Guarda Wallet Review

Guarda Wallet Review: Self-Custody, Coins, Fees and Who It Suits

In our view, Guarda suits people who want one software wallet for a very long list of coins, including Monero. We think it suits users who appreciate integrated features such as swaps, buying, staking, and loans within the same application. We think it is a weaker fit if you want a fully open-source wallet, a traditional recovery phrase as the default backup, or transparent fee figures upfront. This is because Guarda largely delegates pricing responsibility to its partners managing swaps and purchases.

What Guarda is

Guarda is a non-custodial software wallet: your private keys and backups are created on your own device, encrypted, and never sent over the internet. The first Guarda wallet, for Ethereum, launched in 2017. Guarda says it has more than 1M active users and supports more than 70 blockchains. It also claims more than 1M supported tokens, which in practice means you can add almost any token on the chains it covers.

The terms of service name two companies as the provider: GUARDACO LDA, incorporated in Portugal, and Guardium LTD, incorporated in the British Virgin Islands. The Portuguese company's registered office is in Lisbon, and the terms say either company may provide the service during a transitional period.

Guarda is accessible via a browser, a desktop app for Windows, macOS, and Linux, on iOS and Android, and as a Chrome extension for decentralized apps. The desktop download page currently offers version 1.1.1, complete with release checksums.

Custody and backup

Since Guarda is self-custodial, no one at Guarda can move or freeze your coins, nor can they recover them if access is lost. This is the trade-off we would explain to any first-time user.

Backups work differently from many other wallets. To restore a Guarda wallet you need a backup file and your password, a two-step check, and you can also import or export single coins with their private keys. In our view this is convenient, but it puts two things in your hands instead of one: lose either the file or the password and the restore fails. We would keep an offline copy of the backup file and store the password separately.

On mobile you can lock the app with Face ID, Touch ID or your device's biometrics. There is no account-level two-factor login, because there is no account: you create a wallet without registering.

Security and open source

Guarda states that private keys remain on your device and that it never accesses your funds. Multisig support is available for certain assets, allowing more than one key for transaction approval. If you own a Ledger, it can be connected to keep keys on the hardware device while using Guarda as the interface.

Guarda is only partly open source: its public GitHub account holds archived Android wallets, the Chrome extension and desktop release files, but we found no published source for the current apps. For a wallet that holds your keys, we prefer projects where the full app code can be inspected, so we count this as a minus. We found no security incident report on Guarda's own security, about or home pages.

Supported assets

Coverage is Guarda's strongest point: more than 70 blockchains, and Monero is supported, which many multi-coin wallets have dropped. Not every asset can be bought with a card, though: the buy page lists 129 coins. If you mainly hold mainstream coins, we think the long list matters less than how the wallet handles backup and fees.

Swaps, buying and fees

Swaps run through partners, and the exchange page names ChangeNOW and Swapzone. Guarda advertises swaps without registration or KYC. In our view that claim describes the wallet, not every swap: the partner that executes a trade sets its own limits and may still ask for identity checks.

Purchases are handled by ChangeNOW, Guardarian, and Simplex. Depending on the provider and your location, payment options include card, Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal, Revolut, Venmo, or SEPA bank transfer.

On fees, Guarda's terms are clear about who gets paid: the company says it receives no payments from users and that all fees go directly to the third-party providers. That means the price of a swap or purchase sits in the partner's quote, so we would compare that quote with the rate on an exchange before confirming a larger trade. Sending coins costs the network fee of the chain you use.

Staking, loans and extras

Guarda advertises staking on 14 networks, run with its partner CoinCrypto. Staking rewards change with each network, so we would treat the estimates on the staking page as a guide rather than a promise.

Crypto loans are provided by CoinRabbit, with stablecoin loans advertised at up to 17% APR. A loan against volatile collateral can be liquidated in a sharp drop, so in our view it only suits people who understand that risk.

Guarda has also added prediction markets powered by Polymarket and lists perpetual futures among its features. These sit far from the core job of a wallet, and we would only use them with money you can afford to lose.

Day-to-day use

In our view, Guarda's main appeal in daily use is that the same wallet opens in a browser, on a computer and on a phone, so you are not tied to one device. The web wallet, the desktop apps for Windows, macOS and Linux and the mobile apps for iOS and Android all unlock the same wallet once you restore it from your backup. That flexibility has a cost: a browser wallet is only as safe as the computer and browser you use it on, so we would keep larger balances on a phone or a hardware device.

We would also point out that you can create a wallet in about a minute without handing over an email address or ID, which keeps the wallet itself private. The flip side is that every service inside the app, from card purchases to loans, is run by a separate company with its own terms, so we would read the partner's conditions on screen before each first use.

Support

Guarda offers live chat and email support at [email protected]. In our view live chat is a real plus for a self-custody wallet, as long as you remember that support can never restore a lost backup.

Using Guarda in the US

Guarda's terms do not mention the US: they exclude residents of sanctioned jurisdictions under EU legislation and FATF lists and anyone barred by local law. In our view, US availability is therefore unconfirmed rather than ruled out. Buying and swapping depend on the partners, each with its own country rules, so check the provider shown in the app before you pay.

Who should look elsewhere

If you are new to self-custody and want the simplest possible setup, we think a wallet with a standard recovery phrase is easier to back up, and our Exodus review and Trust Wallet review cover two common choices. If you hold larger amounts, we would move most of them to a hardware wallet such as the one in our Ledger Nano X review and keep Guarda for everyday use. For another long-list multi-coin wallet, see our Coinomi review, and for a side-by-side view of two popular software wallets, see Exodus vs Trust Wallet. All reviewed wallets are on our wallets overview.

Our verdict

In our view, Guarda is a capable multi-coin wallet with unusually wide coin coverage, Monero support and many built-in services. Its backup model, the partly closed code and the lack of fee figures of its own are the points we would weigh before trusting it with larger sums.