Hey everyone,
I have some questions about using Lightning with the Electrum wallet.
1 Can I use the same seed on both the mobile and desktop versions? I think I can, but is there any issue if both are active or open at the same time?
2 I can't seem to find any info on the fees for using Lightning:
Are there specific ranges of sats that correspond to different percentages of the transaction fee? Like, are there cut-off points for sending 2m, 3m, or 4m sats? Just trying to figure out the most efficient way to open a channel and start using Lightning. Is there a fixed fee with Electrum/LSP, and then the rest is just the mining fee for the transaction, which I know I can adjust?
I saw that Electrum uses Boltz for the swap service, right? And they charge 0.5% for LN to on-chain BTC swaps. But I can't find out how much it costs to send on-chain BTC to Lightning. Is this the only way to get and use Lightning in the wallet? I need to send on-chain BTC to the wallet and then swap it to Lightning? I haven't seen an option to send Lightning directly to the wallet yet (I've only checked out the mobile app).
I think those are my main questions. I'm really eager to start using the wallet but have been holding off because I wasn't sure what the 'optimal' channel size would be. I’ll probably move the sats out once I open it to avoid any liquidity problems with a large channel.
Thanks for any help!
Yes you can use both mobile and desktop with the same seed and shouldn't have any problem if both of them are running or open.
It's a bit confusing? There's no straight answer for this but it should cheaper than the on-chain fees.
Opening/closing a channel use on-chain fees that's should be your normal fee that you use when sending BTC to someone/exchanges or anywhere you want.
You might be talking about the lightning/routing fees, usually 0.5%, but this is adjustable. You can go to Tools > Preferences > Lightning. You should be able to see the slide for "Max lightning fees to pay" you can slide it to the left to lower the fees but take note of possible transaction failure.
I didn't use Lightning Network so I can not help you technical directly, but you can read some guides on Lightning Network if you want to learn.
Mastering the Lightning Network.
[Table] All Lightning Network Threads In One Place
Electrum Lightning Network walkthrough
Lists of open-source bitcoin lightning wallets
Only for his on-chain BTC, but for the question: "Lightning", only one instance should have an active version of the same channel.
If the client is set to create "Recoverable Channels", the existing channels will be restored to the other client (via seed)
as "static channel backup" that can only be requested for force-closure via the remote node.
Having multiple active instance of the same channel is dangerous since the channel will be outdated once the channel in the other client made a transaction.
Closing it could cost the user his part of its funds.
Because this heavily depends on the route that your payment will take.
Talking about the accumulated fee of the routing channels it used to reach the recipient, higher amount may be broken-down to multiple routes but there's no specific sat amount.
If you want to save fees and you're planning to use lightning in Electrum mainly to send and receive to a specific exchange, you should consider establishing a channel to that exchange's lightning node.
If you want reliability, I'd recommend the hard-coded trampoline remote nodes in the 'New Channel' option (trampoline routing in the preferences enabled).
Not anymore, after an update in Boltz terms, Electrum removed the service in their submarine swap feature.
AFAIK, now the user has to set his own swap server for the feature to work.
For the question, it wasn't Electrum who charges that but Boltz's fees (which you can still see in their website).
ok. thanks for input man. will install electrum desktop today and have a proper explore. just wanted to get a bit more clarity before dived into opening up a big channel.
Only for his on-chain BTC, but for the question: "Lightning", only one instance should have an active version of the same channel.
If the client is set to create "Recoverable Channels", the existing channels will be restored to the other client (via seed)
as "static channel backup" that can only be requested for force-closure via the remote node.
Having multiple active instance of the same channel is dangerous since the channel will be outdated once the channel in the other client made a transaction.
Closing it could cost the user his part of its funds.
ok. i thought it wasn't so straight forward. the last lightning wallet i used was mutiny, a web wallet for desktop, as well as an app on the phone. i was advised 'to not have both wallets open at the same time'... but seemed it was fine to use the wallets (which had the same seed) interchangeably, at different times.. i didn't meet any problems.
would this be the same with electrum for desktop and phone? i expect i'll use on desktop for 90% of the time, for now.. but if i closed the application on desktop, then in a few days opened up my phone app. any reason that there would be an issue there?
i'm not familiar with the point you've raised, as i've not yet set up my account on desktop,with seed > which i planned to use to set up the mobile app... u mention 'client set up for create recoverable channels'... is this the only option i have? if i create wallet from seed of desktop, will it not create the same active wallet, with LN channel?
i'll only use wallet for lightning i expect, as have other desktop wallet i use for OC btc.
[/color]
Because this heavily depends on the route that your payment will take.
Talking about the accumulated fee of the routing channels it used to reach the recipient, higher amount may be broken-down to multiple routes but there's no specific sat amount.
If you want to save fees and you're planning to use lightning in Electrum mainly to send and receive to a specific exchange, you should consider establishing a channel to that exchange's lightning node.
If you want reliability, I'd recommend the hard-coded trampoline remote nodes in the 'New Channel' option (trampoline routing in the preferences enabled).
ok, good to know. but wont be sending funds to exchange.. will be p2p txs. so i'm happy/expect i'll be using the LSP that electrum provides? what is that LSP btw? is there just one.
so, u recommend trampoline node, for my use case? of occassional p2p tx, including donations etc. after the larger initial channel opening and then transfer of those funds out.
Not anymore, after an update in Boltz terms, Electrum removed the service in their submarine swap feature.
AFAIK, now the user has to set his own swap server for the feature to work.
For the question, it wasn't Electrum who charges that but Boltz's fees (which you can still see in their website).
[/quote]
ok, good know. as i say, not explored in depth. so i can expect to see some swap service options when go to make the swap from OC > LN , or vice versa?
are there any other things to bare in mind when using the wallet, solely as a lightning wallet? again, it's not so clear from the docs and website, so no idea the sending fees for LN out of the wallet? assume there would be a small % of the tx? ... or is that just something i set in the preferences, as shared above, depending on my needs.... and receiving would be 0 afaics? with the sender paying the routing fees?
thanks man, appreciate the support
sorry. not so familliar with all the embedded quotes! seemed to have messed them up... so just coloured my response!
I'm not familiar with "Mutiny wallet" but in Electrum's case, your channels don't sync with any other instance of it.
And having an outdated instance of a channel is bad if you accidentally closed it. (as I explained above)
This is why recovering the channel from seed is limited to "static channel backup" that can't be forced-closed on your side for safety purposes.
There are three hard-coded remote node options when you enable trampoline routing setting.
One is owned by Electrum developer and the other two are owned by a famous services (acinq and hodlister).
Since those are trampoline nodes, has good number of channels and capacity, your payment shouldn't have major issue unless the recipient's channel doesn't have good connection itself.
You can still use Boltz's swap service outside of Electrum client, they have their website with open-source code: github.com/BoltzExchange/boltz-web-app
Or any other Exchange that can swap Lightning to On-chain as long as your channel's capacity is enough to send/receive.
For the fee, it's not a specific percentage, but the "routing fee" set by the payment channel(s) that your transaction took.
The longer route that it takes (more than one routing channels), the higher the accumulated fee that you'll pay.
For receiving; yes, the sender pays for the fee.
ok, thanks man, i appreciate the patience with my questions.
getting clearer.
so seems i can drop idea of having electrum with same active LN channels on both phone and desktop.. will gladly just use either set up.
and good to know about trampoline nodes. so basically i just choose one of these nodes i suspect, and use them? i assume they just act as the LSP? providing me the connection and gateway to the rest of the LN network?
so possibly best to just choose one node (to gain bit more privacy, and possibly loose bit of security... by not giving out my channel data (and other data? what data does this node get from me?... instead randomly selecting one of those three nodes? ... same goes for choosing a public node for my btc wallet too. whether go random, or choose one i trust... not yet running own node, so fine with this trust trade-off).
and the FEE piece still not clear. not a big deal. checked out boltz there, and they of course offer BTC > LN (small fee + 0.1% of tx) ; and LN > BTC (small fee + 0.5% of tx)... this LN > btc isn't the query i wonder about in electrum. it's the BTC > LN... after i send the btc to the wallet... i have no idea how much electrum charge for that swap? ... be great if can get somewhere close to boltz's 0.1% of tx, but i've no idea, as it's not expressed anywhere... i assume it will be shared when i make the tx?
any idea if there is a max amount i can send to LN, to create a channel? 2mil, 3mil sats? or more.
thanks man. appreciate it. strange this stuff isn't up on the electrum website though no?
Yes, those will appear as options in the remote node drop-down menu of "Trampoline Routing" is enabled in the settings.
And No, those aren't Service Providers but actual lightning nodes, and your Electrum client act as a lightning node itself.
When you create a channel, you actually setup your own payment channel where your Electrum wallet is the "local node" and the other party is the "remote node".
It's self-custodial setup that doesn't rely on LSP.
Unfortunately no.
Unlike on-chain, Electrum can't compute the total fee of the possible routes that it'll use for your payment, but AFAIK, it has an upper limit of max 1% of the amount.
You'll just see additional satoshis in your total payment in the 'History' tab.
Depends on the remote node, you'll see an error: "funding_sat too high" including the maximum funding sat that you can set.
ok, thanks again man,
yes, the channel set up how i thought.. didn't mean actual LSP i guess.. but the node somewhat acts like one.. providing me the gateway to the whole network, via the single channel we create. assuming all those nodes had very high liquidity, for that purpose, and many other nodes connecting to them.
i'm happy to just give it a go and see what electurm offers, re fees etc.
one slight 'concern' i have, is the warning (which i'm aware they're likely had since LN inseption no?)... 'Lightning support in Electrum is experimental. Do not put large amounts in lightning channels.... doesn't fill me with confidence.. wanting to set up a relatively large channel.
any reason what a 'large amount' is? a couple of mil sats? no idea how big one of these channels could be... but just thought to check, whether u're a LN electrum user, and whether u'd heard of any/many issues occuring with channel closures or such, that i 'should' be aware of..
i guess i plan to open a big channel, then remove funds, so as to free up liquidity to receive, so won't be much on my side anyway.
maybe electrum is just 'covering themselves'.. like, 'we told you'..
u sense it's more 'experimental', after all these years, than a phoenix, zeus, blixt etc. LN wallets?
I wouldn't put in more than I can afford to lose. It's a hot wallet, and on top of that, it's still experiemental. Things do go wrong sometimes.
If you don't expect to receive large amounts, you don't need to have that much incoming liquidity either.
ok, good know that things do go wrong sometimes.. surprised it's still in this experimental stage though, after all these years.. but i'll bare all in mind.
and good reminder. about channel size. i've just had sense, from many recommendations, to open a big channel, which will last a long time and allow for how ever much movement i wanted (which could be p2p buys on robosats for example)... but wonder if my main reason for not wanting to have to increase my channel size in the future, is this one time OC tx associated with it.. given whatever fee i'd pay for the new channel would be a % of the amount i send in right? so really it wouldn't make much/any difference to have a 1m sat channel now, and add another 1mil sat later (if wanted/needed), than setting up a 2mil sat channel to start (as an example)... of course 1st scenario has two OC txs, but wonder if are other considerations.
but mulling over the big urgency for a big channel... as OC txs now are very cheap! i guess it's considering the future, and fees likely going up, so people wanting to secure themselves now, so don't need to mess with channels if and when fees do go up... but maybe i'm missing some other associated fees or reasons to have that large channel off the bat?