What is Bitcoin Cash?

What is Bitcoin Cash?

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) is a direct result of a Bitcoin fork that occurred on August 1, 2017. It is an alternative version of Bitcoin that makes use of new features and rules, and has a different development roadmap. 

How do I get Bitcoin Cash on Coinbase?

Coinbase customers have automatically been credited with the appropriate amount of Bitcoin Cash for their accounts. These funds appear within a separate Bitcoin Cash balance on your Portfolio page or in the Coinbase mobile apps.

You can also obtain additional Bitcoin Cash by purchasing it on Coinbase.

How much Bitcoin Cash will I receive?

The amount of Bitcoin Cash you receive will be the amount of Bitcoin that was in your account at the time of the fork. The fork occurred on August 1, 2017 at 5:16:14 PST and on block #478558. Please note you will not receive Bitcoin Cash for any Bitcoin you removed from the platform before the fork, or purchased after the fork. 

How can I trust that Coinbase knows the exact amount of Bitcoin Cash that was in my account at the time of the fork? 

At the time of the fork, we duplicated the current balance of all Coinbase customer accounts. Customers can download a copy of their transaction history to see a running log of their Bitcoin balances.

If I had a pending BTC purchase at the time of the fork, will I still receive BCH for that purchase?

No. To be credited with BCH, the corresponding bitcoin must have been present in your account at the time of the fork on August 1st, 2017, block #478558. If you had a pending purchase that completed after this time, you will not receive BCH for that purchase.

If my Bitcoin was in my Coinbase Vault at the time of the fork, will I still receive my BCH?

Yes, you will still receive your Bitcoin Cash funds. All BCH will be credited to a single BCH balance in your Coinbase account.

What if I sent BCH to my Coinbase BTC balance after the fork, but before Coinbase added support for Bitcoin Cash?

Any BCH sent to your Coinbase account addresses has been credited to your new BCH balance.

I sent my funds off of Coinbase before the fork. Will I still get my BCH?

No. If you sent Bitcoin off of Coinbase before the fork, you will not receive Bitcoin Cash from Coinbase. If you sent to another exchange and did not receive your BCH, please contact their support team.

Can I send BCH to Coinbase? 

You can send BCH to and from Coinbase the same way you send all other assets on the platform. You can select Deposit next to your BCH balance to view your BCH deposit address. 

What happens if I send Bitcoin Cash to a Bitcoin address?

At this time, Coinbase has already credited accounts who received any BCH at their existing BTC addresses. Going forward, we cannot guarantee that funds will be properly credited when one asset is sent to the address of a different asset. Please make sure that you only send funds to the specific deposit address displayed in your Coinbase account for the asset you are sending. You can view a list of these addresses, or create a new one, by visiting this page.

If you have sent BCH to an external address that was used only for BTC, you will need to obtain the private keys for that address and import them into a BCH balance in order to access the funds stored there. Coinbase does not support the importing of private keys.

Previous Announcement: As of December 19, 2017 Coinbase will add Bitcoin Cash to our assets. Coinbase customers in qualifying countries will now be able to buy, sell, send and receive Bitcoin Cash.

Previous Announcement: The European markets were not sufficiently healthy to enable Coinbase customers to buy and sell Bitcoin Cash. We anticipate enabling buys and sells for European customers in early January 2018. 

Update: On November 15, 2018, we paused Bitcoin Cash (BCH) trading, including the ability to send and receive BCH, while monitoring the outcome of a planned hard fork. For more information, please read What to Expect During the Bitcoin Cash Hard Fork.