A step by step guide for Bitcoin gift cards (paper wallets) for the non-crypto savvy

Note: Bitcoin fees are ridiculous now, but when they go down, this will be more useful

This year, I wanted to do something different for Christmas. All my relatives and friends are bugging me about Bitcoin, so I decided to introduce them the best way I know how, by giving them a Bitcoin gift card (in our world we call this a paper wallet). The cost is only the cost of the BTC and the transfer fee (yikes!). I had one big problem though, what are they going to do once they get the paper wallet?

My relatives are completely befuddled by tech even though they own all the latest iPads, iPhones, etc. That's where this guide comes in, I'll explain how I made the paper wallet and then give a step by step guide that you can give to your gift card recipients to move these bitcoins over to a coinbase account (coinbase doesn't handling sweeping paper wallets at this time).

Make a paper wallet

The first step is to make the paper wallet. You can order some nice card stock for these or just make them in your cheapo printer. The best site I've found for making paper wallets is bitcoinpaperwallet.com. This link will take you to the first step - generating the paper wallet.

They do an excellent job explaining how to make the paper wallet, calibrating your printer, and handling all the security concerns, so I won't go into exhaustive detail on making the paper wallet. Their tutorial video is excellent. However, unless your recipient is tech savvy, you're pretty much on your own in helping them figure out how to get to their bitcoin from the paper wallet.

After you've made the paper wallet, you'll need to give them a little guidance for getting the bitcoin. We'll use the copay app and coinbase (there are hundreds of ways to do this, but I found these apps/sites to be the most grandma friendly).

When you're done, you should have something that looks like this. It will have a bitcoin address on the left and a private key qr code on the right (Please don't put bitcoin in this address, it's not being used).

Put some money in your paper wallet. You should be able able to send bitcoin by now if you've got it. Use that public address on the paper wallet and send away.

Get Copay and sweep your paper wallet

(These are the instructions you'll want to give to grandma)

Download the Copay app for iOS or Android. You'll want them to use an app so they can take advantage of the QR codes. Otherwise, you can download copay for almost any platform and it's open source, so you can download it to a laptop or desktop, but I've found the app to be the easiest to use.

Let's walk through the process:

First download the app and tap get started; do a backup later:
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You'll be nagged, but that's ok. Tap ok to all the nag and acknowledge screens:

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You'll then be asked for an email. Enter that and your wallet will be ready. All you need to do is scan the private key on the paper wallet. I've made a sample paper wallet (this address and private key are not being used, so no need to try and hide it). There's a little scan icon in the center on the bottom. Tap that and scan your QR private code for the paper wallet:

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Make sure you sweep all the funds from the paper wallet to Copay and you're done. You should have the bitcoin in your copay wallet and grandma has now entered the world of cryptocurrency.

Transfer to Coinbase

I prefer coinbase for bitcoin. If the transfer fees are still exorbitantly high, you can keep using the Copay wallet for sending and receiving (be sure to backup - it's only on the device). Have them sign up for coinbase using this link. It will give them an extra $10 in bitcoin once they buy or sell $100 of bitcoin (and $10 in bitcoin to me as well).

Then they can send bitcoin from Copay using the send icon (to the right of the scan icon). They can use QR codes from coinbase or just type the address in (I highly recommend using QR codes).

That's all there is to it. Next year, I'm giving ether paper wallets. It's a little more involved to make them. The tools aren't as mature, yet, and there's no fancy paper wallet printables yet, but with the bitcoin transaction fees these days, ether is looking more and more promising.