🚦Setting Up for Bitcoin Ordinals
Getting started with Ordinals
Choosing a Wallet for Ordinals:
Not all Bitcoin wallets currently support Ordinals. As this technology is relatively new, you will need a wallet specifically designed to handle Ordinals and their inscribed data. These wallets will allow you to create, send, and receive Ordinals, ensuring a smooth experience.
The two wallets we recommend for Ordinals are Xverse and the Magic Eden Bitcoin wallet. Both of these wallets will look and feel familiar to anyone used to Metamask or other EVM wallets. The setup involves the usual download of browser extensions, storing seed phrases securely (make sure to write them down on paper and DO NOT store them electronically) etc. Xverse have a runthrough here: How to Set Up Xverse Ordinals Wallet
In depth best practice is beyond the scope of this article, but Punk6529 lays out a brilliant framework for digital asset best practices with his TAP (Three Address Protocol) here https://twitter.com/punk6529/status/1701623475725533524. Xverse also has a comprehensive support website with plenty of guides and articles here: https://support.xverse.app/hc/en-us.
Some nuance to keep in mind is that both Magic Eden Bitcoin Wallet and Xverse wallet deal with the complexity of managing SPENDING satoshi’s and INSCRIBED satoshi’s (Ordinals) by hosting TWO SEPARATE wallets for each browser ACCOUNT. To clarify, while Metamask nomenclature refers to each single address as a “wallet”, because Bitcoin accounts actually hold TWO wallet addresses, they are referred to as ACCOUNTS.
(An example Xverse account. As you can see here the top BITCOIN (segwit) address starting with 39VU is for transactional bitcoin, the middle ORDINAL (taproot) address starting with bc1 stores Ordinals. (Stax is essentially a software scaling solution, similar in concept to an L2, for Bitcoin).
Magic Eden’s bitcoin wallet looks similar, but utilises two separate taproot addresses for transactional bitcoin and ordinals.
Magic Eden bitcoin wallet has the added advantage of enabling swaps between Solana, ETH, Matic and Bitcoin, making the process of acquiring bitcoin much simpler.
As with Metamask, browser wallets make it very simple to connect to Dapps, marketplaces, minting sites etc.
It is also worth noting that both Xverse and Magic Eden wallet support cold storage (Ledger).
Getting funds onto your Bitcoin wallet:
Magic Eden Wallet swap: The simplest method is going to be using the Magic Eden Wallet swap feature. It really is as simple as wrapping ETH in Metamask. Simply send over your ETH, SOL or Matic, hit the swap button, input the amount, approve and wait somewhere in the region of 20 minutes for the swap to complete in the wallet. 20 minutes!! We hear some of you exclaim? Bitcoin is slow and this is how long it can take transactions to complete. (Blocks can take anywhere from 10 minutes to an hour to confirm).
Centralised Exchange (CEX): Another option is to route your funds through a CEX of your choice. This option needs little explaining. Just be sure to send to the correct transactional address to avoid having to take measures to recover transactional BTC later.
Decentralised Exchange (DEX): Decentralised exchanges, such as @SimpleSwap_io and @ChangeNOW_io offer non KYC options to exchange tokens and move Bitcoin to your wallet. As with the above, be sure to use the correct TRANSACTIONAL Bitcoin address.
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