(Note: this is an unofficial tutorial created by me as a Nimiq community member, rather than by a member of the Nimiq team. I look forward to receiving feedback regarding this tutorial from both the Nimiq team and fellow Nimiq community members!)
Once you have successfully created your first Nimiq account, you will have a Nimiq wallet featuring one account. That one account will have one address each for USDC on Polygon and NIM. Meanwhile, the Nimiq wallet generates single-use addresses for Bitcoin – as a privacy feature – even though the Bitcoin is all going to the same place.
However, it is possible to create both additional Nimiq accounts within the Nimiq wallet, and also to add additional NIM addresses to the NIM panel within each account. Your motivation for creating additional NIM addresses might be privacy/obfuscation or maybe even to trial sending NIM back and forward to yourself between to addresses as a learning experience! You might want to hold the main balance of your NIM on an address which you never share details of. You would share details of another NIM address and transfer the NIM from the publicly-disclosed address NIM to the undisclosed NIM address. (Although obviously all transactions on are publicly viewable via a blockchain explorer.)
Meanwhile, reasons for creating additional Nimiq accounts include security and plausible deniability. One common use case is to only ever login to the Nimiq account in which most of your funds are stored from one home computer – you could think of this account as your secure “safe”. Meanwhile, you could be logged in on your mobile device to another Nimiq account, which might only contain small balances of NIM and USDC, but no Bitcoin – you could think of this account as your easily accessible “pocket money”. Note that the advent of the forthcoming Nimiq Pay app may potentially render redundant the idea of having an additional account for your mobile device. However, the plausible deniability use case for creating additional Nimiq accounts will continue to be valid.
Below, I first outline how to create an additional NIM address, and then explain how to rename a Nimiq wallet account, wallet address label and login file. Additional accounts in your Nimiq wallet can be created by following the same procedure by which you created your first Nimiq account. (From the Nimiq wallet, click on the button named “Red Account” – your account may be a different colour – then click on the “Add account” button. From there, the procedure is the same as outlined here.)
How to create a new NIM address
1. In the Nimiq wallet, bring the account in which you want to create the new NIM address to the front. (This step only applies if you already have more than one account.)
2. In the main panel, directly beneath “Total Balance”, click on the “+” sign on the NIM panel.
3. To add a new address, you first need to unlock your account.
4. Enter your account password.
5. Click on “Continue”.
6. Click on an Avatar to choose an address.
7. If you like, you can rename the address. To do this, simply click in the address name box and start typing.
8. Click on “Add to account”.
9. You will then see a green box with a checkmark confirming that your “New Address added to your Account!”
10. Your new NIM address is now listed below any existing NIM addresses on the NIM panel.
11. Congratulations on creating an additional NIM address in your account!
Renaming a Nimiq wallet account, wallet address label and login file.
If you create multiple accounts in your Nimiq wallet, you will eventually create an account with the same colour as one of your existing accounts. To avoid confusion, you will want to rename one of the two accounts which have the same colour, and also rename the corresponding address label and login file. For example, if you have two accounts named Orange Account, you could choose to rename one of them “Marigold Account” (marigold being an orange-coloured flower). To rename the account/address label/login file:
1. In the Nimiq wallet, navigate to the account which you wish to rename.
2. Navigate to the NIM panel lick on the NIM panel. (One the left hand side, underneath “Total Balance”, click on the “Yellow Address” – your address may have a different colour.)
3. Next, in the top right hand corner, hover your mouse on the funny identicon.
4. Click on the gear icon.
5. Click “Rename”.
6. On the pop-up window entitled “Rename Account”, click on the fields for “Orange Account” and “Orange Address” (or whatever colour your account is) and rename them.
7. Click the blue button to “Save”.
8. Next, click on the “Marigold Account” button (or whatever new name you’ve given your account) at the foot of the left hand panel.
9. On the menu, click on the first option, “Save Login File”.
10. Click on the blue button “Continue to Login File”.
11. Enter your password.
12. Click on the white button “Unlock”.
13. Click on the blue button “Download” to download your renamed login file. (Note that the new name which you choose for your account appears in the image file.)
14. Save the login file to your computer.
15. Click “Continue”.
16. Delete the login file with the old account name. (Caution: make sure to choose the correct login file to delete if you have two login files with the same name! If you are not sure, then check the respective dates of creation on the bottom right hand corner of the login file images.)
17. Congratulations – you have successfully renamed your Nimiq wallet account, wallet address label and login file.