What is a Hot Wallet?

A hot wallet is a crypto wallet whose private key is stored on an internet-connected device — phone, desktop, or browser. MetaMask, Phantom, Trust Wallet, Coinbase Wallet, and Rabby are leading examples. Strengths include speed, dApp interaction, swap and NFT mint flows; weaknesses include exposure of the private key or seed to a much wider attack surface (clipboard hijack, browser exploits, malware, fake extensions). The standard recommendation is to keep only 'spending money' in hot wallets and to hold long-term positions in a hardware/cold setup. Smart-contract approval calls are the single largest risk for a hot wallet: an unbounded allowance, once granted, can drain the wallet via a single subsequent malicious transaction. Periodic allowance hygiene with tools such as revoke.cash is essential. Multi-sig hot wallets (Safe) add a layer of protection because no single signer can unilaterally move funds. Seed phrases must never be backed up to cloud services (iCloud, Google Drive, email) and should be stored on physical, encrypted, redundant media.