Is there a hardware wallet that supports importing private keys?

[adamas]

I want to import (not sweep!) keys from an old paper wallet (no seed) into a secure hardware wallet.

[Charles-Tim]

Maybe possible but I do not know of any hardware wallet that can do this. It is better to generate seed phrase on the wallet and sweep or send the coin to the address that the hardware seed phrase generated. You can import the private key on a wallet on an airgapped device and send it to the address generated on the hardware wallet.

[adamas]

Maybe possible but I do not know of any hardware wallet that can do this. It is better to generate seed phrase on the wallet and sweep or send the coin to the address that the hardware seed phrase generated. You can import the private key on a wallet on an airgapped device and send it to the address generated on the hardware wallet.

 Ok, but I dont want to sweep all the coins to another address.

[OmegaStarScream]

I want to import (not sweep!) keys from an old paper wallet (no seed) into a secure hardware wallet.

I don't know any hardware wallets that does that, nor do I think that we would ever see such a thing.

If you're using a hardware wallet, it's because the seedphrase/private keys were securely generated offline. Why would you want to generate it somewhere else (and risk of compromising it) and then import it?

[crwth]

Doesn't it defeat the purpose of having a hardware wallet and letting it generate for you safely? I don't think importing seed phrases is helping hardware wallet manufacturers do it because there might be an import that could get back at them and say that it wasn't a practical hardware wallet. I don't know if it's possible.

[adamas]

Why would you want to generate something elsewhere (which could be compromised) and then import it?

  I dont intend to generate keys elsewhere. They were generated before "seed" wallets existed.

[Charles-Tim]

Why would you want to generate something elsewhere (which could be compromised) and then import it?

  I dont intend to generate keys elsewhere. They were generated before "seed" wallets existed.

Do not let hardware wallet or having the coins on any other wallets to fool you if you are not planing to spend the coins. As you do not plan to do anything with any of the coins but you want it to be old on blackchain as it is now, then do not import the paper wallet at all and let it be as it is now.

If you have it on a hardware wallet and still have the paper, metal or any other backup, it is still the same like you have the paper/matal backup but you just have to make sure that eproperly backup the seed phrase. Having like 2 or 3 backups. You can even prefer encrypting the backups instead on a storage device like a memory card through an airgapped device.

Best alternative
Alternatively, you can get a cheap laptop. Make it airgapped and run Electrum on it. You can import the seed phrase on Electrum. It is a cold storage wallet and secure.

[FatFork]

Why would you want to generate something elsewhere (which could be compromised) and then import it?

  I dont intend to generate keys elsewhere. They were generated before "seed" wallets existed.

No, this is not possible with hardware wallets. The whole point of hardware wallets is that the private key is never exposed or accessible. They use internal circuits to sign raw transactions so that there is never any possibility of private keys being exploited by malware or third parties. They are not designed to securely store your private keys generated elsewhere, but as signing devices.

You can use a software wallet that allows you to import private keys. However, keep in mind that this exposes your private keys to your computer, which could be vulnerable to malware attacks. A safer option would be to use a more secure solution like a cold storage device (a device that doesn't have the ability to connect to any network) and/or a secure physical location.

[Pmalek]

I dont intend to generate keys elsewhere. They were generated before "seed" wallets existed.

Do you have a reason to doubt the security of your old paper wallet and that's the reason you are looking for an alternative? Has someone perhaps seen it or knows where to find it? If it's not that, I wouldn't touch it for the time being. If you decide to move those coins and get a hardware wallet, I would sweep everything to a new address generated on your HW device and after that do whatever I want with them.

Out of curiosity, why do you not want to move the entire UTXO to your hardware wallet and why do you prefer to leave some on the old paper wallet?

[DaveF]

No, as others have pointed out that would defeat the entire point and security model of a hardware wallet. Hardware wallets generate the keys offline in a secure way.
If you are importing a private key then it's no longer secure.

The closest thing you might be able to do, and I don't know if it's even possible, would be to import the key into a wallet that is on an offline encrypted device that needs some sort of hardware dongle to boot. But, there are still issues with that. Not to mention adding another layer of difficulty. And, since you obviously have a private key that was generated outside of a secure hardware wallet you don't even really know if it's truly secure now anyway.

-Dave

[Pmalek]

The closest thing you might be able to do, and I don't know if it's even possible, would be to import the key into a wallet that is on an offline encrypted device that needs some sort of hardware dongle to boot. But, there are still issues with that. Not to mention adding another layer of difficulty. And, since you obviously have a private key that was generated outside of a secure hardware wallet you don't even really know if it's truly secure now anyway.

If OP has a second device that he can use as a properly airgapped computer, there would be no reason to purchase a hardware wallet. He won't gain anything security-wise. If the original paper wallet was created offline and the private key remained offline at all times, he could import it into Electrum or Bitcoin Core and use it for signing. His phone or desktop hot wallet would be used for creating and broadcasting transactions. He needs his public key as well.

[21M]

Ellipal Titan has an option to import private keys.

Caution:
Recently I imported a (single) priv key from a paperwallet into Titan wallet (qr scan). Surprise: It generates a wrong pub address! Every other wallet I've tried generates the correct address, - but not Titan!

I contacted support and gave them all the screenshots with detailed explanations, but the support guy doesn't understand how paperwallets work. He thinks it has to do with the derivation path. The support guys don't seem to know the difference between a private key and a seed.

I posted it on Reddit: Instead of fixing the problem they deleted my post! It's a bug in the code that they don't want to admit!

There's another user on reddit who has the same problem: https://www.reddit.com/r/ELLIPAL_Official/comments/1i0fisn/import_of_old_dogecoin_private_key_not_workinghelp/

[Forsyth Jones]

Ellipal Titan has an option to import private keys.

Caution:
Recently I imported a (single) priv key from a paperwallet into Titan wallet (qr scan). Surprise: It generates a wrong pub address! Every other wallet I've tried generates the correct address, - but not Titan!

I contacted support and gave them all the screenshots with detailed explanations, but the support guy doesn't understand how paperwallets work. He thinks it has to do with the derivation path. The support guys don't seem to know the difference between a private key and a seed.

I posted it on Reddit: Instead of fixing the problem they deleted my post! It's a bug in the code that they don't want to admit!

There's another user on reddit who has the same problem: https://www.reddit.com/r/ELLIPAL_Official/comments/1i0fisn/import_of_old_dogecoin_private_key_not_workinghelp/

When importing a private key, the software/hardware provide an uncompressed address derived from the private key?  It would need to derive a compressed address from the private key.

More on compressed and uncompressed: https://learnmeabitcoin.com/technical/keys/private-key/wif/

Hardware wallets, at least the ones i know of, don't have the feature to import or sweep private keys, but if you connect the hardware wallet to Electrum, it has a feature to import balance (sweep private keys) into one of the addresses of the paired hardware wallet.

But it won’t be importing private keys, it will only be sweeping the balance from them.