Sparrow Wallet for desktop cold storage and multisig

Swiss angle

Sparrow Wallet is maintained by Craig Raw: the download page, read on 4 October 2026, shows release 2.5.5 signed by him, and the GitHub repository says Sparrow is licensed under the Apache 2 software licence. You download the software and keep the keys yourself, so Sparrow is not a financial service.

It drives the Swiss hardware wallet too. The connected wallet guide lists Trezor, Ledger, Coldcard, BitBox02, Blockstream Jade, KeepKey and OneKey, all driven the same way over USB. If you own a BitBox02 from Adliswil, Sparrow is one of the wallets its maker names as compatible on the BitBoxApp page.

It also talks to your own node. The Sparrow home page lists public servers, Bitcoin Core and private Electrum servers as connection options, with Tor built in. A public server learns your addresses. Your own node keeps them at home.

You hold the keys, so nobody sends you a year-end statement. You look up the ESTV year-end value of your bitcoin and enter it in the wealth tax section of your return; the Swiss Bitcoin tax guide shows how. Sparrow labels every transaction, input and output, according to its home page, which helps when you have to explain where coins came from.

The GitHub repository says release binaries are reproducible from version 1.5.0 onwards, so anyone can check that the download matches the published code.

Who it is for

Hardware wallet owners who want one desktop app for several devices or a multisig setup. The home page lists full support for single sig and multisig wallets, and the cold storage setup guide shows where such a wallet fits.

People who run, or plan to run, their own Bitcoin Core node at home and want their wallet to use it instead of someone else's server.

Users who want to pick the coins and set the fee before they sign, which the home page lists among its features.

Who it is not for

Phone-only users. The download page, read on 4 October 2026, offers builds for macOS 11 and later, Windows 10 and later, and Linux, and no phone build.

Beginners who want the app to decide for them. Sparrow shows every detail of a transaction on purpose. For a simpler start, the self-custody guide covers the first steps.