Bitcoin Address Validator

Bitcoin has no undo. An address with one wrong character is usually caught by its own checksum, which is exactly why every Bitcoin address carries one, and this tool does nothing more than read that checksum and tell you what the address actually is. Paste one and you get a verdict, a type, a network, and the raw bytes underneath.

Three formats are in circulation at once, and they fail in different ways. Legacy addresses beginning 1 or 3 use Base58Check. Native SegWit addresses beginning bc1q use Bech32. Taproot addresses beginning bc1p use Bech32m, which differs from Bech32 by a single constant. Getting that constant backwards is the most common bug in address checkers, and it is why a Taproot address is sometimes reported as a typo by software that has not been updated.

Reading the Breakdown: A Field Reference

• Type is derived, never guessed from the first character. A Base58Check address is classified by its version byte: 0x00 is P2PKH, 0x05 is P2SH. A SegWit address is classified by its witness version and program length, so 20 bytes at version 0 is P2WPKH and 32 bytes is P2WSH.
• Network comes from the same place. A testnet address is flagged loudly, because coins sent to one from mainnet software are gone for good.
• Witness program is the actual hash the address commits to, shown as hex. For a legacy address the equivalent field is the 20-byte hash160.
• Taproot is recognised as version 1 with a 32-byte program. A well-formed address at a witness version with no assigned meaning is reported as valid but unrecognised, which is the honest answer rather than an error.

Precision of the Checksums

Base58Check appends the first 4 bytes of a double SHA-256 over the version and hash, giving roughly one chance in 4 billion that a random typo slips through. Bech32 does better on the errors people actually make: its checksum is guaranteed to catch any 4 characters changed, and the alphabet leaves out 1, b, i and o so the confusable pairs never arise. Base58 drops 0, O, I and l for the same reason, and typing one returns “"0" is not a Base58 character.” Every check here was run against the published BIP-173 and BIP-350 test vectors, including the cases where a version 0 address is wrongly encoded with Bech32m and vice versa, which this tool reports as a scheme mismatch rather than a typo.

Not a Substitute for Checking Who Owns It

A valid address is a correctly spelled one. It says nothing about who controls the keys, whether the address has ever been used, or whether the person who sent it to you is who they claim to be. Address substitution by malware and by a forwarded invoice are both far more common than a mistyped character, and no checksum can see either. Nothing here contacts the network, so balances and transaction history are outside what this page can know. Verify the destination through a second channel before sending anything you would mind losing.