I have a Bitcoin wallet for android and I would like to know what happens if I back up the wallet and restore it in other phone. Will I be able to use the bitcoins in both devices? Thanks in advance
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2 Answers
Yes you will be able to access the same coins with both devices. You can think about it like if you make a copy of a key to your home, and give it to someone; both people will be able to open the same door.
answered Nov 21, 2016 at 4:24
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Okay! Thank you very much. (I up voted but I still don't have sufficient rating.) Commented Nov 21, 2016 at 4:35
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@hisetip: If this completely answers your question, clicking the check mark will mark it as "accepted". Commented Nov 21, 2016 at 14:03
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Note that the wallet software needs to be designed to handle this. Some wallets might get confused by transactions that spend their coins that come from somewhere else. Commented Nov 21, 2016 at 14:05
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@NateEldredge Which wallets don't check the utxo to determine a users "balance"? Are there some that just store it in local memory until the device issues a new transaction? Seems like a bad idea. Commented Nov 21, 2016 at 19:23
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Well, for instance, if you have keys in two wallets, you might accidentally double spend. As I recall from some tests, Bitcoin Core gets confused when this happens, as it refuses to give up on its own transaction even after a conflicting transaction has many confirmations. You have to
-zapwallettxsand rescan to fix it. Commented Nov 21, 2016 at 19:29
Bitcoin Wallet uses a deterministic key derivation, so you are able to use both copies in parallel and see the same balances in either.
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Keys/addresses won't diverge. Actually Bitcoin Wallet was the second deterministic wallet, the first being Electrum.– AndreasCommented Jan 3, 2017 at 20:49
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