Cypherock X1: hardware wallets rating breakdown
A genuinely different idea: no seed phrase to write down at all. The master seed is split by Shamir's Secret Sharing across the device and four cards, with a 2-of-5 threshold — so losing one thing loses you nothing.
A genuinely different idea: no seed phrase to write down at all. The master seed is split by Shamir's Secret Sharing across the device and four cards, with a 2-of-5 threshold — so losing one thing loses you nothing.
How the score is built
Each criterion is scored 0–10 and weighted. The median column is the middle score across every entry in this ranking, so a row reads as a position rather than a number.
| Criterion | What we measured | Weight | Score | Category median | Rank | Weighted gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Security architecture | — | 30% | 5 | 6 | 9 of 13 | -0.30 |
| Clear signing | — | 15% | 3 | 6 | 10 of 13 | -0.45 |
| Recovery and seed portability | — | 15% | 8 | 8 | 4 of 13 | 0.00 |
| Company and customer-data safety | — | 10% | 7 | 7 | 6 of 13 | 0.00 |
| Connectivity and air-gap | — | 10% | 4 | 6 | 11 of 13 | -0.20 |
| Assets and networks | — | 8% | 6 | 8 | 10 of 13 | -0.16 |
| Price and true cost | — | 7% | 5 | 6 | 8 of 13 | -0.07 |
| Maintenance | — | 5% | 5 | 7 | 9 of 13 | -0.10 |
Measured 14 July 2026 · weights and method · decided by clear signing, worth -0.45 points against the median
Security architecture: 5/10
Secure element: present or not, which chip, and the actual certification level (EAL5+, EAL6+) as published by the certifying body rather than the vendor’s marketing. Then the three questions vendors like to blur into one: is the firmware open source, is the hardware design open, and are the builds REPRODUCIBLE — can you verify that the binary on your device was built from the source you just read? Audits count only when the firm is named and the report is public.
Scored 5 of 10 against a category median of 6, which places it 9th of 13 among hardware wallets on this criterion. At a 30% weight that is 0.30 points below the median contribution of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 9, the worst 2.
Clear signing: 3/10
Its own criterion, not a footnote to UX, because this is the hole the money actually leaves through. Does the device parse and display what you are signing — the ERC-20 approval amount, the swap destination, the EIP-712 payload — or does it show you a hash and ask you to trust the computer it is plugged into? Read from vendor documentation and firmware source. NOT hands-on: we have not bought these devices, and we say so rather than implying we pressed the buttons.
Scored 3 of 10 against a category median of 6, which places it 10th of 13 among hardware wallets on this criterion. At a 15% weight that is 0.45 points below the median contribution of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 10, the worst 0.
Recovery and seed portability: 8/10
BIP39, SLIP39/Shamir, passphrase support. The decisive question: can the seed be restored into a DIFFERENT vendor’s wallet? If it cannot, that is vendor lock-in, and it loses points — the entire premise of self-custody is that you can walk away from the company that sold you the device.
Scored 8 of 10 against a category median of 8, which places it 4th of 13 among hardware wallets on this criterion. At a 15% weight that is exactly level with the median of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 9, the worst 5.
Company and customer-data safety: 7/10
Jurisdiction, ownership, and the history of customer-data leaks. This carries more weight than it looks: when the buyer list of a hardware wallet leaks, it publishes the names, home addresses and phone numbers of people known to hold crypto. That is a physical-safety event, not a privacy inconvenience, and it is scored as one.
Scored 7 of 10 against a category median of 7, which places it 6th of 13 among hardware wallets on this criterion. At a 10% weight that is exactly level with the median of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 9, the worst 2.
Connectivity and air-gap: 4/10
Is the device fully air-gapped (QR or SD only), or does it require USB or Bluetooth? Which software wallets it interoperates with, from vendor documentation.
Scored 4 of 10 against a category median of 6, which places it 11th of 13 among hardware wallets on this criterion. At a 10% weight that is 0.20 points below the median contribution of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 10, the worst 2.
Assets and networks: 6/10
What the official support list actually contains, and — importantly — whether support is native on the device or delegated to third-party software with caveats. This is the vendor’s own claim; we mark it as such, because verifying it properly means buying the device and trying ten coins, which is Level C and which we have not done.
Scored 6 of 10 against a category median of 8, which places it 10th of 13 among hardware wallets on this criterion. At a 8% weight that is 0.16 points below the median contribution of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 9, the worst 3.
Price and true cost: 5/10
Vendor store price, plus any accessory the device genuinely needs to be usable. A cheap device that requires a paid dongle is not a cheap device.
Scored 5 of 10 against a category median of 6, which places it 8th of 13 among hardware wallets on this criterion. At a 7% weight that is 0.07 points below the median contribution of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 9, the worst 2.
Maintenance: 5/10
Firmware release cadence and how long old models keep receiving updates — counted from the public repository’s release history, not from a promise on the website.
Scored 5 of 10 against a category median of 7, which places it 9th of 13 among hardware wallets on this criterion. At a 5% weight that is 0.10 points below the median contribution of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 9, the worst 2.
Other measurements
- third-party audit
- Keylabs — named, report NOT published SOURCED
Its nearest neighbours in this ranking
| # | Entry | Clear signing | How it differs |
|---|---|---|---|
| 7 | OneKey Pro | 5 | Ahead by 2 on clear signing. |
| 8 | Ledger (Flex / Stax / Nano) | 7 | Ahead by 4 on clear signing. |
| 10 | SafePal S1 | 3 | Level on clear signing; the gap is elsewhere. |
| 11 | ELLIPAL Titan 2.0 | 3 | Level on clear signing; the gap is elsewhere. |
Questions about this score
How does Cypherock work without a seed phrase?
+
The seed is split into five shares — one on the device and one on each of four cards — using Shamir's Secret Sharing, with any two required to reconstruct it. No single item is enough to steal your funds, and no single item being lost or destroyed is enough to lose them.
Is that safer than a metal seed backup?
+
Against the most common real-world failures, yes: a single seed backup is a single point of both theft and loss, and most people store it badly. Against complexity it is worse — five objects to place thoughtfully, and an inheritance conversation that is harder to explain to whoever will one day have to do it.