🔐 Ledger review: security, features and score
Holding more than you would be relaxed about losing, across many chains.
The facts
- DEVELOPER
- Ledger
- LAUNCHED
- 2014
- TYPE
- Hardware
- CUSTODY MODEL
- Hardware, keys on device
- KEY MODEL
- 24 word seed generated on device. Keys never leave the secure element.
- CHAINS
- Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana and 5,500 plus assets
- PLATFORMS
- Ledger Live on desktop and mobile, plus MetaMask, Rabby, Phantom and most wallets
- OPEN SOURCE
- Partial
- AUDITS
- Certified secure element, regular audits
- HARDWARE SUPPORT
- Is the hardware
- SWAP COST
- Third party swap providers inside Ledger Live, priced by the provider.
What it can do
How the score breaks down
Each dimension is explained on the methodology page.
Where it is strong and where it is not
- Certified secure element, the strongest chip level protection available
- Supports more assets than any competitor
- Works inside MetaMask, Rabby and Phantom
- Screen on the device shows what you are actually signing
- The 2020 data leak still generates phishing and real world risk for named customers
- Firmware is not fully open source
- Recover permanently changed how some users read the trust model
Incident history
An e-commerce database breach exposed around 270,000 customer names, addresses and phone numbers. Those people have been targeted by phishing and, in some cases, physical threats ever since. No device or key was compromised.
Ledger announced Recover, an optional service that shards an encrypted seed to third parties. The backlash centred on the revelation that firmware could in principle extract the seed at all. It is opt in, and it materially changed how many people view the trust model.
A compromised npm package from a former employee injected a drainer into several dapp front ends using Ledger Connect Kit. Funds were lost through affected websites rather than through Ledger devices.
Reputation and reviews
A reputation score out of 100, kept separate from the feature score above. It reflects what users actually report over time rather than a star rating scraped on one day.
The most widely used hardware wallet, and the most controversial. The 2020 customer database leak led to years of phishing and physical threats against named holders. The 2023 Recover announcement caused a serious trust crisis over whether a seed could ever leave the device. Neither event has ever cost anyone funds through the device itself.
Check current reviews yourself
Star ratings change constantly, so we link to the sources rather than printing a number that is out of date the day after it is written.