ZEUS

ZEUS is a mobile wallet for bitcoin and the Lightning Network that holds keys on the user's device and never takes custody of funds. Its GitHub repository describes it as a Bitcoin and Lightning wallet and a remote node manager for LND and Core Lightning, and the code is published under the GNU Affero General Public License v3. The repository has about 1,400 stars and more than 12,000 commits, and it documents reproducible builds so that anyone can check that a released app matches the public source.

The App Store lists Atlas 21 Inc. as the seller and copyright holder, and the same name appears in the footer of the ZEUS docs. A May 2024 Bitcoin Magazine profile names Evan Kaloudis as founder, dates the project to 2019 (Bitcoin block 563345, the "Est." date on the GitHub page) and says the company was incorporated in 2023, has no headquarters and works fully remote. It gave the headcount then as two. ZEUS does not publish where Atlas 21 Inc. is incorporated, and it has no token.

Besides the wallet, ZEUS runs a Lightning service provider (LSP) that sells inbound channels to wallet users and to third-party wallets such as Alby Hub, and it operates Olympus, the large public Lightning node behind that service. ZEUS Pay gives users a Lightning address, and ZEUS Pay+ is a paid tier that adds profile features. The price of ZEUS Pay+ is not given on the pages read for this profile. For how it compares with other self-custody apps, see our software wallet ratings.

ZEUS lets one app work at very different levels of self-sovereignty. Since v13.0.0 (27 April 2026) the onboarding has three stages. New users can start with Cashu ecash, which needs no channel at all. They can then move to an embedded Lightning node running on the phone, for which the default is now LDK Node in place of embedded LND. Or they can connect the app to a node they already run at home or in the cloud.

Each option carries a different trust model, and the app does not remove that difference:

• Cashu ecash: balances are tokens issued by a mint, so the mint operator holds the underlying bitcoin until the user redeems. This is the least self-custodial option in the app.
• Embedded node: the phone holds the keys and channel state. LDK Node wallets restore from a 12-word seed by default, or 24 words since v13.2.0, and keep their channels on restore; embedded LND users must move channel state by hand.
• Remote node: ZEUS acts as a remote control for an LND or Core Lightning node, connecting directly or through Lightning Node Connect. LNDHub accounts and Nostr Wallet Connect are also supported.
• On-chain: the wallet also sends and receives ordinary bitcoin transactions.

Other features include a point-of-sale mode, Nostr contact imports, and a setting added in v13.2.0 to point the app at the user's own Mempool server for fee estimates and block data. People comparing self-custody setups can use our self-custody security checklist, and readers who want a simpler bitcoin-only app can compare BlueWallet.

The wallet itself is free to download and the docs state there are no processing fees. Costs arise when the user buys Lightning liquidity from the ZEUS LSP or pays network fees. The LSP fee page publishes the following rates for low-fee periods; in high-fee periods channel-open prices move with block-space demand, and the page points users to Mempool.space for current conditions.

Ordinary on-chain transactions pay the Bitcoin miner fee the user sets. Lightning payments pay routing fees to the nodes that forward them. The swap service that used to move funds between on-chain and Lightning is currently suspended, so its fees are not listed here.

ZEUS is a self-custodial wallet: with the embedded node or a remote node, the keys and funds stay with the user, and ZEUS the company cannot move them. The code is open source and builds are reproducible. In April 2026 the company said it had completed a SOC 2 Type II audit by Prescient Assurance covering controls around its infrastructure; it did not name which services were in scope. A SOC 2 report checks operational controls, not the wallet's code.

On 5 August 2026 ZEUS took its services offline after an intrusion. Its post-mortem of 14 August says the attacker came in through a BTCPay Server vulnerability, used to fetch an admin credential for a connected LND node, then took money from ZEUS's own operational wallets and closed most of its publicly announced and many private LSP channels. ZEUS states that no customer funds were lost, because a closed channel settles each side's balance on-chain to its owner. ZEUS Pay addresses returned on 6 August, Olympus and the LSP on 8 August, and replacement channels for affected customers were being processed from the week of 10 August at no cost.

The post-mortem lists the fixes: services isolated from each other, firewall rules rebuilt, and node credentials moved out of reach of other services. ZEUS also disabled Zaplocker, saying its safety depends on every downstream service checking payments correctly, and kept its swap service offline for review. Separately, Cointelegraph reported that ZEUS disabled swaps on 3 August after Boltz, the swap provider, halted operations. The v13.2.0 release notes of 22 August describe ZEUS swaps as indefinitely suspended, with manual fund rescues still possible on the swaps website.

The plain risks: a phone that runs a node holds hot keys; Lightning channels need the app to come online now and then; ecash depends on the mint's honesty; and anyone using the ZEUS LSP relies on the company's infrastructure for liquidity, as August showed. Our guide to common seed phrase mistakes covers backup errors that cause most losses.

ZEUS is available on the Apple App Store (iOS and iPadOS 15.1 or later, Apple-silicon Macs and visionOS), on Google Play, and as direct Android APKs, a self-hosted F-Droid repository and Zapstore. Download links and the release-signing PGP key are on zeusln.com and in the GitHub README, which is the safest place to start because copycat apps exist for most popular wallets.

Leaving is a matter of moving funds. A user can close Lightning channels to return balances on-chain, pay out over Lightning to another wallet, or restore an LDK Node seed in a fresh ZEUS install. Remote-node users lose nothing by deleting the app, since the funds sit on their own node. Cashu balances should be redeemed before the app is removed.

ZEUS has a Telegram group, an X account, a Nostr profile and a developer Slack, all linked from the GitHub README, and the August incident notice directed customers to the support email shown inside the app. The README does not publish a general support address. ZEUS staff will not ask for a seed phrase; any message that does is a scam.

ZEUS dates itself to Bitcoin block 563345 in 2019 and began as a remote control for users' own nodes. Bitcoin Magazine reports the company was incorporated in 2023. The blog records a run of 0.x releases through 2024 and 2025, with ZEUS Pay Lightning address fees cut to zero in December 2024. v13.0.0 in April 2026 skipped ahead in numbering, made LDK Node the default and rebuilt Cashu support. The August 2026 breach was followed by v13.2.0 on 22 August, and v13.2.3 reached the App Store on 12 October 2026.