Create your wallet
Creating a wallet takes about a minute and a single biometric prompt. Open the web wallet at wallet.getvela.app and choose Create a wallet.
Steps
- Name your wallet. Pick a name so you can recognize the account later and when signing in on another device. It’s stored next to your public key, so treat it as public — don’t put anything private in it.
- Acknowledge the basics. A short checklist confirms you understand that Vela is self-custodial and still alpha software, with links to the privacy policy and terms.
- Create your passkey. When prompted, authenticate with Face ID, Touch ID, or your fingerprint. This creates a WebAuthn (P-256) passkey that your device holds and Vela never sees. There is no seed phrase step, because there is no seed phrase.
- Done. Vela shows your wallet address and you’re in. You can verify it and sign in to land on your wallet.
What your wallet actually is
This is the part most wallets don’t explain — and it matters for how Vela works.
Your Vela wallet is a Safe smart account (a smart contract), not a plain “externally owned account.” Your passkey is the account’s owner; an ERC-4337 setup lets you operate it with just your face or fingerprint.
A useful consequence: the address is counterfactual. It’s computed before anything is deployed on-chain, so you can receive funds at it before your wallet contract exists. The contract deploys itself — paid from its own balance — the first time you send a transaction on a given network.
What just happened to your keys
- A passkey key pair was generated by your device.
- The private key is held by your OS passkey provider (iCloud Keychain or Google Password Manager), stored end-to-end encrypted and synced across your devices — no app, including Vela, ever sees it.
- The public key and your chosen name are published to Vela’s Passkey Index (a contract on Gnosis Chain) so your account can be found again on a new device. See recovery & sign-in.