Coinbase announces Wallet as a Service. Now any company can seamlessly onboard their users to web3.

Tl;dr: With Wallet as a Service, Coinbase will enable companies around the world to help bring the next hundred million consumers into web3 through a seamless wallet-onboarding experience. The most recognized names in retail, commerce, entertainment, and web3 are turning to Coinbase for our security, ease of use, and ability to scale to billions. 

Web3 presents a wealth of opportunities for companies to better engage and serve their customers. It allows brands to create rich, immersive experiences, such as what Moonray is building within their game for users to interact with digital assets and NFTs. Retailers can provide personalized shopping and onchain loyalty programs, while social companies can build stronger communities with creators and viewers. By engaging in web3, companies can create new revenue streams, strengthen user engagement, and encourage reward redemption across participating businesses.  

However, many companies face significant challenges that prevent them from capitalizing on these opportunities. One major challenge is the complexity of web3 wallets, which store digital assets, facilitate transactions, and act as users’ digital identity. Traditionally, wallets have made it difficult for users to access and benefit from web3's potential because of their complex mnemonic seeds and counterintuitive UIs. In a world where wallets are simple, companies can finally build web3 experiences accessible to everyone regardless of technical knowledge. 

Today, Coinbase is solving this problem for the industry with Wallet as a Service (WaaS). WaaS is a scalable and secure set of wallet infrastructure APIs, enabling companies to create and deploy fully customizable onchain wallets to their end users. Companies can offer their users wallets directly in their apps with onboarding as simple as a username and password. Whether enabling gamers to trade in-game items and currency or creating new avenues for loyalty programs such as token-based rewards, WaaS is a powerful tool for companies looking to tap into the potential of web3.

End users can explore web3 without managing a complicated 24 word recovery phrase because WaaS is powered by Multi-Party Computation (MPC) cryptographic technology. MPC allows a ‘key’ to be split between the end user and Coinbase. Ultimately, this means that self-custody keys are safe even if a user's device is compromised. Furthermore, advanced and automatic backup with MPC guarantees that even if an end user loses access to their device, the key to their web3 wallet is still safe and can be securely stored.

Companies like Floor, Moonray, thirdweb, and tokenproof are building with Coinbase WaaS to onboard users to web3 experiences across gaming, token-gated events, and digital marketplaces.

“Tokenproof is on a mission to make web3 more accessible to a new wave of users. Individuals will no longer have to come with knowledge of how the blockchain works in order to interact with the brands they love. When users download the tokenproof app, we’ll help welcome them into web3 by creating their first wallet, which will be powered by Coinbase. This is a huge step towards making the space more approachable and accessible and we’re excited by the opportunity to work with such a highly trusted partner.”- Fonz, Founder Tokenproof

Getting started with Wallet as a Service

Coinbase Wallet as a Service was designed from the ground up to enable companies to provide their users with safe, secure, and easy access to web3 wallets. These fully customizable and reliable APIs free up resources that would be spent navigating the nuances of blockchain infrastructure. Instead companies can focus on what matters most: delivering more value and innovative products to their customers.

• Seamless user experience: Allow your users to access web3 wallets with the ease of use of web2. Users can create, access, and restore their wallets with authentication as simple as a username and password. This makes it easy for anyone to start using web3, even if they have never used cryptocurrency before.

• Secure: Wallets deployed using WaaS use advanced multi-party computation (MPC) for added security, helping keep user assets safe by securely dividing, encrypting, and distributing keys among multiple parties. This is a significant improvement over traditional web3 wallets that require users to manage their keys alone.

• Key ownership: Users have full control over their assets, including an option to export their keys off platform at any time.

• Native integration: With our APIs, companies can build native wallets into their applications, thus maintaining a cohesive user experience with no need to redirect users to a separate website/app.

• Built for scale: We have a proven track record in providing secure, scalable and user-friendly gateways to web3 that can reliably service hundreds of millions of users. 

Start building with Wallet as a Service. Contact us for early access: waas@coinbase.com

Why Companies are turning to Coinbase

Enterprises, startups and institutions are constantly on the hunt for new ways to provide value for their customers. More and more companies are realizing that web3 will generate a massive industry of new decentralized applications and services. And they want to empower their customers to access it. 

Once companies start to explore building gateways to web3, they quickly learn the complexities of key management, scalability, security, UX and so much more. This process can require significant time, resources, money and expertise which could be better spent on providing value to their end users. Ultimately companies come to Coinbase because they want to work with a partner who has a proven track record in providing secure, scalable and user-friendly gateway to web3. This way, they can focus on their core business and let us take care of the technicalities. 

Whether it’s an enterprise that wants to give their millions of existing users an easy gateway to web3 or a start-up wanting to introduce their dapp to the masses, Coinbase is ready to meet the demands of hundreds of organizations ready to bring the capabilities of web3 to new users. 

Coinbase for Developers

Coinbase empowers developers with APIs and services to help simplify the process of dapp development and onboard millions of new users into web3, such as our recent project, Base. In addition to WaaS and Base, Coinbase also offers a fiat on-ramp through Pay SDK, trading APIs, Wallet SDK, and other resources. Our aim is to give developers all the tools they need to create impressive web3 applications quickly, easily, and securely.

Coinbase's Wallet as a Service (WaaS) offers a solution to the complex nature of web3 wallets, enabling companies to provide their users with safe, secure, and easy access to web3 wallets. 

Click here to learn more about how Wallet as a Service can provide your users with a secure, scalable and user-friendly gateway to web3. If you are interested in trying out our other APIs and SDKs, sign up for Coinbase Cloud.

Legalese/Disclaimers

This document and the information contained herein is not a recommendation or endorsement of any digital asset, protocol, network, or project. However, Coinbase may have, or may in the future have, a significant financial interest in, and may receive compensation for services related to one or more of the digital assets, protocols, networks, entities, projects, and/or ventures discussed herein. The risk of loss in cryptocurrency, including staking, can be substantial and nothing herein is intended to be a guarantee against the possibility of loss. 

This document and the content contained herein are based on information which is believed to be reliable and has been obtained from sources believed to be reliable, but Coinbase makes no representation or warranty, express, or implied, as to the fairness, accuracy, adequacy, reasonableness, or completeness of such information, and, without limiting the foregoing or anything else in this disclaimer, all information provided herein is subject to modification by the underlying protocol network.

Any use of Coinbase’s services may be contingent on completion of Coinbase’s onboarding process, including entrance into applicable legal documentation and will be, at all times, subject to and governed by Coinbase’s policies, including without limitation, its terms of service and privacy policy, as may be amended from time to time.