We at CoinCorner are excited to announce the release of a brand new product - the Bolt Card. This product has been requested by a large number of users and is the result of months of work by our team, so we hope you enjoy using it!
What is the Bolt Card?
The Bolt Card is a contactless payment card which is powered by Near-field Communication (NFC), the Bitcoin Lightning Network and LNURL. It works in a similar way to your standard debit card held with your bank. Once linked to a CoinCorner account users can tap their card on a point of sale device that is displaying a Lightning invoice and the payment is made instantly across the Lightning Network in the background and deducted from your CoinCorner balance.
You can also use the Bolt Card as a gift card, gifting bitcoin to a friend or family member with a simple tap. Top the Bolt Card up with some sats from your account, give the card to the recipient and they can sweep the bitcoin on that card to their own Lightning wallet, provided it has LNURLw compatibility (the majority of major wallets now have this).
Setting up the Bolt Card as a debit card
To set your Bolt Card up as a debit card that pulls from your BTC balance when used you will first need to open up the CoinCorner app on a device with NFC capabilities with NFC enabled.
Go to the Cards tab of the navigation bar at the bottom of the screen and choose The Bolt Card. This will not be available if you are on an older version of the app, so if you can't see this then you will need to go to the app store and update the app to the latest version for your device.
Tap Set Up on screen and hold your Bolt Card against the back of your phone when prompted until you receive notification of a successful scan, this can take a few seconds.
Check out below for a video guide on how to do this.
The card currently carries a single and daily use limit of £/€50 when set up as a debit card. Either of these can be reduced by the user by clicking 'Edit card details' on the app. We may consider increasing this limit in future once we've had a chance to review customer usage.
Setting up the Bolt Card as a gift card
To set up your Bolt Card as a gift card and pre-load it with sats that can be spent or gifted to another person you will again need to open up the CoinCorner app on a device with NFC capabilities with NFC enabled.
Head to the Cards tab in the navigation bar at the bottom of the screen and choose Gift Cards. This will not be available if you are on an older version of the app, so if you can't see this then you will need to go to the app store and update the app to the latest version for your device.
Tap Set Up and choose a name for the gift card. Enter the amount of sats you want to load it with, or you can change this to a BTC amount or fiat amount. Tap the design of the card and then Done, then hold your Bolt Card against the back of your phone when prompted until you receive notification of a successful scan, this can take a few seconds.
Below is a video guide on setting up a gift card:
Using the Bolt Card to pay on a website
You can even use the Bolt Card to tap-and-pay on websites that are compatible with this feature. The video below gives an example of this. Please note this function is only available on Android devices at the moment due to restrictions imposed by Apple.
Can I use the Bolt Card without a CoinCorner account?
The Bolt Card was designed to be used in conjunction with a CoinCorner account, where it can draw directly from your bitcoin balance to make instant, contactless payments over the Lightning Network. In order to benefit from the full functionality of the card you’ll need to make sure you live in a territory that is currently supported by CoinCorner, which are listed here.
The Bolt Card is available for sale worldwide, including to countries that we do not currently support. We have designed the card to be interoperable with current industry protocols, namely Lightning and LNURL and the interoperability of the card will continue to improve, allowing it to be used with other wallet providers in future. Some people also wish to buy the Bolt Card designs as collectibles.
If you want to go non-custodial, here is an article explaining how to make your own self-sovereign, self-custodial, contactless payment card to pay with Bitcoin over the Lightning Network.
If you have any other questions, about the Bolt Card or anything else CoinCorner please get in touch with our team and we’ll be happy to help.