How to Create a Coinbase Account

Create a Coinbase account with ease. Use this illustrative guide to create a Coinbase account for buying, selling, and storing cryptocurrencies.

What’s even more interesting is that Coinbase supports about 32 countries and these are not limited to the U.S., Austria, Switzerland, Spain, Malta, Finland, The Netherlands, and Portugal. The potential of creating a Coinbase account is limitless irrespective of where you reside globally.

Who is Coinbase?

Coinbase is a cryptocurrency exchange headquartered in San Francisco, California, in the United States. It was founded on June 20, 2012, by Brian Armstrong, and Fred Ehrsam. As a broker exchange, it serves as a platform for buying, selling, withdrawing, and depositing Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, Stellar Lumens, Zcash, among several other digital assets.

It’s also worthy to note that Coinbase provides its users with a wallet for sending and receiving cryptocurrencies. If you’d rather have a secure platform to accumulate your virtual assets, this would be it. There are also different versions of the platform such as the Coinbase Pro and Coinbase Prime, a trading platform for financial institutions.

Why You Need a Coinbase Account

Admittedly, there are several cryptocurrency exchanges based in different jurisdictions and as such, it could be difficult to make a decision on which to trust with your hard-earned money. Concerns that may arise include, “is its level of security beef up to withstand the prevalent hacks in the crypto space?”, “does it rarely experience downtime that could potentially impact your trades?”

Nonetheless, these and many more are some considerations you need to make before settling for an exchange/wallet. Consequently, Coinbase has met these criteria and more, and so here are some reasons why you need a Coinbase account:

1. User Interface:

Have you just taken baby steps into the cryptocurrency space? Then you need a cryptocurrency market that offers one of the simplest to use interface. This is because there will definitely be a lot of functionality to work with and as such, it should be very easy to navigate even without resorting to YouTube videos. Now, if that sounds good to you, you need to try Coinbase.

2. Level of Security:

It’s no longer news that a number of digital currency exchanges have been hacked in 2019, with some exchanges being hacked multiple times. Nonetheless, Coinbase continues to work on better ways of protecting customers funds. This is because the platform’s level of security is constantly being updated to eliminate loopholes. There are bounty programs running occasionally to discover bugs which have helped in keeping Coinbase safe.

How Do You Create a Coinbase Account?

After being armed with this information, here are the simple steps on how to create a Coinbase account in 2019:

Step 1: Create an Account:

• From a web browser such as Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, or Safari, go to https://www.coinbase.com/
• In the spaces provided, carefully enter your ‘First Name’, ‘Last Name’, ‘Email Address’, and ‘Password’ (for security reasons, choose an alphanumeric password combination, it’s most secure when the indicator turns green).
• Accept the terms and conditions by ticking the checkbox.
• Click on ‘Create Account’.

Click on ‘Next’.

Accept the privacy policy by selecting ‘I acknowledge’.

You can optionally choose to allow email notifications.

Solve the captcha (it is appears) puzzle by selecting the images you have been asked to.

Step 2: Verify Email and Phone Number

• Next, go to your email and click the confirmation message from Coinbase in order to activate your account.

• You’ll be redirected to a page to choose your country and enter your phone number.
• Click on ‘Send Code’.

A seven-digit code will be sent to your number, enter it in the text field, and then click on ‘Submit’.

Step 3: Verify Identity:

According to Coinbase, financial regulators demand that it requests personal information about customers it serves on its platform. It can be assumed that this is in a bid to meet the KYC requirements in order to curb money laundering and other criminal use of cryptocurrencies.

Accordingly, you’ll need to provide details such as your:

• First Name
• Last Name
• Date of Birth
• Street Address
• Postal Code
• Country
• Unit
• What will you use Coinbase for
• Your source of funds
• Current Occupation
• Employer

Keep in mind that you need to supply the correct information because you will need to present either a driver’s license, passport, or photo identification in order to complete your account registration on the Coinbase platform.

However, these requirements may differ depending on the country you’re registering from and if it is the U.S, for instance, it is mandatory to supply them before you can trade. Other countries may not require it and if that’s so in your case, you can proceed to trade with your newly created account (check step 4).

• Choose a type of ID such as ‘Passport,’ ‘Driver’s License,’ or ‘Photo ID’.

• If it’s Photo ID you’ve settled for, then you choose between taking a picture or presenting an existing ID.
• If you have settled to take a live picture of your ID, proceed to turn on your webcam by clicking on ‘Allow’ on the pop-up notification.

First, you’ll need to take a picture of the front of your ID and as such, select ‘I’m ready’.

• Now, capture the back of your ID and select ‘Next’.
• And finally, a personal picture of yourself.
• Once you’ve submitted these items, Coinbase will begin an automatic verification of your account.

Upon verification, you can start trading on Coinbase.

Step 4: Buy, Sell, and Trading Using Coinbase Wallet

Now that your Coinbase account has been set up, you can start trading on the platform right away. You can also opt to buy bitcoin on Coinbase using your credit card or bank on the U.S. based cryptocurrency exchange. You can also proceed to set up two-factor authentication to secure your account.

Conclusion

After going through these steps on how to create a Coinbase account, you’ll agree that it’s pretty easy. Owning a Coinbase account means that you can store your cryptocurrencies on Coinbase’s built-in wallets which makes you trade between virtual assets without the need to transfer back and forth from your hardware wallet. Nonetheless, users are always advised not to leave so much that they can afford to lose on exchanges since they may still be susceptible to some level of attack.