If you're locked out of a crypto wallet, the first thing worth knowing is that "lost" rarely means gone. Most crypto that people give up on is still sitting on the blockchain, exactly where they left it — behind a forgotten password, an incomplete seed phrase, a corrupt wallet file, or a dead device. The coins haven't moved. The problem is access, and access problems can often be solved.
This guide covers what crypto wallet recovery actually is, what can and can't be recovered, the honest odds for each situation, how recovery works for every major wallet, and — because this industry is full of fakes — how to tell a real recovery service from a scam. We've been recovering wallets since 2017, and the fee is published openly: 20% of the recovered amount for wallets under 10 BTC, and nothing at all unless the recovery succeeds.
What "wallet recovery" actually means
Your crypto isn't stored in your wallet — it lives on the blockchain. Your wallet just holds the keys that prove the coins are yours. Losing access to a wallet means losing access to those keys, and recovery is the work of getting them back. That breaks down into five distinct problems, each with its own methods:
- Forgotten password. The wallet file or account is intact; you just can't remember the password that unlocks it. This is the single most common — and most recoverable — case.
- Lost or partial seed phrase. You have some of your 12/24-word backup but not all of it, or the words are miscopied, misspelled, or out of order.
- Corrupt or obsolete wallet file. The file won't open — a damaged
wallet.dat, a Multibit wallet from software that no longer exists, a truncated backup. - Dead or damaged hardware wallet. A Trezor with a broken screen, a water-damaged Ledger, a device you can't unlock.
- Hacked or compromised wallet. Someone has your seed and is draining the wallet — a race against a sweeper bot, not a password problem.
Which problem you have determines everything about your odds and the method. The rest of this guide is organized around exactly that.
What's recoverable — and what isn't
The honest answer is that recoverability depends entirely on what you still have. We'll always tell you our real assessment in the free evaluation, including when the answer is "no." Broadly:
Often recoverable
- A wallet file plus partial memory of the password (length, era, words, patterns you used).
- A seed phrase missing one or two words, or with words misspelled, miscopied, or out of order.
- A corrupt wallet file where the encrypted key material still physically exists in the file.
- A hardware wallet with a hardware fault (dead screen, broken button) but intact internal storage.
- A deleted wallet file on a drive that hasn't been heavily overwritten since.
Usually not recoverable
- A seed phrase that is completely lost with no wallet file and no backup — there is nothing to work from. No legitimate service can conjure keys from nothing.
- A password with no clues at all on a strong, long passphrase — the search space is simply too large.
- Funds already transferred out of a compromised wallet. Once coins leave your address, they're gone; anyone promising to "hack them back" or "trace and reverse" the transaction is running a scam.
For a fuller, scenario-by-scenario breakdown of what shifts the odds in each case, see your recovery odds, by scenario.
Recover by wallet
Different wallets fail in different ways and need different tools. Start with the page for your wallet:
- Bitcoin Core / wallet.dat — the oldest and one of the most
recoverable formats. Forgotten passphrases (GPU cracking), corrupt Berkeley DB files, deleted
wallet.dat, and pre-2014 versions. See also the deep guide to recovering a corrupt or deleted Bitcoin Core wallet. - Trezor recovery & repair — dead screens (we transplant them at our Denver bench), forgotten passphrases and PINs, incomplete BIP-39 backups, and Shamir/SLIP-39 shares.
- Ledger — device faults, forgotten PINs, and passphrase recovery for Ledger's 24-word backups.
- Blockchain.com / Blockchain.info — password recovery for the legacy web wallet, including the v1/v2/v3 formats. See how we brute-force Blockchain.info wallets at scale.
- Multibit Classic & HD — the discontinued 2011–2017 wallet that still strands a lot of early Bitcoin. File locations, formats, and moving funds into a modern wallet.
- Electrum — corrupt wallet files, forgotten passwords, and seed issues.
- iPhone / mobile wallets — extracting a wallet seed from a locked or wiped phone, including forensic KeyChain work.
Don't see your wallet? MetaMask, Exodus, and dozens of others share the same underlying password-and-seed mechanics — describe what you have and we'll tell you whether it's viable.
Recover by problem
If you know the type of problem better than the brand of wallet, start here:
- Forgotten password — how password clues become targeted candidate lists tested on GPU hardware, instead of hopeless blind guessing.
- Lost or partial seed phrase — reconstructing BIP-39 backups with missing, misordered, or misspelled words, and evaluating Shamir shares.
- Corrupt wallet file — extracting keys from damaged, truncated, or obsolete wallet files, including formats whose software no longer exists.
- Hacked wallet rescue — time-critical: moving assets out of a compromised wallet before a sweeper bot does. Read first if funds are actively draining.
- Inherited / estate recovery — for executors and families accessing a deceased holder's crypto, with the paper trail estates and courts need.
How to tell a real recovery service from a scam
This matters more here than in almost any other industry, because the "recovery" space is overrun with scammers who prey on people who've already lost money. Before you trust anyone — us included — check for these. We wrote the full checklist in how to tell a legit crypto recovery service from a scam, but the essentials:
- A named, real human you can verify — not a pseudonym and a Gmail address. Scammers are anonymous by necessity.
- A verifiable legal entity with a physical address you can look up. We're Veksler Consulting LLC, registered in Colorado.
- Published pricing and no upfront fee. Anyone demanding payment before recovery is running the classic advance-fee scam. A real service is paid from what it recovers, or not at all.
- They never contact you first. No unsolicited DMs, no "recovery agent" appearing in your replies. Every legitimate contact from us comes from one published address, verifiable against our PGP key.
- Honest odds, including "no." A service that promises a "100% success rate" or guarantees it can recover anything is lying. Real recovery has real limits, and we'll name them.
How recovery works here
The process is the same five steps for every case:
- Tell us what happened. In a free evaluation, describe what you still have. Before anything else, we give you an honest read on whether recovery is likely — including when it isn't.
- Sign the contract, send the material. We agree to a written service contract, then arrange transfer of your wallet file or device — by PGP-encrypted channel, tracked shipment, or in person in Denver. For some wallet types we can work from a password hash without holding your funds.
- We run the recovery. Password testing on dedicated GPU hardware, file and device analysis, or physical hardware repair — matched to your case.
- Your crypto comes back to you. You provide a destination address you control; we return your coins minus the agreed fee, and help you set up a wallet so this never happens again.
- Your data is destroyed. After completion — or a no-recovery verdict — we delete case data and return or destroy physical media, your choice.
What it costs
Our fee is published in full: 20% of the recovered amount for wallets under 10 BTC, a negotiated lower rate above that, and a free initial evaluation. There are no upfront fees, ever, and you pay nothing unless your crypto is back under your control. The fee is in the written contract before any work begins — no quote games, no surprise invoice.
Unlike anonymous recovery operations, you'll know exactly who is accountable for the job: David Veksler, working through a Colorado-registered LLC with a physical address, a written contract, and a published PGP key — the difference between a recovery service and a recovery scam.
Frequently asked questions
Can you recover a wallet if I've completely lost my seed phrase and have no backup? Usually no. If there is no wallet file, no partial seed, and no backup of any kind, there is nothing to work from, and no honest service can recover it. If you have any material — a file, some of the words, an old device — the picture changes. Tell us what you have.
Is my crypto actually gone, or just locked? If you never moved the coins and no one has your keys, the crypto is still on the blockchain — it's an access problem, not a loss. If funds were transferred out (a completed theft, a scam payment), that's a true loss and isn't reversible.
How do I know you won't steal my crypto? You have a written contract with a Colorado LLC run by a public, named person accountable under US law. For some wallet types we can test a password hash without ever holding your funds, and you can verify every message against our published PGP key.
How long does recovery take? It ranges from hours to weeks depending on the case — a short password with strong clues can crack fast; a long passphrase with weak clues takes far longer, if it's feasible at all. The free evaluation gives you a realistic estimate before you commit.
Start a free evaluation → — describe what you have, and we'll give you an honest read on your odds before any contract or fee.