The fallout from the Coldcard crisis is showing up in hardware wallet sales. Trezor, Bitbox and Onekey all confirmed a spike in orders over the past week, a sign that many Bitcoiners are buying new devices rather than giving up on self-custody. Bitcoin.com News reached out to 13 manufacturers for comment, but only those three responded.
Why the bump happened
The three companies said they saw a clear increase in sales since the Coldcard problem came to light. They didn't share figures, but the trend was consistent across the three. That suggests the response wasn't a one-off fluke, but a broad shift in behavior among Bitcoin users.
Instead of abandoning hardware wallets entirely, buyers seem to be switching to a different brand. It's a vote of confidence in cold storage, even if it's a hard day for the affected vendor.
Sticking with self-custody
The sales pattern is a meaningful signal. When a hardware wallet runs into trouble, the risk is that users will pull their coins and hand them to an exchange. That hasn't happened, at least not at the scale that would show up in these numbers. The three manufacturers are reporting the opposite: people are doubling down on the hardware route.
That's not a trivial detail. It tells you that for a large chunk of Bitcoiners, the idea of holding keys themselves is more important than any single product's reputation.
AI-powered threats on the way
The wallet makers aren't just counting sales. They're also preparing for a new set of security challenges involving AI. The threat model is changing, they say, with attackers likely to use machine learning to craft more convincing phishing attacks or tamper with firmware updates. The coming generation of hardware will need to be ready for that.
What that looks like in practice is still vague. But the fact that several manufacturers are talking about it now is a good sign. The Coldcard incident is a reminder that security is a moving target, and the next battle might be against AI-generated attacks rather than brute force.
Silence from the rest
Bitcoin.com News contacted 13 hardware wallet companies about the sales uptick. Only Trezor, Bitbox and Onekey confirmed. The other ten didn't respond, and that's worth noting. It doesn't mean they didn't see anything, but it doesn't mean they did either. The lack of comment leaves a gap in the picture.
For now, the three confirmed sellers are the ones that are showing the market's reaction. The rest are staying quiet, which might be a story on its own.
The Coldcard crisis is still fresh, and the sales data suggests the response is to buy more hardware, not less. The next real test comes when the first AI-powered attacks start hitting the market, and we'll see whether these new wallets are ready.
