# Networks, Coins & Tokens

"Crypto" isn't one thing. It's many separate **networks** (also called *chains* or *blockchains*), each with its own ledger, its own rules, and its own money. Getting this mental model right prevents the most common — and most expensive — beginner mistakes.

## Networks and their native coins

Each network has one **native coin** that it runs on:

- **Bitcoin** the network → **BTC** the coin.
- **Ethereum** the network → **ETH** the coin.
- …and so on for THORChain, Cosmos, Solana, and others.

The native coin is what you use to pay that network's [fees](/docs/learn/transactions-and-fees). Networks are separate worlds: **you cannot send BTC over the Ethereum network**, and sending a coin to an address on the wrong network can lose it for good.

## Coins vs. tokens

Here's the distinction that trips people up:

- A **coin** is the native currency of its own network (BTC, ETH).
- A **token** is an asset that *lives on top of* another network — it doesn't have its own chain. Most well-known "coins" like USDC or UNI are actually **ERC-20 tokens** running on Ethereum.

Because tokens ride on a host network, **you pay fees in the host's native coin.** To move a USDC token on Ethereum, you need some ETH for gas. New users are often surprised they "can't send their USDC" — they just have no ETH to pay the fee.

## EVM chains

Ethereum's design (the *Ethereum Virtual Machine*, or **EVM**) was copied by many other networks — Polygon, Arbitrum, Base, BNB Chain, Avalanche, and more. These **EVM chains** share Ethereum's `0x...` address format and token standards, which is why one Ethereum-style address often works across many of them.

## What "supported" means

For a hardware wallet to use a network, its **firmware** must know how to build and sign that network's transactions. That's what "supported" means — and it's why firmware updates can add new chains.

## On your KeepKey

- KeepKey multi-chain firmware **7.14.1** and later natively signs on **11 chains** — Bitcoin, Ethereum, XRP, Cosmos, THORChain, Maya, EOS, Nano, Solana, TRON, and TON (Solana, TRON, and TON are new in 7.14.1). See [Supported Coins](/docs/supported-coins).
- Through Ethereum it handles **any ERC-20 token and any EVM chain**; through Bitcoin it covers the **Bitcoin family** (Litecoin, Dash, and more). Per-chain details are in [Supported Chains](/docs/firmware/supported-chains).
- New networks arrive via signed firmware updates — see [Firmware](/docs/firmware).