
[5 Jan 21] Epoch 238 rewards are paid into your old wallet.

Epoch 241

[10 Jan 21] The Epoch 242 stake snapshot occurs. Your new wallet begins earning rewards.
[10 Jan 21] Epoch 239 rewards are paid into your old wallet.

Epoch 242

[15 Jan 21] The Epoch 243 stake snapshot occurs and your new wallet continues to earn rewards.
[15 Jan 21] Epoch 240 rewards are paid into your old wallet. This is the last epoch rewards were earned by the balance in your old wallet. You can now claim your rewards and undelegate your old wallet (which will also return your 2 ADA deposit). Send these funds to your new wallet.

Epoch 243

[20 Jan 21] Your first rewards are paid into your new wallet (earned in Epoch 241). The stake snapshot for Epoch 244 occurs and picks up your entire balance (new wallet plus the earned rewards from your old wallet that you transferred on 15 Jan).

As you can see, you don’t miss out on any rewards by moving your funds to another wallet. While it takes 3 epochs to receive your first rewards in your new wallet, your old wallet continues to receive reward payouts for those 3 epochs.

Be sure to check out our staking tutorials for Daedalus and Yoroi wallets. If you have questions about staking or anything else related to Cardano, feel free to join our Telegram channel. Follow us on Twitter and Reddit to be notified of future posts!

The source of this information came from this IOHK whitepaper.

7 Things to Consider When Choosing a Cardano Stake Pool (Updated)

2021-03-19T00:00:00-06:00

We have seen a lot of confusion and misconceptions about how staking works and the differences between stake pools. We hope this guide will help clear up any confusion about how staking rewards are earned and what is and is not important when choosing a staking pool.

Controlling Your Own Stake

Importance factor: 5/5

Not your keys, not your crypto. You should never use exchanges to store your cryptocurrency long-term (just look at what happened to the world’s largest exchange in 2014). This is doubly true for using exchanges to delegate your stake. When you let an exchange stake for you, you are giving up control of your own funds and handing the keys to the exchange. You can maintain control of your ADA by using a Cardano wallet, such as Daedalus, Yoroi, or AdaLite.

Pool Performance

Importance factor: 5/5

This is the most important metric to evaluate. Your ROS can take a huge hit if the pool you have delegated to is missing the slots they have been scheduled for. Pools only receive rewards for the blocks they mint on the blockchain. Poorly maintained pools will tend to miss opportunities to mint blocks, causing the total rewards paid out to stakers to decrease.

A minor consideration is the hardware a pool runs on. If the server has insufficient resources, they can get bogged down with keeping up with the tip of the blockchain (or even crash) and miss out on minting blocks. Additionally, if a pool runs on a dedicated server at the operator’s house, it is susceptible to power outages. Even if the server runs on an uninterruptible power supply (UPS), their local internet service provider equipment can go down, rendering the pool inoperable for a period of time. Large cloud computing providers, such as AWS and DigitalOcean, provide servers in multiple availability zones, so that even in the event of widespread power outages, pools can remain operational if they have backups in another zone.

Overall, pool performance can be a hard metric to evaluate. As explained in the previous section, a small pool can have wild swings in the number of blocks they create. So if a pool had a low ROS during an epoch, it does not necessarily mean it is performing poorly. You must evaluate a pool’s performance over many consecutive epochs to get a feel for their overall performance. This makes a pool’s transparency very important, as we’ll explain later.

Supporting Decentralization

Importance factor: 4/5

Supporting decentralization is critical to the long-term success of the Cardano network. In order to make sure the blockchain continues to run reliably and with integrity, we need to maintain a healthy distribution of stake across many stake pool operators. You can help by not delegating to groups that control a large number of stake pools, such as Binance:
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Communication and Transparency

Importance factor: 4/5

Since determining how effectively a pool is running based solely on ROS is very difficult to do, pools that openly provide performance data should be given serious consideration for your stake. For example, PoolTool provides the ability for stake pools to self-report the slots they get elected for at the beginning of each epoch. These reports are then evaluated against the actual blocks the pool produces, and PoolTool publishes both of these values on the pool’s page. This provides real measurements of a pool’s performance over time.

For example, we post regular pool updates to our telegram channel, so delegators can easily stay up to date on our performance. The team is always available for comments, suggestions, or questions.

Pool Fees

Importance factor: 3/5

To maximize the rewards you earn, you will want to choose a pool with low fees. There are two types of fees stake pools charge: fixed fee and margin. The fixed fee is an amount of ADA taken from the total rewards the pool produces in an epoch (epochs last 5 days). Note: this is not a fee charged to each delegator.

Margin is a percentage taken from the pool’s total rewards each epoch after the fixed fee has been deducted. These fees go to the pool’s operators to cover the costs of running their pool (more on this later).

As an example, let’s break down the rewards payouts between two pools with the same amount of stake for a hypothetical epoch:

Pool A has a fixed fee of 1,000 ADA and a margin of 2%.
Pool B has a fixed fee of 360 ADA and a margin of 4%.

If each pool earned 20,000 ADA in rewards during an epoch, the rewards would be distributed as follows:

Pool A would take a fixed 1,000 ADA from the rewards plus another 380 ADA in margin (19,000 * 2%) for a total of 1,380 ADA. The remaining 18,620 ADA would be divided amongst pool’s delegators based on the amount of ADA they staked in the pool.
Pool B would take a fixed 360 ADA plus another 786 ADA in margin for a total of 1,146 ADA. This pool’s delegators would get the remaining 18,854 ADA.

During this epoch, Pool A had an effective tax of 6.9% (1,380 / 20,000) while Pool B had an effective tax of 5.7%. The larger the stake in a pool, the smaller the effect of the fixed fee, as this fee is divided between a larger amount of delegation. If the example stake pools were larger and earned 100,000 ADA in rewards during an epoch, their effective taxes would be 3% for Pool A and 4.4% for Pool B.

Beware of extremely low-fee pools, like those charging 0% margin. Pool operators can change their fees at any time, and pools with fees that seem too good to be true are likely to raise their fees after they fill up their pool.

Pool Size

Importance factor: 2/5

It is important to choose a pool that is not over-saturated. The current Ouroboros implementation attempts to enforce decentralization by capping rewards at a specific limit to prevent pools from growing too large. In the current version of the network this value is set to 0.66% of the total ADA staked. So, if a pool has 6.6% of the total ADA staked, it will only receive rewards as if it had 0.66% of the total ADA staked. Therefore, stakers in this pool are receiving 1/10th of the rewards they would be in a smaller pool. Smaller pools will not run the risk of being over saturated, but they will on average mint fewer blocks.

Pool rewards need to be considered as averaged over time. A smaller pool will divide bigger shares of the reward amongst its stakers (since there are fewer of them), but they will statistically get chosen to produce less blocks. A larger pool will find more blocks but payout smaller rewards. As long as the bigger pool isn’t saturated, the rewards will be the same over time. Also, since it is a random selection, some pools may have good or bad luck “streaks”. For example, the Cardano network has targeted about 4.6% rewards (Return on Stake, or ROS). Large pools will tend to pay out more consistent rewards, as there is lower variance in the number of blocks they mint per epoch. Small pools will have much more variation in the amount of blocks they produce per epoch, and so the rewards will vary significantly. Across three epochs, a small pool may payout 1%, 9%, and 4% ROS, but over time the rewards will average out to 4.6%.

This is important to remember when looking at pool performance over a short period of time. A small pool may get “lucky” on their first few epochs and get selected for many more slots than average. They will appear to pay out a much higher ROS than other pools. However, after several epochs, this will even out to the expected ROS.

The following graphic illustrates the breakdown of pool fees (more on this later) based on pool size and the small overall effect they have on overall ROS:

Pool Pledge

Importance factor: 2/5

Pledge also has a small effect on the rewards earned by the pool’s delegators. This is called the pledge influence factor, which is currently set to 0.3. The overall effect of pledge is very small on the ROS a delegator will earn. Compared to a pool with 0 ADA pledged, here are a few examples of how much more a delegator can expect to earn:

ADA Pledged	Increase in ROS over 0 pledge
250k	0.02%
1M	0.09%
5M	0.42%
12M	1.0%

Based on these values, you can see that it would be better to stake your ADA in a pool with 0 pledge and a 2% fee than a pool with 12M ADA pledged and a 3.5% fee. Fees and pool performance are a much bigger factor in your expected returns than a pool’s pledge, as we explained in the previous section.

FAQ

If I spend or add funds to my wallet after I delegated to a pool, does the staked amount change automatically?

Yes - when you delegate to a pool, you are delegating your entire wallet - not just a fixed amount. So if funds are added or removed from your wallet, you staked amount will change accordingly.

If I delegated to a pool during the Incentivized Test Net (ITN), do I need to redelegate for Mainnet?

Yes - in fact, you will have 2 wallets that need to be delegated. You will need to migrate your original Byron-era wallet to a Shelley wallet. Additionally, your ITN rewards are paid out in a new wallet, which you can recover using the recovery phrase generated when you created your ITN wallet. Check out our Daedalus staking tutorial for more details.

Why does it take two epochs to earn rewards?

Slot leaders are elected at the start of each epoch, so the stake in the prior epoch is used to select leaders. Then the epoch must commence and each pool must show up when it’s their turn for a slot. After the epoch has ended, all the pools will have produced the blocks assigned (or missed them), and rewards are calculated. The rewards are then paid out on the following epoch.

Do only big pools get selected to make blocks?

No, they only have the best chance statistically. A pool with only 10 ADA in it could get selected, only its chances are extremely low. Over a very, very long period of time, this pool has the opportunity to earn the same amount of rewards as a pool with 10M ADA, but it will take much longer to even out.

Does k=500 mean only the top 500 pools will be able to earn rewards?

No, the k parameter only means pools will saturate at 0.2% of the total staked ADA. People can still delegate to over-saturated pools, and there can be any number of unsaturated pools. Basically, it just means only up to 500 pools can operate with the maximum amount of stake and not be saturated.

Is my ADA locked when I delegate to a pool?

No, you are free to spend your ADA at any time (although you will stop earning staking rewards on anything that you spend).

If you have questions about staking or anything else related to Cardano, feel free to join our Telegram channel. Follow us on Twitter and Reddit to be notified of future posts!

Why You Should Use a Hardware Wallet [Ledger/Trezor Comparison]

2021-03-02T00:00:00-07:00

What is a hardware wallet?

Cryptocurrency hardware wallets protect your funds by enforcing two-factor authentication (“something only you have and something only you know”). When using a regular software wallet, you authenticate a transaction with a spending password that you choose. If that password is leaked, or an adversary gains access to your computer, an adversary can steal your funds. With a hardware wallet, you must authorize every transaction by entering a PIN on a physical device connected to your computer or mobile device. There is no risk of an adversary remotely gaining access to your funds in this situation.

Why should I use one?

All blockchain transactions are governed by public and private key pairs. A user is authorized to make a transaction by proving they have access to a wallet’s private key. If someone else gains access to this key, they can authenticate this wallet’s transactions and access its funds. A hardware wallet holds the private keys to your cryptocurrency wallets, and these keys never leave your device, keeping them safe from adversaries. When setting up the device, you will write down a recovery phrase that you can use to recover your wallets to another hardware device if your hardware wallet is lost or destroyed. You must never store this phrase on a device connected to the Internet. If this phrase is leaked, someone else can use it to recover your wallets to a new device and steal your funds.

Even if someone gains physical access to your hardware wallet, they cannot access your funds without knowing your PIN. If the wrong pin is input too many times, the hardware wallet will erase itself and will need to be recovered using the recovery phrase.

To provide additional security, some hardware wallets support hidden wallets by pairing your PIN with any number of different passwords/passphrases (not to be confused with the recovery phrase used to restore your hardware wallet). Each unique PIN + passphrase combination accesses an entirely different wallet, and without knowing these, there is no way to know that this wallet even exists. This feature provides plausible deniability as well as increased security. For example, if you are in a situation where an adversary coerces you to unlock your device, or if someone gains access to your recovery phrase, it is impossible to access the funds on your hidden wallets without also knowing the passphrase. One could even set up a “decoy wallet” with a small amount of funds on it, which you could give up if threatened without revealing the existence of hidden wallet(s) that hold the majority of one’s crypto funds.

Which hardware wallet should I use?

When choosing a hardware wallet, you must first verify the device in question supports the cryptocurrencies you plan to store on it. Cardano is currently fully supported by the Trezor Model T and the Ledger Nano (S and X versions). Below we will compare these devices’ features to help you make an informed decision on which wallet is best for you.

Price

Ledger Nano S: $59
Ledger Nano X: $119
Trezor Model T: $192

Winner: Ledger Nano S

App Limit

To use a cryptocurrency with a Ledger device, you must install the associated application on the device itself. These devices are limited by their onboard storage, and the number of apps they can hold varies significantly based on the particular currencies you intend to use. The Nano S can hold 3 to 20 apps, while the Nano X can hold up to 100 apps. The Trezor Model T, on the other hand, has no such limit.

Winner: Trezor Model T

Touchscreen vs Buttons

A device with a touchscreen is substantially more straightforward to use than one without. Typing in a PIN by scrolling through digits using only one or two buttons (e.g., the Ledger Nano) can be tedious. In addition to ease of use, a device with a touchscreen (e.g., Trezor Model T) can provide better security by never having to type in hidden wallet passphrases via the computer with which it interfaces. While you are provided the option to type in your passphrase on your computer to unlock the hardware device, we recommend you always input the passphrase directly on the device. An adversary could potentially access your hidden wallet passphrase through malware on your computer (e.g., a keylogger). This is not possible if you enter the passphrase directly on the device.

Winner: Trezor Model T

Screen Size

A small screen makes it difficult to read data displayed on the hardware wallet (e.g., confirming a transaction before authorizing it). Devices with larger screens can present the information in a format that is much easier to digest, and users are thus less likely to make a mistake.

Ledger Nano S: 128 x 32 pixels
Ledger Nano X: 128 x 64 pixels
Trezor Model T: 240 x 240 pixels

Winner: Trezor Model T

Host Compatibility

While all three devices support Windows, Mac, and Linux PC connections, Ledger devices can additionally be used with mobile devices. The Ledger Nano X supports iOS and Android, while the Nano S only supports Android.

Winner: Ledger Nano X

Wireless Capability

The Ledger Nano X is the only hardware wallet that supports wireless connection to the host device (i.e., Bluetooth). The Nano S and Trezor Model T require a USB connection.

Winner: Ledger Nano X

Hidden Wallet Support

While all three devices support hidden wallets using passphrases, the Trezor Model T’s touchscreen makes this significantly more manageable and user-friendly.

Winner: Trezor Model T

Summary

Overall, we recommend the Trezor Model T. Its increased capability over the Ledger Nano devices more than makes up for the higher price. However, using any hardware wallet is much more secure than not using one at all. We suggest that if your cryptocurrency holdings are worth at least ten times more than the cost of a hardware wallet, it is time to invest in one.

If you would like to support our pool and the content we provide, please consider using the affiliate links above when purchasing a hardware device.

Once you’re ready to stake your ADA, check out our tutorials for staking using the Daedalus or Yoroi wallets. If you have questions about hardware wallets or anything else related to Cardano, feel free to join our Telegram channel. Follow us on Twitter and Reddit to be notified of future posts!

How to Stake Your ADA [Atomic Cardano Wallet]

2021-02-08T00:00:00-07:00

The Atomic wallet is an easy to use multi-asset wallet that supports many cryptocurrencies in addition to Cardano. This makes it attractive for people who invest in ADA as well as other crypto assets. In this guide we will walk through how to stake your ADA using the Atomic Wallet.

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The first step is to setup your wallet and fund it with some ADA. We won’t cover that here. Once you have some ADA in your wallet select staking on the left column. Then select Cardano from the list.

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Note that the Atomic Wallet displays the annual yield as 5%. This is approximately what you can expect to earn given the Cardano network parameters if you select a pool that has good performance (more on how to select a pool below).

To begin staking, you first need to choose a pool. Click the button “CHOOSE POOL”.

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By default the Atomic Wallet stake pool will be selected. However, you may want choose a different pool for several reasons. We recommend doing your own research before selecting pool and have published guide here that explains the factors to consider. Websites like pooltool.io, adapools.org, or adafolio.com are fantastic resources.

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In order to select a different pool, click on the pool “Atomic Wallet” and select “Custom pool” in the menu.

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The custom pool input form will open. Here you will need to enter the pool name and the pool ID. The pool ID for your pool can be found on PoolTool. The example below shows how to select VIPER stake pool (d69b6b16c6a135c4157365ded9b0d772d44c7628a05b49741d3ae25c) as an option.

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Once you have selected your pool, you will then preview the selection prior to submitting the transaction. If this is your first time staking the wallet, a 2 ADA deposit is required for registering the new staking key in addition to a transaction fee. The deposit is specific to the Cardano protocol and not a fee charged by the wallet or the pool.

—–

Enter the wallet password in order to make the delegation transaction on the network.

——

Successfully delegate your ADA to a stake pool to begin earning rewards.

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Once your ADA is successfully staked, it will take a few days to begin seeing rewards. The Cardano blockchain takes what are called “stake snapshots” every 5 days (one epoch). These snapshots are then used in the following epoch (another 5 days later) and the results from that epoch take another two epochs to show up in the wallet. After the initial delay, rewards will show up routinely every epoch. The un-delegating process works in reverse, after un-delegating your wallet you will continue to receive rewards for two epochs. See our Staking Rewards Timeline for further explanation.

If you have questions about staking or anything else related to Cardano, feel free to join our Telegram channel. Follow us on Twitter and Reddit to be notified of future posts!

How to Stake Your ADA [Daedalus Cardano Wallet]

2020-12-01T00:00:00-07:00

Byron vs Shelley

If you created a wallet prior to July 29, 2020, it was created during the Byron era of the Cardano blockchain, which did not support staking. In order to stake your ADA, you will need to move your funds to a Shelley wallet. If you participated in the Incentivized Test Net (ITN), this wallet is already a Shelley wallet and can be used for staking.

The length of your wallet’s recovery phrase will tell you what kind of wallet you have:

12 words: Byron wallet
15 words: ITN (Shelley) wallet
24 words: Shelley wallet
27 words: Byron paper wallet

Step 0: Download Daedalus Shelley Mainnet

If you haven’t already, download and install Daedalus Shelley Mainnet wallet.

Important: Only download Daedalus directly from the official website.
Open Daedalus, select your preferred number and date formats, and wait for the node to sync (this can take a couple hours if this is your first time opening Daedalus).

Step 1: Restore an existing wallet

If you have not previously created a Daedalus wallet, skip to the next step.

Select “Add wallet” at the bottom of the screen, and the select “Restore”.

Select the type of wallet you would like to restore and click “Continue”.

Type in the recovery phrase for this wallet and click “Continue”.
Give the wallet a name and create a new, secure password (recommend using a password manager, such as LastPass to generate a strong, random password).

Step 2: Create a new Shelley wallet

If you have not previously created a Daedalus Shelley wallet, go ahead and create one by selecting “Add wallet” > “Create”.

Write down and then type in the generated recovery phrase.
Give the wallet a name and create a new, secure password (recommend using a password manager, such as LastPass to generate a strong, random password).

Step 2: (Byron only) Convert Byron wallet to Shelley wallet

If you did not restore a Byron wallet, skip to the next step.

In order to stake your ADA, you will need to move the funds from the restored Byron wallet into the new Shelley wallet we just created. If you select the wallet on the left navigation pane, you will see a message informing you to move the funds. This message will include a link to do this transfer automatically.

Step 3: Delegate your stake

Select Delegation Center on the left side of the screen.

Select the desired wallet and click Delegate (wallet must have at least 10 ADA in order to delegate).

Select your desired stake pool (VIPER is a great choice!)

Confirm your staking delegation and enter your spending password.
You have now staked your ADA! You will begin receiving staking rewards after the current and next epoch (5 days) have completed. You can see the remaining time of the current epoch in the Delegation Center.

If you have questions about staking or anything else related to Cardano, feel free to join our Telegram channel. Follow us on Twitter and Reddit to be notified of future posts!

Restore Your Cardano ITN Rewards from Public/Private Key Pairs (Without a Mnemonic)

2020-11-21T00:00:00-07:00

Most of the tutorials about claiming ITN rewards describe how to use Daedalus or Yoroi wallets using the recovery seed phrase. However, if you are like me and used jcli to manually create a wallet, i.e., public and private keys only, there wasn’t a recovery phrase. Not to worry, we are still able to recover the rewards manually using the cardano-cli. To simplify matters, we will be using the Cardano-Tools Python library.

Prerequisites

For this tutorial, you will need:

A working install of the cardano-node and cardano-cli binaries Note: for extended keys (ed25519e....), you will need a build of cardano-node newer than 1.18.0.
A running instance of cardano-node fully synced with the blockchain.
The latest Cardano-Tools python library (>= 0.3.0).
A Shelley wallet with enough ADA for the transaction fees.
Public and Private key pairs from the ITN wallet.

If you are new to setting up a node, check out this tutorial.

Start your script by creating a ShelleyTools object and pointing it to the CLI, node socket, and a working directory containing the ITN wallet public and private keys.

from cardano_tools import ShelleyTools
from pathlib import Path

path_to_cli = "/home/cardano/.cabal/bin/cardano-cli"
path_to_socket = "/home/cardano/cardano-node/node.socket"
working_dir = Path("/home/cardano/working-dir/")

# Create a ShelleyTools object
shelley = ShelleyTools(
    path_to_cli,
    path_to_socket,
    working_dir,
    ssh=conn  # <-- pass the SSH connection here
)

If you want to connect to an instance of cardano-node running on a remote server, you can use an SSH connection object from the fabric library. Note that this will require all the files to reside on the remote host; therefore, this method should be used with caution.

from cardano_tools import ShelleyTools
from fabric import Connection
from pathlib import Path

path_to_cli = "/home/cardano/.cabal/bin/cardano-cli"
path_to_socket = "/home/cardano/cardano-node/node.socket"
working_dir = Path("/home/cardano/working-dir/")

# SSH connection to remote host
conn = Connection(
    host="hostname",
    user="admin",
    connect_kwargs={
        "key_filename": "/home/myuser/.ssh/private.key",
    },
)

# Create a ShelleyTools object
shelley = ShelleyTools(
    path_to_cli,
    path_to_socket,
    working_dir
)
# shelley.debug = True  # optional for debugging

Convert ITN keys to Shelley Staking Keys

Use the convert_itn_keys function. It will convert both the public and private keys as needed.

# Convert the ITN keys to Shelley staking keys
itn_prv_key = working_dir / "itn_owner.prv"
itn_pub_key = working_dir / "itn_owner.pub"
stake_addr = shelley.convert_itn_keys(itn_prv_key, itn_pub_key)

The example assumes the ITN public and private keys are located in the directory /home/cardano/working-dir/ and respectively named itn_owner.prv and itn_owner.pub. The result is a set of keys found in the same directory named owner_shelley_staking.vkey and owner_shelley_staking.skey corresponding to the public and private keys. An additional file will also be created, owner_shelley_staking.addr which contains the address of the newly created Shelley staking account.

Withdraw the Rewards

The reward funds are withdrawn from the staking address, just like regular staking rewards. The balance may be first checked using the get_rewards_balance function.

# Get the rewards balance
bal = shelley.get_rewards_balance(stake_addr)
print(f"Rewards balance: {bal/1_000_000} ADA")

Finally, the rewards may be withdrawn to a Shelley spending wallet. Note that this requires a transaction fee to be paid. The fee may be paid from the wallet receiving the funds or from another account. The claim_staking_rewards function has an optional input payment_addr in case the address paying the fees is not also receiving the rewards.

# Claim the rewards to a spending wallet.
stake_skey_file = working_dir / "itn_owner_shelley_staking.skey"
pmt_addr = open(working_dir / "wallet.addr", 'r').read()
pmt_skey = working_dir / "wallet.skey"

shelley.claim_staking_rewards(stake_addr, stake_skey_file, pmt_addr, pmt_skey)

# Or
recv_addr = "addr1...."
shelley.claim_staking_rewards(stake_addr, stake_skey_file, recv_addr, pmt_skey, payment_addr=pmt_addr)

The process to withdraw the funds will submit a transaction to the chain using your locally running cardano-node. Therefore, it is imperative that the local node is running and fully synced with the chain.

Final Script

A complete script containing all the above steps is provided below.

from cardano_tools import ShelleyTools
from pathlib import Path

path_to_cli = "/home/cardano/.cabal/bin/cardano-cli"
path_to_socket = "/home/cardano/cardano-node/node.socket"
working_dir = Path("/home/cardano/working-dir/")

# Create a ShelleyTools object
shelley = ShelleyTools(
    path_to_cli,
    path_to_socket,
    working_dir
)
# shelley.debug = True  # optional for debugging

# Convert the ITN keys to Shelley staking keys
itn_prv_key = working_dir / "itn_owner.prv"
itn_pub_key = working_dir / "itn_owner.pub"
stake_addr = shelley.convert_itn_keys(itn_prv_key, itn_pub_key)

# Get the rewards balance
bal = shelley.get_rewards_balance(stake_addr)
print(f"Rewards balance: {bal/1_000_000} ADA")

# Claim the rewards to a spending wallet.
stake_skey_file = working_dir / "itn_owner_shelley_staking.skey"
pmt_addr = open(working_dir / "wallet.addr", 'r').read()
pmt_skey = working_dir / "wallet.skey"

shelley.claim_staking_rewards(stake_addr, stake_skey_file, pmt_addr, pmt_skey)

# Or
# recv_addr = "addr1...."
# shelley.claim_staking_rewards(stake_addr, stake_skey_file, recv_addr, pmt_skey, payment_addr=pmt_addr)

Conclusion

In this tutorial, we walked through the process of claiming ITN rewards from public/private key pairs using the Cardano-Tools library. We hope you found this tutorial helpful. If you have questions about staking or anything else related to Cardano, feel free to join our Telegram channel. Follow us on Twitter and Reddit to be notified of future posts!