SeedPhrase more important than private key?

[Ambatman]

Don't really mind my title. I want some confirmation.

Say I create a wallet and I'm given a seedphrase
With that I can access wallet addresses connected to the wallet (electrum).

All individual private keys are gotten from the seedphrase right?

Just some confirmation so it won't seem my knowledge is flawed. Thank you.

[Mia Chloe]

Don't really mind my title. I want some confirmation.
Say I create a wallet and I'm given a seedphrase
With that I can access wallet addresses connected to the wallet (electrum).
All individual private keys are gotten from the seedphrase right?
Just some confirmation so it won't seem my knowledge is flawed. Thank you.

Both your seed phrase and your private keys are way important basically what happens is when you create a wallet your seed phrase is  hashed to get a master key that master key is further hashed to get child keys.

At least for most standard wallet like ELECTRUM wallet and BIP 39 that's how the HD works.  So the most important thing per say is the seed itself and the master keys.

I hope you get it now.

[electronicash]

i'm not sure if wallet gives both seedphrase and private key, it usually just which of them.  ETH usually give private key back then and then later on, you are given seed when you generate one these days. and its the same with Bitcoin. any reason for this?

but then whichever you have, its important to access your wallet in case you want to import to another kind of wallet.

[PX-Z]

All individual private keys are gotten from the seedphrase right?

Yes, all individual private keys are derived from the seed phrase which also called a mnemonic phrase or recovery phrase. Losing this phrase means lossing your access to all derived private keys as well. That's why every wallet creation, saving a backup of your seed phrase is a requirement.

[Mia Chloe]

i'm not sure if wallet gives both seedphrase and private key, it usually just which of them.  ETH usually give private key back then and then later on, you are given seed when you generate one these days. and its the same with Bitcoin. any reason for this?

From my experience so far on the crypto space you get  seed phrase almost every single time when you create a new wallet whether for the case of Bitcoin or alt coins rarely before you get just a private key only, if you make use of a regular wallet software.

For the case of some meme coins most times you get just private keys and also when you create a custom address using something like vanity search or vanity gen.

[Ambatman]

Both your seed phrase and your private keys are way important basically what happens is when you create a wallet your seed phrase is  hashed to get a master key that master key is further hashed to get child keys.

Yeah but the seedphrase is more important than the master key since its what derives the master key that's what my title was insinuating.

I hope you get it now

well that wasn't necessary my question but thanks.
PX-Z has confirmed what I wanted.

[Mia Chloe]

Yeah but the seedphrase is more important than the master key since its what derives the master key that's what my title was insinuating.

Nope and yeah  without the seed you can't hash out the private keys and without the keys the wallet is almost useless since you can't sign a valid transaction so they both work hand in hand.

Well simply put it as the seed is the head and the master key the neck which supplies necessary things to the head. A random set of 12 words
For instance from the BIP39 word list is useless without being hashed to a get a master key.

[ABCbits]

i'm not sure if wallet gives both seedphrase and private key, it usually just which of them.  ETH usually give private key back then and then later on, you are given seed when you generate one these days. and its the same with Bitcoin. any reason for this?

It depends on which wallet you use, not coins you use. Electrum and other wallet with advance feature have option to show both seed phrase and private key for each address.

[Lucius]

It depends on which wallet you use, not coins you use. Electrum and other wallet with advance feature have option to show both seed phrase and private key for each address.

I know that there used to be an option to see the private key of a particular address in Electrum, but didn't they remove that a long time ago? Although I may be wrong and I just confused that with the fact that in Electrum you cannot see the private key of an address when using a hardware wallet with the same interface.

What I do know is that I have read many times that it is theoretically possible to "hack" someone's seed if one or more private keys generated from the same seed are leaked somewhere.

[electronicash]

Yeah but the seedphrase is more important than the master key since its what derives the master key that's what my title was insinuating.

Nope and yeah  without the seed you can't hash out the private keys and without the keys the wallet is almost useless since you can't sign a valid transaction so they both work hand in hand.

Well simply put it as the seed is the head and the master key the neck which supplies necessary things to the head. A random set of 12 words
For instance from the BIP39 word list is useless without being hashed to a get a master key.

but we still can import a wallet using the private keys. i did it to some of my wallet which was successfully imported. so both can be used.  the updated version though prompts seed when you create a wallet.

seem to be the standard now since its a lot easy to memorized the word than the hexanumeric line, you have to write it down to have a back up.

[TomPluz]

Back in the days when MyEtherWallet was way more popular than other wallets, I used to save my private keys but am not so sure if they also got seed phrases back then. right now, I am mostly using TrustWallet and I am keeping seed phrases which I can use to access my wallet aside from the smartphone where the wallet is installed. So both of these can be functioning as our access keys but I always prefer seed phrases as they are less confusing though still so hard to memorize so keeping a note is always necessary.

[Kemarit]

It depends on which wallet you use, not coins you use. Electrum and other wallet with advance feature have option to show both seed phrase and private key for each address.

I know that there used to be an option to see the private key of a particular address in Electrum, but didn't they remove that a long time ago?

No, in Electrum you can see still your seed and private keys,

for Seed, Wallet=>Seed
for Private Key, Wallet=>Private Keys=>Export (for each of your address)

As far as the importance, both of them are. That's why we should be backing both of them as a security practice.

[JollyGood]

Yes, all private keys are derived from the seed. Try reading this.

All individual private keys are gotten from the seedphrase right?

[Lucius]

~snip~
As far as the importance, both of them are. That's why we should be backing both of them as a security practice.

If we already have a backup of our seed, I don't see why anyone would keep the private keys of all the addresses they used because that's just an additional risk. It may make some sense for those who often install wallets and enter their seed, because if their device happens to be infected with malware, it is certainly better to lose the funds related to one private key than for a hacker to get hold of the seed.

For me, it's much safer to protect my wallet and seed by adding a unique and strong passphrase to each wallet - and then keeping that data separate.

[Forsyth Jones]

The seedphrase or mnemonic phrase is the universal backup for your wallet, it's all you need in case you need to restore funds on another device. It contains all the entropy needed for your wallet, as well as the seed (hex) and the master private key.

It's no longer necessary to save/export private keys (WIF) individually, as it's the seed phrase itself that generates the private keys and public addresses through an encryption process.

You can optionally write down the derivation path and the fingerprint (the wallet identifier). With these details, it's easier for you to gain access to your funds faster if you aren't familiar with wallet management.

NOTE: If you are using a passphrase, you should save the passphrase in a safe place, preferably offline and away from your recovery phrase.

Security recommendation: save your passwords in an offline password manager like keepass.

There are wallets that don't have a seedphrase, such as Bitcoin Core, in which case you should export an encrypted keystore. In this case, you must remember the password used to encrypt the wallet, as it will be requested when spending funds.