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Board Beginners & Help
Re: is bitcoin address the same as Public key ?
by
HeRetiK
on 29/12/2017, 08:08:39 UTC
is bitcoin address the same as Public key in my wallet's ?

thanks for any help i need it, i have tried to google this but did not understand this.

Not exactly. See this article on the Bitcoin Wiki, specifically the section titled "How to create Bitcoin Address."

Bitcoin uses public-key cryptography. A private key is used to sign transactions, and the public key verifies that signatures are valid. For each "Bitcoin address" in your wallet, a public/private keypair is generated. Specifically, the address is a hash of the associated public key:

[...]

is bitcoin address the same as Public key in my wallet's ?

No, though many people confuse the two. A Bitcoin address is a base-58 encoding of a hash of a public key.

[...]

To expand on those two posts:

Since your Bitcoin address is only an encoded hash of the public key, even your public key remains unknown until the first transaction from aforementioned address is made. Once you use a Bitcoin address to send coins, your public key gets published as well, which then allows nodes and miners to verify your outgoing transaction.


Put differently:

1) Your Bitcoin address is necessary for you to receive transactions (well of course it is)

2) Your public key is necessary for other parties to verify your outgoing transactions

3) Your private key (which you should never give away) is necessary for you to send outgoing transactions