I have partly lost my seed phrase, what is still possible?

By S.E. (Simcha) Schrijver, blockchain investigator at Paucitas

What Paucitas does

We first establish which kind of wallet and which kind of recovery code is involved and exactly how much is missing. A phrase of twelve words behaves differently from one of twenty four, and a missing word whose position is known is a different problem from one whose position is not.

Only after that do we say anything about feasibility. The number of missing words, their positions and the presence of a known address together decide whether a search space is workable or hopeless, and we put that in writing before any work begins.

A partly lost seed phrase is not one problem but several. A phrase of twelve words behaves differently from one of twenty four, and a missing word whose position is known is a different matter from one whose position is not. The number missing, the positions and the presence of a known address together decide whether the search space is workable, and we put that in writing before any work begins.

What you supply

You supply the number of words you still have and their positions as far as you know them, the type of wallet and the software or hardware, the wallet address, and documents showing that the wallet is yours. Never send a complete recovery phrase to anyone, including us.

Tell us the type and the version of the device or the software as precisely as you can. Wallet software has changed its derivation defaults over the years, and knowing which version wrote the wallet can be the difference between a workable test and an impossible one.

What you receive

You receive a report with the test and its outcome. In one anonymised case two of twenty four words were missing on a hardware wallet and the positions were known, which kept the search space within reach and allowed the balance on the known address to be confirmed first.

Where the outcome is negative, the report says so in the same plain terms. That answer has value too: it ends a search that otherwise carries on for years.

For readers outside the Netherlands there is one point worth repeating. No firm can promise access, and any party that does is selling a result it cannot control. What can be promised is a written test of the routes and a plain conclusion, including the conclusion that nothing remains.

You also receive the state of the wallet itself: the address, the balance on a given date and the transactions established. Knowing whether the funds are still there changes the urgency in both directions, and it is the one answer we can almost always give.

How to get started

You tell us how many words you are missing and which type of wallet it is. That is enough for a first judgement, and it costs nothing. Write through the contact page and leave the words themselves out of your message.

Never send a complete recovery phrase to anyone, including us. For a first judgement we only need to know how many words are missing and, if you know them, their positions.

What is technically possible depends on the data that exist. Access to a wallet can never be promised in advance.