How to set up a PEARL wallet — complete beginner's guide

· by LordKuba

You can't mine PEARL, receive PEARL, or send PEARL without a wallet. This is the no-bullshit guide for setting one up correctly the first time, with the security gotchas that catch most beginners.

What a PEARL wallet actually is

A "wallet" in crypto is misleading — it doesn't store your PEARL. PEARL lives on the chain. Your wallet stores the private keys that prove you own the PEARL at a given prl1… address. Lose the keys, lose the coins. Period.

Pearl uses XMSS post-quantum signatures — a hash-based scheme that's resistant to quantum-computer attacks. The trade-off is that PEARL public keys (and addresses) are larger than Bitcoin's. A typical address looks like prl1pqrw4pw0y03gya5f5jd9lrajjcywm03k6q9d2jefgl8gh258acvnq7am2q8. Don't be alarmed by the length — it's by design.

Step 1 — Install pearld + the wallet binary

The Pearl reference implementation ships as a single tarball with both the full node (pearld) and the wallet (prlwallet). Pull from the official Pearl GitHub releases:

curl -LO https://github.com/PearlChain/pearl/releases/latest/download/pearl-linux-x64.tar.gz
tar xzf pearl-linux-x64.tar.gz
cd pearl/

Mac and Windows builds exist too. Same workflow.

Step 2 — Initialize the node

The wallet needs a Pearl full node to talk to. Start it once to bootstrap:

./bin/pearld --daemon

Initial sync takes a few hours from genesis. While it runs, move on to step 3 — wallet creation doesn't need full sync.

Step 3 — Create a fresh wallet

./bin/prlwallet --create

You'll be prompted for a passphrase. This protects your wallet file at rest — it doesn't replace your keys. Pick something long, write it down somewhere offline, and never reuse it from another service.

The wallet will print a 24-word seed phrase. Write it down by hand on paper. Do not screenshot it. Do not paste it into a notes app. Do not email it. Two copies, two physical locations. This is the single most important security step you'll ever take with PEARL.

Step 4 — Generate your first address

./bin/prlwallet getnewaddress

You'll get back a prl1… string. That's your receive address. Anyone who sends to it credits PEARL to your wallet. Save it; you'll use it for mining payouts and incoming transfers.

Pro tip: paste the address into the search bar at lordofpearls.xyz — you'll get a live wallet page showing balance, transaction history, and (once it's live) your rank in the network.

Step 5 — Verify everything works

Send yourself a tiny amount from another wallet (a faucet, a friend, an exchange withdrawal). Watch it confirm by pasting your address into the explorer. If you see the inbound transaction within a minute or two, your setup is correct.

If you sent and don't see anything, three things to check:

  1. Address format — must start with prl1. If you accidentally used a Bitcoin or Kaspa address, the funds are gone. There is no recovery.
  2. pearld sync status — your wallet won't see deposits until pearld is fully synced. Run ./bin/prlctl getblockcount and compare to the live tip on /stats.
  3. Network selection — make sure your wallet is on mainnet, not a testnet (rare gotcha if you compiled from source).

Step 6 — Back up properly

You should have three independent backups:

  1. The 24-word seed phrase, handwritten on paper, two copies in two places.
  2. A copy of the wallet.dat file (encrypted with your passphrase) on offline storage — USB stick or hardware-encrypted drive.
  3. Optionally, a metal seed-storage plate (Cryptosteel, Cobo Tablet) for fire/water resistance.

If any single backup is destroyed, the others recover you. If all backups are destroyed, your PEARL is unrecoverable. Plan for fire, theft, and accidental disposal — they're the three failure modes that catch most people.

Common mistakes to avoid

How to send PEARL to someone

./bin/prlwallet sendtoaddress prl1...recipient... 100.5

Confirms in seconds. The fee is auto-estimated based on mempool conditions; on Pearl's current low-traffic network it's effectively zero.

Always send a tiny test amount first when transferring to a new address. There is no "undo" button.

FAQ

Is the seed phrase the same as the password?

No. The seed phrase is the master key — it can recreate your entire wallet from scratch on any computer. The password is just encryption-at-rest for the local wallet file. Both matter; the seed phrase matters more.

Can I use a hardware wallet (Ledger, Trezor) for PEARL?

Not yet. PEARL's XMSS signature scheme isn't supported by mainstream hardware wallets as of writing. The official roadmap mentions hardware-wallet support but the timeline is uncertain. Until then, an air-gapped offline machine is the closest equivalent.

Are PEARL transactions reversible?

No. Once a transaction is mined into a block and that block has 6+ confirmations (≈ 6 minutes at Pearl's block time), it's irreversible. Send carefully.

How many addresses can I have?

Unlimited. Your wallet derives addresses deterministically from your seed phrase. prlwallet getnewaddress always gives you a fresh one. The seed phrase backs up all of them.

What if I lose my passphrase but have my seed phrase?

You can recover everything from the seed phrase. Wipe the wallet, reinitialize from seed, set a new passphrase. The on-chain coins are unaffected.

What if I lose my seed phrase but still have wallet.dat?

You can keep using the wallet as long as the file isn't corrupted, but you have no disaster recovery. If wallet.dat is destroyed without the seed phrase, the coins are gone forever. Get the seed phrase backup done immediately.

Next steps

Setting up a wallet correctly takes 30 minutes. Recovering from a botched setup can take forever. Take the time.

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