Address Formats
Bitcoin has three living address formats, and pool payouts arrive at any of them. The difference is the cost of spending and compatibility with older software.
Which formats exist
The oldest format starts with a one: a legacy of the early years, works everywhere, but spending from it takes up more block space and therefore costs more. Addresses starting with a three are scripts, and most old-school multisig lives in this format.
The modern format starts with bc1: SegWit addresses. Spending from them takes fewer bytes, so the transfer fee at the same priority is lower. For a miner who receives payouts regularly and consolidates them later, the difference adds up to real money.
Mixing up formats within one network is hard: wallets understand all three. The real danger lives between networks: Litecoin and Dogecoin have their own prefixes, and sending coins to another network's address ends in a long recovery at best, a loss at worst.
The practical rule is simple: give the pool a bc1 address from your own wallet, compare the first and last characters after copying, and take a litecoin address only from a litecoin wallet, however similar the letters may look.
The short version in a table
| Starts with a one | the oldest format, expensive to spend |
| Starts with a three | scripts, old multisig |
| Starts with bc1 | SegWit, cheaper to spend |
| The danger | another network's address, not another format |
| For pool payouts | bc1 from your own wallet |
How to handle addresses
Use bc1 for regular payouts: savings on every future spend and consolidation.
Compare the first four and the last four characters after pasting: malware knows how to swap an address in the clipboard.
Never carry addresses between networks by hand: a litecoin payout address comes only from a litecoin wallet.
Test a new address with a small amount before pointing pool payouts at it: one test transfer is calmer than a month of doubt.
A savings example
A miner spent a year receiving payouts to an address starting with a one, collected dozens of small inputs, and decided to sweep them into one. Spending from the old format cost noticeably more than it would have from bc1: every input from the old address weighs more in a block. He pointed his new payouts at a SegWit address.
Related terms
Where to go next on the site
Coins
Hardware
- ASIC Miner knowledge base
Questions and answers
The pool rejects my address, what's wrong
Most often it is an address from another network or a typo: the checksum fails and the form turns it down. Copy the address again from a wallet on the right network.
Should I move old coins to bc1
Not for the migration alone: the transfer costs a fee. It makes sense to do it along with a planned consolidation into an empty mempool.
Are Bitcoin and Litecoin formats the same
The idea is similar, the prefixes differ: litecoin has its own letters. That is exactly why you always take the address from a wallet on the network where you expect the coins.
How the terms connect
Every link in the chain is clickable. Orange marks where you are now.
Looking for an ASIC miner
The catalog holds 212 models. You can compare them by hashrate and by joules per terahash, then plug your own rate into the calculator and see what stays in your pocket.
Page written and checked by Denys Klimchuk. Updated .