Cheapest Cold Storage

An interesting conversation is around the costs of setting up a secure (possibly airgapped) cold storage. People usually bring up the do-it-yourself Seedsigner (<$50) and Blockstream's Jade ($80 plus shipping). The conversation often includes usability (tiny screens and few buttons for both) and tinfoil hat aspects of security.

What people don't usually mention is is the Coinkite Tapsigner ($20 plus shipping), probably because it's not a device per se, but an NFC card that signs transactions leveraging your phone's electromagnetic field. Sure there are some theoretical security trade-offs (it can't independently verify transaction info), but this can be mitigated with another coordinator and multi-sig. Plus you get full use of whatever smartphone app you're pairing it with (currently only Nunchuck, but that app is pretty slick).

At the end of the day, if you're paranoid about your long-term, high value stash, penny-pinching isn't worth it. But the tapsigner opens up the UX of your smartphone without relying on it to hold your private key. This may be the wisest introduction to cold storage.