How to Track Crypto Wallets: Tools and Tips for Beginners
A cryptocurrency wallet can be your gateway to the blockchain, serving as both your “bank” for storing, sending, and receiving cryptocurrencies, or as a form of digital identity to connect to different tools and services.
These innovative on-chain wallets offer a high level of transparency, which not only makes for a level playing field, but also makes it possible to track them.
As a beginner trader, tracking wallets is something you should familiarize yourself with, as it can improve your security, give you more actionable information to trade with, and open up a new world of strategic possibility in the crypto-sphere.
Ok, let’s go!
What Does Tracking a Crypto Wallet Mean?
First of all, let’s be clear that when it comes to wallet tracking, you can either track yourself, or track others. This means looking at or monitoring transactions, balances, and activities associated with a specific blockchain address.
Personal wallet tracking: Monitoring your crypto wallet address’ activity, balance, and transaction history to maintain security and track your investments.
Public wallet tracking: Following publicly visible wallets on the blockchain, such as those belonging to major investors (known as whales), projects (to see what they’re up to), or institutions (to gain insight into possible investments).
Why Would You Track Crypto Wallets?
There are more reasons than you might think to go ahead and track other people’s wallets, for example:
Investment Research: Understanding how experienced traders and investors manage their portfolios can inform your own trading strategy, and can also help you discover coins you didn’t know about. Tracking “whales” - people with huge holdings in certain coins, can help you know when to move your assets.
Security Monitoring (Internal): Keeping tabs on your own wallet's activity to detect unauthorized transactions. However unlikely it may seem, it does happen. You might even receive random scam airdrops that you need to be careful about.
Security Monitoring (External): Performing security analysis checks on other people’s wallet addresses is a growing trend, with new platforms offering cheap KYC services to the retail market.
Market Analysis: Identifying trends and patterns in cryptocurrency movements can also be done from some wallets, which may have different built-in tools and features to help you.
Portfolio Management: Maintaining an overview of your crypto assets across different chains and platforms is critical. If using MetaMask, for example, you need to be able to track your holdings across different chains, such as Ethereum, Arbitrum, and Polygon, for example. Failure to do this could mean coins getting lost somewhere.
Writer’s Note: A while back, the writer of this article was left unpaid by an agency. The agency claimed they couldn’t pay until their client had paid them. The writer found the client’s wallet address in their transaction history and saw that the agency was holding over $20m in funds.
On top of that, the agency had already been paid by their client several days before, which could be confirmed through their on-chain transactions.
While the writer took no action, it was a breakdown of trust. It’s important to know that your on-chain activity is transparent, so lies or fraudulent behaviour can be quickly exposed.
So, what to do next?
How To Find The Best Crypto Wallets To Track
Now that you are aware of your power to go and track other people’s wallets, you’ll need to know how to find them. It’s not like there’s a big public directory with people advertising their wallet holdings and addresses.
While balances and public keys are public, the owner of a wallet stays anonymous until they either choose to reveal who they are, or are identified and exposed by on-chain analysis.
To find crypto wallets worth tracking, try these ideas:
Follow crypto news and social media to identify significant players in the space
Use blockchain explorers to find wallets with substantial holdings or frequent activity
Join crypto communities where members share interesting wallet addresses
Monitor DeFi protocols to identify successful traders and investors
Best Tools for Finding Crypto Wallets To Track
Blockchain Explorers
Etherscan: The gold standard for Ethereum blockchain exploration. Features include: transaction history, token holdings, and smart contract interactions. It is arguably the best explorer for detailed analysis of Ethereum wallet activity.
BscScan: The best blockchain explorer for the Binance Smart Chain, featuring transaction tracking, token transfers, and contract verification. No other BSC monitoring tool comes close.
SolScan: Arguably the best Solana blockchain explorer (though there are strong competitors), featuring a user-friendly and real-time scanning and tracking tool to view your (and others) $SOL and Solana-related tokens (such as meme coins).
Recommended Wallet Trackers
If you know how to track crypto wallet addresses manually, you can skip to the next section, otherwise, leveraging these tools will up your game significantly.
Zapper - “See What’s Happening Onchain”
Features: Multi-chain portfolio tracking, DeFi dashboard, NFT tracking
Best for: Complete DeFi portfolio management
DeBank - “The Real User Based Web3 Community”
Features: Cross-chain tracking, DeFi protocol integration, wallet analytics
Best for: DeFi users tracking multiple protocols
Zerion - “Track Your DeFi Portfolio”
Features: Portfolio management, DeFi investments, transaction history
Best for: User-friendly interface and mobile access
CoinStats - “Crypto Portfolio Tracker Trusted by 1 Million People”
Features: Multiple wallet tracking, exchange integration, price alerts
Best for: Beginners wanting a simple, one-stop solution
How To Track Crypto Wallets: Step-by-Step Guide
To get started, you’ll first need a wallet address to track.
You can find this by looking at transaction histories, blockchain explorers, crypto tools that share their addresses, or addresses being discussed in trading groups.
All Ethereum and EVM-compatible networks (including BSC) begin with the 0x prefix, which indicates the use of hexadecimal characters. Bitcoin wallets usually start with 1, 3, or bc1.
See the example below on Etherscan to identify the wallet address, tags related to its ownership (this is only available for certain wallets), and the value of its ETH holdings.
To begin wallet tracking, click the little copy button next to the wallet address, or highlight and copy it.
Confirm the wallet’s blockchain network (ETH/BSC/SOL etc)
Choose your tracking tool (refer back to the recommended wallet trackers section above)
For basic tracking: Use blockchain explorers
For DeFi tracking: Use dedicated wallet trackers
For portfolio management: Use crypto portfolio apps
Identify and measure key metrics
Balance changes and token holdings
Transaction size and frequency
Smart contract interactions
Connected protocols and platforms
Historical trading patterns
Advanced Tracking Techniques
If all of the above is easy or obvious to you, and you’re here looking to take your wallet tracking activities to the next level, here are some advanced tracking techniques you might want to consider:
Use APIs from blockchain explorers to build custom tracking tools
Set up automated alerts for specific wallet activities
Implement data visualization tools for pattern recognition
Create tracking dashboards using multiple data sources
Smart Money Strategy
In crypto, “smart money” refers to the top-performing participants in the market, usually comprising major institutions, funds, whales, stakers, farmers, and more.
Identifying smart money wallets can be a great way to see how the market’s best players act, what they’re holding, and if you want to copy them.
Nansen’s guide to Smart Money is great for advanced wallet trackers. If that’s you - read here.
What to do Next?
Now that you’re on the right track and have a strong understanding of how to track crypto wallets, you can now start taking your tracking and trading efforts to new heights.
Sign up for BONKbot today and unlock the full potential of your crypto trading strategy.