Glossary
Self-custody
Self-custody means holding crypto on your own keys, with no exchange or bank in the middle. Full control and full responsibility. What it means for your family.
Self-custody is holding crypto yourself: only the owner manages the private keys, and no company can either withdraw or freeze the funds.
In practice it means your own wallet, most often a hardware wallet, and a recovery phrase that you wrote down. Nobody can suspend your account, go bankrupt with your money or demand documents before a withdrawal. In return, nobody helps either if you lose the phrase. There’s no password reset procedure.
It’s the opposite of the custodial model, in which an exchange holds the keys. All the responsibility for security and for inheritance rests with you.
Self-custody doesn’t need programmer skills, but it needs order: several copies kept in separate places, a recovery test and written rules. Just buying a hardware wallet doesn’t cover that.
Why it matters for your family
On an exchange, an heir turns to the terms and a procedure that has a specific addressee. In self-custody there’s no such addressee, so your family needs guidance from you. Without it, they don’t know where to look or who to ask. That’s why access instructions come together with your own wallet, and the guide on what they contain describes them. You’ll find a comparison of the two models in the pillar on exchange vs self-custody.