How can we help?

We run a BTCPay Server in Switzerland. On it you get your own store for accepting Bitcoin payments – straight into your own wallet.

BTCPay Server is free, open-source software used around the world. We take care of the server, maintenance and updates; you take care of selling.

Click “Get started” and enter your email address. You receive your login details by email and can try it free for 30 days – no payment details needed.

• Pricing and how the plan works

An email address and a Bitcoin wallet – ideally a new one used only for BTCPay (see “Wallet”). For the point of sale, a tablet, phone or computer with a browser is enough.

For Lightning you also need your own Lightning node. That’s optional: Bitcoin payments work without it.

Your space in BTCPay Server: this is where you connect your wallet and set up your point of sale, invoices, donation campaigns or shop integration. You can also create several stores, for example to keep shop and club separate.

No. You need a wallet and should know how to keep your recovery words (seed) safe. The guides on this page explain everything else.

The checkout page for your customers is available in many languages – your customers can switch it themselves.

The admin area where you set up your store is in English, so its terms match the official BTCPay documentation and guides on the web. Our guides name the menus exactly as you see them.

• What’s what?

The most important terms in the admin area – and what we call them on this website:

Store

Your space with wallet, point of sale, invoices and settings.

Wallets

Where you connect your Bitcoin wallet and your Lightning node.

Invoices

Every payment – anything paid via point of sale, shop or link shows up here.

Point of Sale

The point of sale.

Payment Requests

Invoices to share by link.

Crowdfund

Donation campaign with a goal.

Subscriptions

Recurring payments from your customers.

Pull Payments, Payouts

Refunds and payouts by link.

Reporting

Reports and export for your accounts.

Any Bitcoin wallet that can show or export its extended public key (xpub, zpub …) – for example Sparrow, Electrum or BlueWallet – or a hardware wallet such as Ledger, Trezor or Coldcard.

• Wallet overview on bitcoin.org
• Guide: connect a wallet

Yes, but we recommend a new wallet used only for BTCPay.

Through the public key the server knows every address of that wallet – and therefore every payment to it. With a separate wallet for BTCPay, the rest of your bitcoin stays private.

Also, BTCPay doesn’t detect earlier payments to a wallet that has already been used. With a new wallet, balance and history are right from the start.

The extended public key (xpub, often zpub in newer wallets) is a kind of “address book generator”: BTCPay uses it to create a fresh address for every invoice. It can’t spend anything – that takes your private key, which stays in your wallet.

No. Payments go straight into your wallet, and the server only knows your public key. You sign payouts and refunds yourself – with your wallet or hardware wallet.

Usually it’s the so-called gap limit: if many invoices stay unpaid, BTCPay skips addresses and your wallet doesn’t look far enough. Increase the gap limit in your wallet (for example in Sparrow or Electrum) – then the payments appear.

In BTCPay itself you see all payments under “Wallets” and on each invoice.

Not automatically: BTCPay Server receives bitcoin and doesn’t pay out francs. If you want to convert, send bitcoin from your wallet to a provider of your choice.

BTCPay sees a Bitcoin payment immediately; it becomes final once confirmed by the network – usually within minutes to about an hour. In your store you decide after how many confirmations an invoice counts as paid. Lightning payments are final immediately.

A payment network on top of Bitcoin: payments arrive in seconds and usually cost a fraction of a cent. Ideal for the point of sale and small amounts.

We deliberately don’t provide a Lightning node for customer funds. Otherwise your earnings would sit with us – and that’s exactly what we don’t want: your money belongs in your hands.

With your own node, Lightning stays as independent as Bitcoin itself.

• Set up Lightning – all options

No. Bitcoin payments work without Lightning. Lightning is mainly worth it for the point of sale and small amounts.

Nothing with us – Lightning is included in your plan, and we charge no fees on your payments. The network fees of a Lightning payment are tiny and paid by the sender.

Your own node may have costs: for example for channels with inbound capacity or a hosted service. Those costs don’t go to us.

• Good to know before you start

In a few minutes – with keypad, product list or cart.

• Guide: set up the point of sale
• All about the point of sale

With a payment request: enter the amount in francs, share the link, done – with an expiry date and instalments if you like.

• Guide: create a payment request
• All about invoices

There are official plugins for WooCommerce, Shopware, PrestaShop, Magento and more. Shopify is possible on request, because it needs a plugin on the server.

• Guide: connect WooCommerce
• All about online shops

By link: you create the refund on the invoice, your customer enters their Bitcoin address, and you approve the payout.

• Guide: refunds

Under “Reporting” you find payments, items sold and wallet transactions – as an overview and as a CSV export for your accounts. You can also print payment requests.

Yes. In the store settings under “Users” you invite others and give them a role – for example only for the point of sale or for full management.

In the store settings under “Emails” you set rules, for example an email for every paid invoice. For your own workflows there are webhooks.

Yes. In the point of sale you set a tax rate – for the whole point of sale or per item, prices including VAT if you like, and for tips too.

Without your own setting, your store’s emails – such as payment confirmations to your customers – go out through our mail service, from hoi (at) bitcoinpayments.ch. That works straight away.

You should set up your own email sending, though: then the emails come from your address, and your customers’ replies reach you instead of us.

1. In your store, open “Settings → Emails”.
2. Turn on “Use custom SMTP settings for this store”.
3. Enter your email provider’s SMTP details – server, port, sender, login, password – and save.
4. Send a test email to check that everything arrives.

The first 30 days are free, after that your plan costs CHF 9.90 a month. We charge no fees on your payments – only the usual Bitcoin network fees apply, and they go to the network, not to us.

• Pricing and network fees

In bitcoin, via your billing portal in BTCPay. A few days before it expires you get a reminder with a payment link. You can also top up credit for several months – then your plan renews automatically.

You get a reminder before it ends. If you pay, your plan continues. If you don’t, it ends with the trial – your account is locked, not deleted. Pay what’s due and you’re back right away. The 7-day grace period applies from your first paid month.

You don’t have to – there’s no contract and no notice period. If you stop paying, your plan ends by itself after the 7-day grace period. Your money is in your wallet anyway.

A locked account is kept until you ask us to delete it – at the latest 6 months after your plan ends, we delete it. Records of your payments are kept for ten years, as bookkeeping law requires.

• How long we keep data

After every payment you get a confirmation by email to the address you signed up with – keep it as your receipt. The billing portal shows your balance and next payment date.

Our server is in Switzerland – that is where your account and store are stored. On the way there, the connection passes through Cloudflare and an upstream server in the EU. The Swiss Federal Act on Data Protection (FADP) applies.

• Privacy

As operators of the server we can see your store’s data: invoices, amounts and the details you ask your customers for – and, via your public key, the addresses of your connected wallet.

What we can’t see or do: your private keys and your seed. That’s why we can neither move nor spend your bitcoin.

Lightning: if you connect your own node, you are responsible for its configuration. Give the connection only the right to create invoices – if you allow more, the server operator can access your node too.

BTCPay Server is open source – every line of code is public, and it’s used around the world. We keep the server up to date. For your account we recommend two-factor login.

• Guide: two-factor login

Your money is safe – it sits in your wallet, not with us. During an outage you can’t accept new payments. You can see the current state on the status page.

• Status

Yes. We back up the database every four hours and everything else every night – while the server keeps running, without interruption. The backups are encrypted and stored in several places: in Switzerland and on a server in an EU/EEA country. So your store can be restored even after a total failure; at worst, the changes of the last few hours are missing.

Your bitcoin aren’t part of it – they sit in your wallet. You back up your recovery words yourself.

• Guide: connect your wallet
• Privacy

The invoice then stays partially paid. You can request the rest – for example with a new invoice – or refund the paid part.

The invoice counts as paid and the overpayment is noted. You can return the overpayment with a refund.

• Guide: refunds

Invoices have a time limit so the rate stays fair. If a payment arrives later, BTCPay shows this on the invoice. You decide whether to mark it as paid or refund it.

Reset your password on the login page with “Forgot password?”. If your plan has expired, you get back in via the billing portal as soon as you’ve paid.

Check the status page for a known outage. Your money is safe in your wallet either way.

• Status

How to connect your Bitcoin wallet to your store. You only share the public key.

1. Create a new wallet in your wallet app, used only for BTCPay, and write the recovery words (seed) down on paper.
2. Log in to BTCPay and open “Wallets → Bitcoin” in your store.
3. Choose “Connect an existing wallet” and a method: hardware wallet (via BTCPay Vault), import a wallet file (for example from Sparrow or Electrum), enter the xpub or scan a QR code.
4. BTCPay shows you the first addresses. Compare them with the receiving addresses in your wallet – they must match.
5. Confirm, done: from now on all payments go to this wallet.

• BTCPay docs: Wallet

A point of sale for a shop, market or club.

1. Open “Point of Sale” in your store and create a new point of sale.
2. Choose the view: keypad (free amounts), product list, product list with cart, or print view. The print view needs Lightning: the generated QR codes contain LNURL links – turn on “LNURL” in your store’s Lightning settings.
3. Add your items with price, picture and description – or just use the keypad.
4. Turn on tips, discounts and tax rate if needed, then save.
5. Open the point of sale (“View”) on a tablet or phone and add it to the home screen via the browser menu.

• All about the point of sale

An invoice to share by link.

1. Open “Payment Requests” in your store and create a new request.
2. Enter title, amount and currency (CHF), plus expiry date, note and your email for notifications if needed.
3. Allow instalments with the corresponding option.
4. Save and share the link by email or chat – or put it on your invoice as a QR code.

• BTCPay docs: Payment Requests

Bitcoin and Lightning at the checkout of your WordPress shop.

1. In WordPress, install the plugin “BTCPay for WooCommerce V2”.
2. Open the plugin settings and enter btcpay.bitcoinpayments.ch as the server address.
3. Click “Generate API Key”, log in to BTCPay, choose your store and confirm the permissions.
4. Back in WordPress, the key and webhook are set up automatically. Check that the webhook status is green.
5. Make a test purchase – done.

• BTCPay docs: WooCommerce

Money back to your customer, without having to ask for an address.

1. Open the invoice under “Invoices” and choose “Issue a refund”.
2. Choose payment method and amount – BTCPay creates a refund page.
3. Send the link to your customer. They enter their Bitcoin address there.
4. Under “Payouts” you approve the payout and sign it with your wallet.

• BTCPay docs: Refunds

Protects your account in addition to your password.

1. Open your account (“Account”) in BTCPay and then “Two-Factor Authentication”.
2. Scan the QR code with an authenticator app on your phone.
3. Enter the code shown and keep the recovery codes somewhere safe.