Analysis of 11 Account Abstraction Wallets: How Far Are We from a "Seamless" Crypto Experience?

Author: Biscuit, ChainCatcher

In the cryptocurrency field, users cannot set multiple private keys for the same wallet address, nor can they modify the private key. Therefore, if the private key is lost, not only will the wallet assets be lost, but the wallet will also be permanently unusable and can only be discarded.

According to Conor Grogan, Director of Product Strategy and Business Operations at Coinbase, approximately $1.15 billion worth of cryptocurrency has been permanently lost due to human error. Grogan added that this statistic is far lower than the amount of ETH locked due to lost wallet access, as there are many long-term inactive assets on-chain, making it impossible to determine how many have lost their private keys.

Cryptographic wallets have long been a focus for Ethereum founder Vitalik. Researchers from Nethermind and opengsn, with Vitalik's help, proposed EIP-4337, which presents a solution to bring "account abstraction" to Ethereum without changing any consensus layer protocols. Recently, Vitalik elaborated on his views in his article "How to Choose Guardians for Multi-Signature Wallets and Social Recovery Wallets?", dedicated to promoting the adoption of trusted third parties (Guardians) in cryptocurrency wallets.

Recently, some EIP-4337-based cryptocurrency wallets have begun to emerge, trying to reopen the blue ocean of the cryptocurrency wallet track compared to established wallets like Metamask and Imtoken. This article will briefly introduce the concept of EIP-4337 (account abstraction) and 11 account abstraction wallets, including Argent, Avocado, Braavos, Patch Wallet, Unipass, Opclave, Soul Wallet, and Versa.

What is the Use of EIP-4337?

Currently, Ethereum wallet addresses are divided into EOA accounts (Externally Owned Account) and contract accounts (Contract Account). The EIP-4337 proposal introduces the concept of account abstraction, which can be used to manage multiple contract accounts and external accounts to improve the security and operability of Ethereum accounts. For a deeper understanding of the mechanism, refer to "Can the EIP-4337 Account Abstraction Wallet Solution Open a New Era for Wallets?"

Using EIP-4337 can bring the following benefits:

• More efficient contract deployment and maintenance: Since multiple contracts can share the same address and private key, the workload for contract deployment and maintenance can be reduced.
• Better security: Since account contracts only represent one address and private key, the risk of private key leakage can be minimized.
• Better scalability: Reusable contract code can be implemented more easily, allowing for complex contract logic.

In short, the vision of EIP-4337 is to achieve user-friendliness, primarily from the aspects of usability and social recovery, attracting new users by enhancing the UI experience of cryptocurrency wallets. For example, new users no longer need to write down mnemonic phrases during registration. Users can also recover their wallets through social connections after losing their private keys. Other extended features include multi-account/multi-chain management, bundled transactions, etc., such as allowing wallets to automatically renew services.

However, the challenges in implementing EIP-4337 lie in the complexity of wallets, development costs, compatibility, user privacy, and the higher gas fees generated by complex interactive contracts.

Account Abstraction Wallets

Argent

Argent Wallet is a cryptocurrency wallet designed with a focus on security and ease of use, featuring:

• Social recovery: Argent's social recovery feature allows users to recover their wallets by connecting with trusted contacts. This makes it easier for users to recover their wallets without having to remember complex mnemonic phrases or private keys.
• No need for ETH as gas fees: Argent uses MetaTransaction technology to enable users to send transactions without holding ETH. Specifically, Argent pays gas fees for users through an intermediary service called "Gas Station Network (GSN)" and deducts the corresponding fees from the user's account.
• Attack detection: Argent Wallet employs its own "Guardians" smart contract to automatically detect and prevent phishing attacks, malware attacks, replay attacks, etc. For example, when a user receives an email or SMS that appears to be from the Argent wallet, the Guardians contract checks whether the information comes from official Argent channels. If it detects that the information is not from official channels, the Guardians contract will automatically prevent the user from executing any transactions related to that information.

Currently, Argent has completed three rounds of financing, raising a total of $56 million, with investors including Fabric Ventures, Metaplanet, Paradigm, StarkWare, Jump Crypto, and Animoca Brands. The current user base of Argent Wallet is relatively small, mainly due to the stability of ZK networks and the lack of support for storing and trading multiple cryptocurrencies.

Avocado (Instadapp)

Instadapp is a DeFi protocol based on Ethereum, aimed at making DeFi simpler and easier to manage. The protocol has launched an account abstraction-based wallet, Avocado, which features:

• Multi-chain support: Avocado supports multiple blockchains, allowing users to manage various cryptocurrencies within the same wallet, with all gas fees paid in USDC.
• Security assurance: Avocado Wallet employs multi-signature technology and smart contracts to ensure the security of users' digital assets, and it also supports hardware wallet connections.
• DeFi services: Users can directly access various decentralized applications within the Avocado Wallet, such as lending, trading, and stablecoins. Additionally, users can use all current Instadapp strategies for free.
• Community governance: Avocado Wallet adopts a DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) governance model, allowing users to participate in wallet decision-making and development through voting.

Currently, Instadapp has completed two rounds of financing, raising a total of $12.4 million, with investors including Coinbase Ventures, Pantera Capital, Standard Crypto, Robot Ventures, and Balaji Srinivasan. At this stage, the total TVL of multiple products from Instadapp exceeds $2 billion, and Avocado, as its integrated wallet, enjoys the advantages of network effects, such as using flash loans without fees, offering a $1 USDC gas fee subsidy, and free use of Instadapp's automated investment strategies.

Braavos

Braavos is an open-source account abstraction layer that provides a simple way to manage multiple accounts and offers a unified interface for applications. Its features include:

• Multi-account support: Braavos supports managing multiple accounts, including bank accounts, Alipay, PayPal, etc.
• Unified API: Braavos provides a unified API, allowing applications to use the same code to handle different account types.
• Security: Braavos uses the OAuth2 protocol for authorization and authentication, ensuring data security.
• Easy to extend: The design of Braavos makes it easy to extend to support new account types and services.
• Automation: Braavos automatically handles account balances and transaction histories, allowing applications to focus on core business logic.

Currently, Braavos has completed $10 million in financing, led by Pantera Capital, with participation from StarkWare, Crypto.com Capital, Matrixport Ventures, and others. Braavos's hardware security module is implemented through account abstraction, capable of verifying arbitrary signatures.

UniPass

UniPass Wallet is a smart contract wallet solution that supports on-chain email social recovery, aimed at providing a user experience familiar to Web2 users, with the following features:

• Compatible with ERC-4337: Users can activate ERC-4337 compatible mode by adding a 4337 module transaction in the MainModule. Once activated, transactions initiated by users will be submitted to the Bundler through standard ERC-4337 verification methods. Users can also sign UniPass transactions and submit them to Relayer for on-chain processing.
• Email recovery: Users can set multiple internet email accounts as guardians for their accounts. By submitting the emails to the on-chain smart contract, users can recover their wallet private keys. When users have more than two guardian emails (including the primary email), they can use these two emails to submit account recovery emails and immediately restore the account. When users only have one guardian email, they typically need to wait for a 48-hour lock-up period to recover the account.
• No gas experience: UniPass provides a default relay node that accepts gas payments in native tokens and mainstream stablecoins.

UniPass completed seed round financing in April 2022, with participation from HashKey Capital. Compared to other wallets, UniPass supports all EVM blockchains, and mainstream non-EVM chains are also on the roadmap. Additionally, UniPass emphasizes developer experience, offering multiple SDKs for integration into dApps.

[Soul Wallet](https://www.rootdata.com/zh/Projects/detail/Soul Wallet?k=MTk2MQ==)

Soul Wallet is a plugin wallet that enables users to: 1. Create wallets without mnemonic phrases 2. Maintain wallets by changing signature keys 3. Reduce gas fees by 30% through signature aggregation 4. Support USDC for transaction payments 5. Be sponsored by third parties, eliminating gas fees 6. Bundle multiple transactions together.

Soul Wallet completed a $3.1 million seed round financing on March 16, with participation from Struck Crypto, NGC Ventures, Alchemy, Signum Capital, and others. Its founder [Zeng Jiajun](https://www.rootdata.com/zh/member/detail/Zeng Jiajun?k=MTQ0OTM=) is a former product manager at ByteDance and Meituan, and Soul Wallet plans to launch in the third or fourth quarter.

Versa

Versa is a one-stop UX simplified smart contract wallet that allows users to easily access keyless and social login cryptocurrency wallets, manage gas, recover on-chain accounts, set up automatic spending, and automate investment strategies. Versa announced the completion of seed round financing on March 23, with participation from STEPN developer Find Satoshi Lab, Folius Ventures, and several angel investors. Currently, Versa is in a closed testing phase.

Peaze

Peaze is a wallet that allows users to access Web3 applications via email and credit card. Peaze utilizes smart contracts to control private key access and signatures. When a user confirms a transaction, a standard transaction signature is generated, triggering an entry process that charges the user's fiat payment method and sends the appropriate amount of cryptocurrency to their wallet. Any necessary exchange/bridging processes are also executed in this step.

Opclave

Opclave allows users to create and use non-custodial wallets with touch/face ID without seed phrases. Opclave improves the SC accounts of the OP Stack using ERC-4337, employing AppleEnclave abstracted signatures, with the core idea of turning Apple devices, such as iPhones and MacBooks, into hardware wallets. Opclave was the winner of the Ethereum scaling hackathon, Hack the Stack.

Patch Wallet

Patch Wallet is a cryptocurrency wallet that supports login via GitHub/Twitter/Email without requiring seed phrases. This wallet supports multiple mainstream cryptocurrencies, allowing users to manage various cryptocurrencies within the same wallet. Users can also easily manage and switch between multiple accounts without re-importing private keys. Additionally, Patch Wallet supports hardware wallets, allowing users to store private keys in hardware devices for enhanced security.

ZeroDev

ZeroDev is an SDK built on ERC-4337 for creating Web3 applications powered by account abstraction. Using ZeroDev, developers can create user-friendly applications that allow users to recover accounts through friends without mnemonic phrases, enable third-party payments to completely skip GAS, and merge transaction steps to improve user experience, saving time and costs while enhancing security.

Sequence
Sequence Wallet is a non-custodial wallet designed for seamless integration, compatible with all EVM public chains, supporting social/email logins, fiat payment providers like Moonpay and Ramp, and allowing various currencies to pay gas fees, etc.

Summary

Wallets based on ERC-4337 focus on abstracting underlying functionalities, with social recovery, no native gas fees, and bundled transactions significantly enhancing the UI experience. Additionally, modular development platforms integrating ERC-4377 may become mainstream, such as Patch, Sequence, and the unlisted Gelote.

Account abstraction wallets may need a more "Make Sense" case for widespread adoption. Currently, the "no gas fee" slogans of multiple projects can be somewhat misleading, as the underlying logic merely allows users to pay gas with non-ETH tokens like USDC, and subsidy strategies seem to have limited effectiveness. On the other hand, the multi-chain dilemma of wallets has not seen significant improvement. Wallets claiming to achieve "multi-chain" functionality are primarily aimed at EVM-compatible chains, while ecosystems like zk-SNARKs, Move, and Solana still suffer from isolation effects.

Smart contract wallets are becoming a trend, with other competitors emerging in the segmented track. MPC wallets distribute private keys across multiple devices, achieving keyless and social recovery functionalities through multi-party computation. For example, on March 7, the MPC wallet Capsule announced completion of financing led by a16z, expanding on-chain transaction use cases by introducing programmable MPC. Meanwhile, Telegram, with its vast user base, plans to launch a cryptocurrency wallet, which currently supports direct trading of BTC, TON, and USDT within the app's chat interface. These competitors are also vying for users and continuously rolling out new features and services.