_ Here's how it works: Anybody can ask a question Anybody can answer The best answers are voted up and rise to the top up vote down vote favorite 4 Buest guess/calculation?Transferred some bitcoins to my new wallet after generating an address.This was this morning, and have had my bitcoin wallet syncing all afternoon (5 hours), so far it has downloaded 1.5GB of data and maxed out my 3g broadband quota for the month :-( It is also really slow towards the end, sitting at 80% now and ticking over verrrry slow.Is this because the latest blocks, contain more transactions (as doesnt every block contain history of all transactions before it?).Will that mean future bitcoin newbs are going to have to deal with a huge download size/ sync quota?client wallet network performance networking up vote 6 down vote My current Bitcoin folder, May 28th 2012, is 2.16 GB.Of which maybe 60MB is data personally to me like my wallet, addresses, logs and transaction history.

So basicly you will have to download a little over 2 GB for being in sync with the network.To answer your second question: I think yes.Bitcoin exists out of a long chain with blocks containing all the transactions that were ever made.So the longer Bitcoin lives and the more it is used, the bigger this block chain will grow and the more data every user will have to download before they can use the Bitcoin client safely.EDIT: blockchain.info charts the pure blockchain size here: https://blockchain.info/charts/blocks-size If this growth rate stays the same, bitcoin can get in trouble... up vote 3 down vote You Bitcoin wallet doesn't take up too much space, it's the data about the block chain that is taking up all the bandwidth.Bitcoin relies on everyone keeping a copy of the block chain, to prevent any scams.The standard client uses checkpoints, positions in the block chain, to know which blocks are considered safe and immutable by the developers, meaning they won't be checked as scrumptiously.

The newest blocks are validated more thoroughly, to prevent malicious injection of data.If you have a bandwidth limit, know that Bitcoin should only do this operation once - you're downloading the whole history of operations on Bitcoins after all.After that the downloads will be more managable.The future Bitcoin clients could be operating as "lite clients", which will download far less data, but currently only alternative clients support that.It will also be possible that there will be clients developed that will use the Overlay Network, meaning they won't have to download basically anything at all, but again, the standard client does not support that.If you want to operate on Bitcoins without downloading any data, you can try using some eWallets - they are basically websites that offer to host your Bitcoin needs.Some of them charge a small fee, and if they go down you will lose all of your coins, but on the other hand it provides a lot of flexibility and no need for downloads.All in all, the standard client does require users to go through a bit of pain at the beginning, but after that it is mostly clear sailing.

You can always try using an eWallet, but then you are entrusting the safety of your coins to someone else.up vote 2 down vote bitcoin client as the block chain is hosted on a server and so you don't need to download it every time you open it.It also has some really cool security functions if you lose your local wallet file.bitcoin miner mapup vote 1 down vote MultiBit currently requires about 30Mb However, that is because it is a lightweight client.bitcoin fedora 20It only downloads the transaction headers for the blockchain and keeps only the transactions associated with your particular private keys.sovereign bitcoin exchangeAs such it can ignore the vast amount of transaction data as being irrelevant.up vote 1 down vote This is going to be date and transaction relative.

For example if you setup a wallet today (June 5m 2017) it is about 120GB and most of that is from the last 4 years and moreso in the last several months all due to increasing amounts of transactions.This is both a strength and weakness in the sense that the best way is to have all transactions yet it's not practical for many to have 120GB+ of the transactions stored locally.Your Answer Sign up or log in Sign up using Google Sign up using Email and Password Post as a guest Name Email discard By posting your answer, you agree to the privacy policy and terms of service.Not the answer you're looking for?Browse other questions tagged client wallet network performance networking or ask your own question.nning a “full node” can easily take more than a week to sync on a quad-core computer with fast Internet connection and SSD.If you have a very old computer, it may never sync because the files seem to get corrupted often after a week or two of trying.

Therefore I highly recommend to not use Bitcoin Core as a wallet until after you know what you are doing.Bitcoin Core offers better privacy and security at a very high cost (in terms of syncing).Users who simply want to try out bitcoin should not use Bitcoin Core, but rather start with a fast, lightweight client like:Or just use it on a mobile device, eg:You can explore Cold Storage options if you really need strong security, but do that after using a lightweight option with small amounts and learning about how Bitcoin works.For cold storage, here are some good options: - The first Open, secure, crowdsourced hardware wallet.- The has some elegant and unique features (eg: on-device PIN input, FIDO support) and is less expensive than the Trezor.- Expensive, but seems about as good as Trezor, a few novel improvements made via large screen.- BIP38 Paper wallet.See "Going offline" instructions here: Print Offline Tamper-Resistant Addresses.Offline-created cold-storage, encrypted paper wallets are good (if done right) and can be made for free.