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BIP85 Derived Seeds

BIP85 is a standard that lets you generate child seeds deterministically from your main wallet’s recovery phrase. You back up one phrase, and you can reproduce any number of separate child wallets from it — for family members, separate purposes, or cold backups.

BIP85 derived seeds

Why BIP85 matters

Managing multiple wallets normally means managing multiple recovery phrases. With BIP85:

  • One master backup. Write down the 12 or 24 words of your main wallet once, and that phrase is the “master key” for every BIP85 child you ever generate.
  • Deterministic recovery. Given the same master phrase and the same BIP85 index, you’ll always reproduce the exact same child seed. No additional backups needed.
  • Compartmentalization. Use different children for different purposes — a family wallet, a business wallet, a savings wallet — without managing separate phrases.

How it works

Each child seed is identified by an index (0, 1, 2, …) and a type (how many words the child seed has: 12, 18, or 24). The KeepKey uses the master seed, the index, and the type to deterministically produce a child seed — same inputs, same output, every time.

Child seeds generated by KeepKey are standard BIP39 recovery phrases and can be loaded into any BIP39-compatible wallet: Ledger, Trezor, hardware alternatives, or another KeepKey.

Generating a new derived seed

Generate a new derived seed
  1. Open Settings → BIP85 Derived Seeds
  2. Pick an index (start with 0 and increment — write it down)
  3. Pick the length (12, 18, or 24 words)
  4. Click Generate
  5. The device displays the derived phrase on its own screen
  6. Write it down just like you did for the main wallet — paper, pen, private place

Important rules

  • Write down the index. The index is a critical part of the recovery. Child seed #0 and child seed #1 are completely different wallets. If you remember the child’s phrase but forget the index, you still need to know which child it was to recreate it.
  • Write down the length. 12-word and 24-word children at the same index are different wallets.
  • Children cannot recover the master. A child seed has no way to derive the master phrase. If you lose the master, you lose all children — even if you still have each child’s own recovery phrase.
  • The master still protects all children. Anyone with your master phrase can generate every child seed you ever made. Protect the master phrase as carefully as you would if it controlled all the child wallets combined, because it does.

Use cases

  • Family wallets. Generate a child seed for each family member. You keep the master; they get their own independent wallet.
  • Business wallets. One master phrase can secure separate children for payroll, petty cash, cold storage, and operations.
  • Cold backup rotation. Generate a new child every year; if an old one is compromised, the others remain safe.
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