How to buy Cardano ADA: Fast and cheap in 4 steps

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1

There were many questions regarding the best option to buy Cardano ADA in this forum, with a lot of the same answers. Therefore I am creating this topic. There are multiple ways to do this. However, I use this process for most of my altcoins.

1. The Wallet

First things first: You will want to have a wallet on your computer to be able to store Cardano. Cardano uses the Daedalus Wallet for that. You can download it here: https://daedaluswallet.io/#download.

You will get an address to send your ADA to in the “Receive” tab. Save that!

2. ETH on Coinbase

No, it is not possible to buy Cardano with your credit card/PayPal. What you will have to do is buy another cryptocurrency and then exchange it to Cardano.

Therefore, create an account on Coinbase.com, (or use my referral link if you want to give us both $10 worth of free bitcoin) where you can use credit card or a SEPA transfer and buy ETHEREUM. You should buy ethereum because it is much faster and cheaper to transfer than Bitcoin.

3. ADA Binance

Next up, create an account on https://www.binance.com/. This is a cryptocurrency exchange which enables you to convert one cryptocurrency into another. It is also one of the few who support ETH > ADA exchange.

Go to your Funds tab after you have registered, where you can find your wallets. Look for the “ETH” wallet and choose the option “Deposit”. You’ll get an address to send your ETH to. Save that one as well.

Switch back to Coinbase and send your ETH to the Binance address - now wait a few minutes.

After 30 confirmations, you’ll have the ETH in your Binance account. Now you can finally go to the “Markets” tab, search for the ETH > ADA exchange and spend all your ETH on ADA. You are now the owner of Cardano!

4. Send ADA to Daedalus

In this last step, you’ll go back to your Deposit/Withdrawal page on Binance, look for your ADA and use the “Withdraw” option to send all your ADA to your Daedalus address. Confirm at least a dozen times that you have copied the right address - if you send it to a wrong one, it will be lost.

This will cost you ~30 ADA - this is normal. Wait a few minutes, and your ADA are now secure in your Daedalus wallet.

Now, HODL.

Let me know if there are any errors in this. Enjoy your ADA.

44 Likes
2

Thanks for taking the time to write this guide up.

I’m a little unsure which would be the most cost effective way to buy Ethereum from coinbase.
Credit/debit card with 3.99% or bank transfer ? Method1/method2 ?

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3

Hey, here’s details of my coinbase txn with VISA from a couple oh hours ago.

Subtotal €101.46
Fee €3.54
Total €105.00

roughly 3.4%

4

I want to move ADA from Binance account to Daedalus. I got a 2FA set up on Binance, is the “Label” slot next to the “Address” slot at withdrawals used for 2FA PIN or something else? Sorry if this is already posted elsewhere, can’t find anything on it…
Cheers

5

You can put whatever you want in “Label” field, e.g. “Binance” and this you will see on your wallet address in the block-chain when ADA arrives. It’s just a way to label your transactions so that you can later remember them easier.

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6

Great job! Confirmed my thinking on the process!

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7

Is the non-verified withdraw limit still 2BTC? I have had issues with bittrex and verification with Ada sitting on the exchange.

8

I do believe so.
However, the verification process was okay for me.

9

What are the few other exchange platforms that support this ETH>ADA exchange? I am looking to use Bittrex to convert my currencies. Does Bittrex support this exchange? If not, what are the options?

10

Cool, thank you!

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11

Bittrex and Binance do for sure. I have used the two before. I don’t know about any other

12

Great, Thanks

13

@jonmoss Might be worth to pin this post, since there are still similar questions coming in? Anything missing/wrong?

14

Hi,

Use wire transfer for “Gemini” or “GDAX” (Part of Coinbase). Its faster take about 2 or 3 hrs. Gemini Charges no money, but Gdax charges $10. You get better Exchange rates in Gemini and GDAX compared to coinbase.

Bank also charges for wire transfers, Most credit union charges $15. This is the cheapest and fastest way.

regards
Avi

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15

I’ve had success with binance so far. Very easy and you can actually move up to 2 BTC without verification, unlike bittrex. Thanks @dmonn

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16

Hi all,

Is there something wrong with the wallet. My wallet is saying this: Syncing blocks 16.98%. It doesn’t want to load.

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Syncing all blocks will take time when first opening the Wallet. (for me up till 30 minutes)
Will be better when opening after 1st time.

#geduld :wink:

1 Like
18

Yep, syncing the blocks can go a while (it sometimes gets stuck at 96% for 5 minutes for me)

19

After the 1st time I expect a load time of few seconds :slight_smile:

#Geduld is een schone zaak

20

Thanks, dmonn!