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What happens to cryptocurrency when you die?

Crypto behaves completely differently to every other digital asset when it comes to estate planning. Here's why — and how to handle it safely.

Last changed: 19 October 2026

With many Australians now holding cryptocurrency, it's become a mainstream part of many people's estates — but traditional estate planning wasn't built with it in mind. Understanding the difference between exchange-held and self-custody crypto is the single most important thing to get right here.

Exchange-held crypto

If your crypto sits on an exchange (an Australian or international platform where you log in with a username and password, similar to a bank), it behaves more like a conventional financial account. Most exchanges have some form of deceased-estate process, generally requiring a death certificate and supporting documentation. It's not instant, but there's a path.

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Self-custody crypto: the real risk

Self-custody means you — and only you — hold the private key or seed phrase, usually stored in a hardware wallet or written down. There is no password reset. There is no customer support line. There is no recovery process of any kind. If the seed phrase is lost, misplaced, or simply unknown to anyone else, the asset is gone permanently. No court order, no probate grant, and no amount of legal authority can recover funds without the key itself.

The security dilemma this creates

This creates a genuine tension: you need someone to eventually be able to access the seed phrase, but you also don't want it sitting somewhere easily found or stolen while you're alive. Writing it directly into a shared inventory document — even a private one — creates real risk if that document is ever compromised.

A practical approach

The safer method is to separate the *existence* of the information from the *content* of it:

• Record that a self-custody wallet exists, and roughly what it holds
• Record where the physical seed phrase is kept (a safe, a safety deposit box, a specific secure location)
• Never write the actual words of the seed phrase into any shared or digital document
• Make sure your executor or a trusted person knows the physical location exists — even if they don't need to know the details until it's needed

Exchange logins are a different story

Unlike a seed phrase, exchange login credentials can be stored safely in a password manager (we recommend Bitwarden), just like any other account — because the exchange itself has a recovery process as a backstop. That's so your executor knows the account exists: they should then use the exchange's deceased-estate process, not log in as you.

Dealing with this after a death?

• How to access someone's crypto after they die

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