Why did I try it?
I had read about the Atomic Wallet a few weeks back when they launched a referral campaign with an opportunity to earn some of their native tokens on registering and using their wallet. I had then installed the wallet but did not really use it. You blame this mainly on me being really lazy and also as you would have noticed in my previous posts I am basically a Bitcoin maximalist so I mainly use Trezor and Ledger for storing my Bitcoin.
Since the lockdown I have got more active on platforms like Publish0x, Crowdholding, Uptrennd and recently started experimenting with Read Cash and LBRY as well. I collected a decent amount of BAT, DAI, LRC, ETH and some other ERC20 coins, plus I had some XLM and XRP from previous airdrops. Add to this the tokens I earned on Coinbase Earn which I had been planning to move out of my Coinbase wallet.
This weekend I decided to move my coins to Atomic Wallet and decide to check all it’s functionalities so I can decide if it’s worthy to use long term. I was looking for a hot storage wallet as cold storage wallets are not really efficient for storing altcoins.
How did I test it?
I decided to use all the functionalities I could see on the wallet. To start with I transferred small amount of multiple coins to the wallet and started playing with all the options.
This post will cover the following aspects of my analysis and user experience:
· Things I liked
· Things which can be improved
· How it compares to other wallets I use
· Final Verdict- Will I use it or not?
What did I like about Atomic Wallet?
Here is summary of how was my experience of using the different features of Atomic Wallet:
1. Ease of Use – Score 5/5
As soon as I opened the wallet what I found really remarkable was how intuitive the app was. I did not have to think while navigating the user interface. It was very straightforward and organized. Even someone who is not very familiar with crypto wallets will find it convenient. If I compare it with interfaces of Coinbase wallet, Uphold, Trezor, Ledger it wins hands down on ease of use. It took me some time to get the hang of using Uphold and Trezor and despite using for over a year I sometimes find myself wondering “Where was the option to change the coin?”
The dashboard below shows how my wallet looked 20 mins after I started playing with it. I was able to move small amounts of popular crypto into it very quickly.
2. Functionalities – Score 4/5
This was something that really impressed me. Normally I would buy BTC or ETH from Coinbase then use Binance to trade them for Altcoin. Then I would store them in Trezor or Ledger. Here Atomic wallet support all functionalities to buy, exchange and store all the major coins at one place. This has the potential to simplify my life so much. Rather than maintain 3-4 wallets I can consolidate all my operations on a single wallet.
The reason I gave it a score of 4 and not 5 is because I did not see the option for selling crypto for fiat. This means when I want to sell my coins for cash I will have to move the coins to Coinbase.
3. Security – Score 4/5
Atomic wallet has given a lot of thought to security and it shows in the interface. When you open the app it asks for your password which means if someone has access to your laptop or mobile he cannot access your coins. Further they have provided set of private keys for each token which is available on their platform. The only reason I did not give it a score of 5 is because it is a hot wallet and not cold storage so despite all the measures it is not really 100% safe. That said I won’t mind storing my altcoins here but I will continue to store my Bitcoin on Trezor.
4. Staking Option – Score 5/5
This was an exciting feature for me. I had looking for options to bake my Tezos for a while now but most of the options I found were cumbersome and time consuming and would require me to juggle with multiple platforms which I wanted to avoided.
I was really delighted to see an integrated staking section built into the wallet. The screenshot below shows the wide range of coins which are available for staking on Atomic and the average return you can expect from them (hmm.. Cosmos looks good, I need to research more about that)
I decided bake some Tezos to see how does it work. Here again it was great to see that they have provided multiple bakers to choose from. The screenshot below shows the bakers you can choose for Tezos and what are the different rates they are offering. They have really simplified the staking/ baking process. I plan to move more Tezos to Atomic to bake them long term.
Their staking feature gets a full score from me.
5. Speed – Score 5/5
One common complaint I have with altcoins is that transactions, exchanges, movement between wallets or exchanges can take up a long time. Here I must say I found Atomic wallet quite fast. All the coins I moved, exchanged like BTC, ETH, BAT, XLM, XTZ, DAI was really rapid. I did not have to wait more than 5 mins for any movement or transaction.
Speed gets a full score by me.
6. Operational Fees – Score 4/5
I had planning to start collecting some Cardano but did not start as it is currently not supported by Coinbase. When I saw Cardano on Atomic I decided to exchange some BTC for ADA and I think the exchange rates that Atomic is offering are good, probably not the best but decent enough.
7. Commission Rate – Score 3/5
I decided to check the commission rate they are charging for crypto purchases from fiat. This part was a bit disappointing. As you can see in screenshot below that as per their rates you will get about 0.96 BTC for $10,000 while the market rate now is about 1 BTC for $9,600. This is too expensive for me and this means I will continue to use Coinbase for buying BTC from fiat.
Overall Score- 30/35
Not bad at all. Frankly I was not expecting Atomic to fare so good on my expectations. This is due to the fact that I am quite paranoid about storing my crypto and will never be able to fully trust hot storage wallets.
What are the areas for improvement in Atomic Wallet?
I already mentioned the following things which need to improved in Atomic wallet:
· Option to Sell Crypto for Fiat- If you don’t enable this feature you can never become an end to end single solution and people will need to use an additional platform.
· Exorbitant Purchase Rates- Your rates are very high compared to what Coinbase and Binance offer. You will have to consider how to lower them and make them more competitive if you want more users to buy crypto directly from you
Another option I did not like was the following:
· Unspandale (Typo for Unspendable?) Crypto- For some coins the wallet has set an unspendable hold. For example in the screenshot below you can see the message that if i transfer XRP they will lock 20 tokens which I can’t use. This does not make sense to me. Not sure if this is a requirement specific for XRP (don’t have much love for that coin anyways).
How does Atomic Wallet compare to other wallets?
· Trezor/ Ledger/ Other Cold Storages- When it comes to ease of use and having a user friendly interface then Atomic wins hands down. Another plus is the wide range of tokens that are supported and can be stored easily. We all know what a pain it is to store altcoins in Trezor or Ledger. That said Trezor can’t be beaten on security so I will probably start using Atomic for all my altcoins but will continue to keep BTC in Trezor.
· Uphold- I will not say much. I am gonna move all my BAT from Uphold to Atomic right now!
· Coinbase Wallet- Atomic wallet’s user convenience is way better than Coinbase wallet. I am going to move all my EOS, XLM and DAI from Coinbase to Atomic. I will have to continue using Coinbase to purchase my crypto though, till Atomic decides to lower their commission rates.
Final Verdict- Will I use it or not?
After considering all the factors that I have checked I have decided that I will now start using Atomic as the default wallet for all my Altcoins. It will be my preferred choice to stake my Tezos and also I will be using Atomic when I need to convert BTC to an altcoin I am looking to diversify into eg. Cardano, Kyber.
I will continue to use Trezor to store my BTC as I am not convinced enough to move them from cold storage to hot storage.
Hope you found my review useful and if you think I missed any important aspect do let me know in the comments.
If you want to try out Atomic wallet yourself then download it here - Download Atomic Wallet!
I have created a short video to give you a quick walkthrough on the user interface of Atomic Wallet - https://lbry.tv/@Crypto_Sense:1/Atomic-Wallet-review:5
STAY SAFE! From Coronavirus and from Crypto Whales!
Cheers,
SamBTC
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very informative and use full post kerp it up