Coins held with your own keys are only inherited if someone can find and use those keys after you are gone. Many families never learn the coins existed. A plain letter, often called a letter of instruction, fixes most of that, as long as it holds no secrets: it says what exists, where the backups and devices are kept, who can help, and what not to do, but never the seed words or passwords themselves.
This page makes a template, not the letter. Never enter private information online: leave the [PLACEHOLDERS] in, or use made-up examples. Download the template, then fill in the real names, places and firms offline, on your own computer or by hand, and print it. Don't trust, verify: nothing here is saved or sent, and the page keeps working with your internet turned off. Anything that looks like a seed phrase or a private key is blocked.
A letter of instruction is not a will and is not legally binding, so it should never contradict your will. Keep it with your will or estate papers, apart from your seed backups, and keep the passwords and seed words out of the will too: a will can become a public record once it goes through probate. Walk a trusted helper through the letter once, so you know it makes sense to someone who is not you, and review it every year.
Further reading
Ideas to think about, not legal or financial advice. Laws on wills, trusts and digital assets differ by country and state, so check your plan with an estate lawyer where you live.
About bitcoin and other self-held coins
- Inheritance Planning for Cryptocurrencies: 3 Steps in 3 Minutes by Pamela Morgan, a lawyer who wrote a book on the subject. A simple inventory: the exchanges you use (old ones too), each wallet and where its backups are kept, the devices that can reach them, and at least two helpers from different sides of the family.
- Till Death Do Us Fork: Planning Cryptoasset Inheritance (Bitcoin Magazine, 2018). An interview with Morgan on why a plan has to be usable by heirs who may not know what a key or a hardware wallet is.
- Fifteen Men on a Dead Man's Switch by Jameson Lopp. Why he would not trust an automatic "dead man's switch" with savings, and his offline alternative: written recovery steps, tested with the people who will use them, and updated yearly.
- How to set up bitcoin inheritance and What happens to your bitcoin when you die? (River Learn). Two short guides to the ways people pass bitcoin on.
- Inheritance planning on a bitcoin standard (Unchained blog, from a bitcoin custody company). The legal documents of a typical estate plan, such as a will, a trust and a power of attorney, and why moving the keys is a separate job from moving ownership.
About letters of instruction and digital assets in general
- Basic Estate Planning: Letter of Instruction (Ohio State University Extension). What a letter of instruction usually covers: people to contact, where important papers are, what you hold and arrangements already made. It also explains why the letter is not legally binding.
- A Plan for Your Digital Assets (Nolo). Give your executor legal authority in your will, write your wishes in an informal letter, and keep logins out of the will.
- How to Protect Digital Assets in Your Estate Plan (American Bar Association). An inventory of digital assets, bitcoin included, and sample will wording that gives an executor access. Its advice on sharing passwords is about online accounts; for bitcoin, keep seeds and keys out of every letter and will.
- Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act (Uniform Law Commission). The model law that sets when an executor may reach a person's online accounts. The ABA article above says nearly every state has adopted it. It is about accounts held at companies, not coins held with your own keys.
Related lessons: Inheritance: bitcoin that survives you, Inheritance and the stepped-up basis, Storing the seed.