The Coinbase Wallet and other Crypto Wallets

Published 14 Jan 2022

coinbase wallet
Author: Mensah Alkebu-Lan

Table of Contents #

Understanding-ERC-20-Tokens
Cryptocurrency Wallets
The Coinbase Wallet
- Install the Coinbase Wallet App
A List of other popular Crypto Wallet Brands
References

Understanding ERC-20 Tokens #

Ethereum tokens are smart contracts that make use of the Ethereum blockchain. ERC-20 is known as one of Etherium’s most significant tokens and has emerged as a technical standard. Instead of running on their own blockchain, they are tokens issued on the Ethereum network. Basic Attention Token(BAT) is one of many digital currencies that use the ERC-20 standard.

ERC-20 defines six implementation coding functions. They are:

Total supply
Balance of
Allowance
Transfer from
Approve
Transfer

At this point, it’s enough to know they exist. Going into each one in detail is beyond the scope of this article.

When purchasing digital currencies issued as ERC-20 tokens, you must also have a compatible crypto wallet. The Coinbase Wallet is one of the more popular wallets, so I figured that would be a good place to start.

Cryptocurrency Wallets #

The most popular types of crypto wallets are hosted wallets, non-custodial wallets, and hardware wallets. If you just want to buy and sell crypto, hosted wallets are probably the easiest solution. Many of them will even let you buy crypto with a bank account or credit card.

Non-custodial wallets give you full control of your crypto. What that means is it is your responsibility to keep track of your password or “seed phrase” and make sure it doesn’t get into the wrong hands. Also, you won’t have to share your email address or any other personal information to create an account. They take more work to maintain, but you get far more advanced features than with a hosted wallet.

As you may have already guessed, a hardware wallet is a physical device. Once you buy the hardware, you’ll have to install its software before you are able to transfer crypto to it. A popular example of a hardware wallet is the Ledger Nano X. This product gives you a good balance between accessibility and security.