How to move sats from a lightning wallet back to BTC wallet?

Question

How can I move sats from a lightning wallet back to a BTC wallet?

I installed BlueWallet and put $20 of Bitcoin in my wallet. Then I created a Lightning wallet and moved most of the sats into the lightning wallet.

At this point I am totally stuck:

1. I can't find anything to send sats to, as a test. Why did I just put funds in a lightning wallet I cannot use?

2. Is there a way to send funds back to my BTC wallet? I read somewhere that the only way is to buy a BTC voucher with lightning and then redeem the voucher back to my BTC wallet? Is this normal?

3. Is BlueWallet "meant to be" a one-way, BTC to lightning directional transfer only?

It is really strange that the above questions are so difficult to find answers for. So confused.

Answer 1

I had many of the same questions when I first started using the lightning network and BlueWallet.

To move funds back to an "on-chain" BTC wallet you can use the exchange function.

1. Open your BlueWallet Lightning Wallet
2. Select Manage Funds
3. Select Exchange
4. This will take you to zigzag.io where you can send a lightning payment and receive BTC at a BTC address.

As far as using your Sats to pay for goods and services I like paywithmoon.com It can be used at basically any online retailer. It creates a one time use virtual credit card which you can fund via a lightning payment from your lightning wallet.

Answer 2

I can't find anything to send sats to , as a test. Why did I just put funds in a lightning wallet I cannot use?

The lightning network is a young technology, but nonetheless there are plenty places online / IRL that accept lightning payments. A quick websearch brings up tons or results, for example:

• https://yalls.org/
• https://lightningnetworkstores.com/
• https://acceptlightning.com/list.html

(I do not affiliated with and do not endorse any of those websites, they were simply some of the first examples that showed up in a web search)

Is there a way to send funds back to my BTC wallet? I read somewhere that the only way is to buy a BTC voucher with lightning and then redeem the voucher back to my BTC wallet?

Moving funds from lightning back to 'on-chain' bitcoin is as easy as sending a bitcoin transaction. There is no 'BTC voucher' or any other nonsense like that. Your wallet should be able to create a transaction that will close your lightning channel(s) under the hood, moving your funds back into a regular bitcoin address.

Note that some wallets might hide this functionality, for easier UX. You'll need to decide which wallet to use based on factors such as this (eg fine-grained control vs easy user experience).

Is BlueWallet "meant to be" a one way BTC to lightning directional transfer only?

I am not intimately familiar with Blue Wallet, but in general, no. Any good wallet should allow you control over your funds (including the ability to move funds out of a lightning channel, if desired).

Answer 3

You can do this in a variety of ways as others have mentioned - and one service I've used is coinos.io where you can send Layer-1 (onchain) bitcoin or Layer-2 bitcoin (Lightning), and then withdraw the other.

If you want to experiment with a bitcoin sidechain (Liquid) then you can also withdraw to that - whole other area though!

I like coinos.io because there it is completely anonymous; note though that you are trusting the service for the period between your deposit and your withdrawal. If you want to learn more about the service before using it, you can listen to the TFTC podcast #202 where Marty Bent talks with Adam Soltys.

Answer 4

Use wallet of Satoshi for beginning, it is really user friendly. You can easily move from layer one to layer 2 lightning, then back again.