Burner brings ENS to hardware wallets

Videos of a colorful, thin hardware wallet that could be mistaken for a credit card have been circulating online.

Creators like Jesse Pollack and Naomi (@afrochicksnft) have been spotted giving packets of wallets away on the street.

Why are these wallets gaining so much attention?

Hardware wallets have a familiar connotation of being "expensive tech for the experts." They've got a style too—black or steel gray usually, with a build similar to a hard drive or USB stick.

But that image is changing. Burner, a compact, colorful, and cheap ($9) hardware wallet, is bringing hard wallets to the masses. And by integrating ENS subdomains brnr.eth into its setup experience, Burner is setting a new standard of user-friendliness for hard wallets.

What is Burner doing differently?

Burner's mission is simple: create a lightweight, secure hardware wallet designed to make owning crypto for yourself or gifting it to others easy. They're doing so via a few key strategies:

1. A post-worthy aesthetic: Choose a card from a full spectrum of colors.
1. No app required: Burner operates directly through a browser via NFC tap, no software installations needed.

But what about using it? Is it just as easy?

Simply put, yes. Burner took the additional step to make transacting even easier by adding gasless ENS subdomains to the setup process. This means the little purple hardware wallet that fits in your real wallet isn't called 0xe7E9dcd988793ce820FDEb75e162ea5106A746E5, but rather emily.brnr.eth.

Why add ENS subdomains to hardware wallets?

ENS has been around since 2016, long enough for the default question people should be asking when sending crypto to be "What's your .eth?" While a growing number of companies have ensured people can use their own ENS names with their products, Burner has upped the ante by handing users a brnr.eth subname immediately during setup. In doing so, their users can enjoy ENS benefits like:

Frictionless Gifting and Transactions:

Instead of typing 0x8f3d...92ac when sending or receiving funds, a user simply enters jane.brnr.eth.
Branded wallet personalization:

Crypto owners often have multiple wallets. Having a name attached to a hardware wallet like cole.brnr.eth makes it clear from the get-go it's a user's Burner wallet. Attaching branded subdomains to their wallet also increases awareness of Burner's brand.

Burner’s integration of ENS subdomains is about more than just convenience—it’s about simplifying the relationship between users and blockchain tech. There's no reason using a hardware wallet shouldn't be as easy as paying back a friend for lunch on an app like Venmo. With wallets as "giveawayable" as these, web3 is headed for even broader adoption.

Want to learn more?

Burner's brnr.eth subdomains are powered by NameStone's API, which enables the creation of gasless ENS subdomains. Grab a free API key here. Reach out to slobo.eth on Telegram with questions.