Yoroi Wallet Recovery: Restore Access to Your ADA After SecondFi

Your Yoroi wallet still opens. Just not in Yoroi. EMURGO announced in April 2026 that Yoroi would become SecondFi, and after a security incident that June the service is being wound down for good. A forgotten spending password, a rejected recovery phrase, a new or broken phone, and an old Byron-era wallet each call for a different fix, and this Yoroi wallet recovery guide covers each one.

Start with what happened, because it decides which route is safe for you. Between 21 and 23 June 2026, attackers drained about 16.1 million ADA from 374 wallets. SecondFi traced it to a flaw in how the app built the signature on each transaction: a number that was supposed to stay secret could, under certain conditions, be worked out from ordinary public blockchain data, which let an attacker rebuild the private key of an affected address. SecondFi has since said it is winding down SecondFi and the Yoroi wallet, and that users should move their assets to a wallet of their own (SecondFi incident FAQ).

This reverses the usual advice. SecondFi places the vulnerability at the level of the address and its private key, not the app, so carrying the same recovery phrase into Lace or Daedalus does not clean an affected wallet: a compromised key stays exposed in whatever app you import it into. For an affected wallet the phrase is spent, and the official recovery process is the route. For everyone else the phrase still works. You just use it to leave, not to reinstall.

No legitimate service, EMURGO included, will ever ask you to hand over your recovery phrase, and an upfront payment cannot guarantee the return of stolen ADA.

What you need to recover your Yoroi wallet

Yoroi recovery comes down to two things: your recovery phrase, and knowing which type of wallet you had.

• Your recovery phrase. This is the list of words Yoroi showed you when you first set up the wallet. Every wallet created inside Yoroi gets a 15-word phrase. Yoroi can also restore a 24-word phrase if your wallet came from another Cardano app. It won’t accept a 12-word Byron phrase through its standard restore route; legacy Cardano wallets require a compatible Byron restore route, so rejection here does not mean the phrase belongs to another blockchain. The words and their order are the wallet, so keep them offline and never type them into a website.
• Your spending password is not your recovery phrase. The spending password is a short password stored only on your device, and it approves sending transactions. It never leaves your computer or phone, so no email or reset link can bring it back, but you don’t need it back: a phrase restore replaces it.
• Which era: Byron or Shelley. Cardano changed its wallet format in 2020. Wallets made after July 29, 2020 are Shelley wallets, the standard type that supports staking. Older ones are Byron wallets, and Yoroi ended support for Byron-era wallets in 2023. Daedalus asks which type you’re restoring, and picking the wrong one is a common reason a restored wallet looks empty. Not sure which you had? You can try both, as covered further down.

How to get your ADA out of Yoroi

Four situations, four different routes. Find yours before you touch anything, because the wrong first move closes options.

You can still open the app. Then don’t restore your phrase anywhere. Update SecondFi from the App Store or Google Play and use the migration tool built into it, which sends your ADA, Cardano native tokens and NFTs to a wallet you create with another provider. SecondFi is specific about that destination: give it a new recovery phrase, don’t reuse the words your old wallet used, and don’t send to an exchange deposit address. The tool moves Cardano assets only, so move anything else separately. Leave the SecondFi app and the old wallet in place afterwards, because the claims process may need them. If you still run the old Yoroi app and never updated to SecondFi, SecondFi’s migration FAQ says the tool does not apply to you and you should not install SecondFi to protect or access your assets; it points you to restoring the phrase in another trusted Cardano wallet.

Your wallet is flagged as affected. The app shows a warning banner, and SecondFi’s official checker, checker.secondfi.io, works without the app. Stop there. Don’t move funds yourself, don’t withdraw staking rewards, don’t claim tokens or rewards to that address, and don’t import the phrase into another wallet, because none of that removes an exposure that lives in the key. Follow the official recovery process and file a claim in the app or through support.secondfi.io.

You used a hardware wallet with Yoroi. SecondFi’s assessment is that hardware wallets were not affected, through either app, because the keys never left the device. Set the device up with another Cardano wallet’s official hardware integration and your ADA stays exactly where it is.

You can’t open the app at all. A new phone, a dead laptop, a forgotten spending password: the migration tool is out of reach and the phrase is your way back in. Check the wallet’s status with the official checker first; if it is affected, use the claims process above. If it is not, restore the phrase in a maintained Cardano wallet such as Lace or Daedalus (steps below), then send the balance on to a second wallet you created with a fresh phrase. Retire the old words once you’re out.

One rule survives all four: type your recovery phrase only into wallet software you downloaded yourself from its official site. No website needs it, no support agent needs it, and anything asking for it online is a scam.

How to restore your Yoroi wallet

Restoring re-creates the wallet from your phrase and lets you set a new spending password along the way. It works on any device, which is the whole point of writing the phrase down. With SecondFi closing, the destination is a maintained Cardano wallet rather than Yoroi itself.

1. Confirm the phrase first: check every word against the BIP-39 word list, watch for autocorrect swaps, and count the words: 15 for a wallet created in Yoroi, 24 if it came from another Cardano app.
2. Install Lace (browser extension or phone) or Daedalus (desktop) from its official site only. Fake wallet apps and extensions exist, so check the link before you install.
3. Choose the restore option. Lace asks for the phrase and which blockchains to restore. In Daedalus, choose “Yoroi wallet,” then “15 words (Shelley wallet)” or “15 words (Byron legacy wallet)”; a 24-word phrase goes under “Daedalus wallet,” then “24 words (Shelley wallet).” A Byron wallet needs Daedalus.
4. Enter the words in order, in lower case with a single space between them. Lace notes that capital letters and spacing are the commonest cause of a rejected phrase, and that failed attempts are harmless: there is no lockout.
5. Set a new spending password when prompted and write it down offline before you close the app.
6. Send the balance on to a second wallet you created with a new phrase, and delegate your stake again from there if you want to keep earning rewards.

Lace’s support takes a stricter line than SecondFi: it treats any phrase created in Yoroi or SecondFi as affected by the incident whichever app you use, and sends those users to SecondFi’s checker and support. That is one more reason to use a restored Yoroi phrase only to move your funds to a wallet with a new phrase, never to keep using it. If the checker lists your wallet as affected, do not restore it anywhere.

Troubleshooting common restoration issues

Most recoveries stall on one of these. Find yours.

“Invalid recovery phrase” or a word won’t verify

If the restore screen rejects the phrase or won’t let you confirm, the words don’t form a valid Cardano phrase. Yoroi’s own restore screen shows “Incorrect recovery phrase. Try again” in this case, according to its restore guide. The usual reasons: one word is misspelled or swapped for a similar one, two words sit in the wrong order, or it’s a 12-word phrase from a different wallet that Yoroi can’t use. Each word also has to come from the fixed wordlist that Cardano wallets share with BIP-39, so a near-miss like “recieve” won’t pass.

If you’re sure you have the right words but the order or one entry is off, the fix is to test the likely combinations methodically until the valid one appears; our guide to an invalid mnemonic phrase has the full method.

You forgot your spending password

You can fix a forgotten spending password yourself, without anyone else’s help: because the password lives only on your device, there’s no reset for it, but a restore from your recovery phrase replaces it with a new one during the same process.

What changed is where you do it. Don’t remove the wallet from SecondFi to re-add it: SecondFi asks users to leave the app and the old wallet in place for the claims process, and removing the wallet destroys the encrypted key data sitting on that device. Restore into a different Cardano wallet instead, following the restore steps above, and set the new password there.

The hard case: you also lost the recovery phrase. Do not remove the wallet or uninstall Yoroi. The encrypted key data on the device is then your only copy, and removing the wallet destroys it. The password itself cannot be read out of the app: it encrypts the key material. What can be done is testing password candidates against that encrypted data, offline, as long as the install is still there. Before that, try focused recall: write down every password you have ever used, note caps lock and keyboard language, and give the list twenty minutes. If the recall list runs dry, the options are: you have the wallet still installed (password testing is possible; leave it untouched), or you have most of the seed phrase (missing words can sometimes be reconstructed).

A new, broken or lost phone

The device doesn’t matter; the destination does. Don’t put Yoroi or SecondFi on the new phone. Check the wallet’s status with SecondFi’s checker first; if it is not affected, install a maintained Cardano wallet, restore there, then move the balance to a wallet with a fresh phrase. You don’t need the old device or any exported file, because the recovery phrase is enough on its own.

The wallet restored but the balance shows zero

Two causes are common. First, you restored the wrong era, a Byron phrase into a Shelley slot or the reverse; the fix is to restore again and choose the other type. Second, the phrase belongs to a wallet you’d already emptied into a newer one, so that old wallet really is at zero.

One reassurance: a zero balance on its own doesn’t mean your words are wrong. If the wallet accepted the phrase, the phrase is at least valid. Try the other era before you assume the coins are lost.

You’ve lost the recovery phrase

This is the hard one. Without the phrase there’s no built-in way in, and any service that claims to conjure one from nothing is lying.

The phrase is 15 or 24 plain words, and people store them in more places than they recall:

• A password manager, a notes app, or an email or message you sent yourself.
• A photo or screenshot in your camera roll or cloud backup.
• A paper backup: a notebook, a drawer, a safe, or the box the hardware came in.
• A second browser or phone where you once restored the same wallet.

If you have most of the words but the phrase is incomplete or out of order, a partial or shuffled phrase can sometimes be rebuilt: Yoroi uses BIP39, so dictionary and brute-force techniques can work through the gaps. Crypto Recovers works with phrases that are missing up to four words; our guide to recovering missing seed words explains how.

If you used SecondFi and lost the phrase, keep the app installed: SecondFi says any claim needs either the app or the seed phrase.

When you do find the phrase, enter it only in a maintained Cardano wallet you installed yourself from its official site. Online “phrase checkers” that offer to validate or restore it for you are a common way people get robbed.

You have an older Byron-era wallet

Byron wallets still open, but they’re the old format and don’t earn staking rewards. If your restore only works as Byron, move your ADA into a new Shelley wallet you create: you send the funds from the Byron wallet to a receiving address in the new one, the same as any normal transaction. Daedalus, Cardano’s full-node wallet, still opens Byron wallets, and EMURGO recommended it for them when Yoroi dropped Byron support. Our Daedalus wallet recovery guide covers its zero-balance and sync problems.

Still locked out of your Yoroi wallet after trying this?

Crypto Recovers has done wallet recoveries since 2019, with 200+ recoveries completed, among them rejected phrases, forgotten passwords and phrases with missing words. It’s no recovery, no fee: you pay only if the recovery works. We never touch your money: once access is back you move the ADA yourself, into a wallet only you created, and you pay the agreed fee separately. What we don’t do is undo the theft or stand in for SecondFi’s official process for affected wallets. Request a confidential assessment, no commitment.

Need help recovering your Yoroi wallet? Contact us.

FAQ: Yoroi wallet recovery

Can EMURGO or Yoroi recover my wallet for me?

No, except in one case. If your wallet was among the 374 hit in June 2026, SecondFi runs an official claims process for those funds and has announced a separate recovery portal; when we checked on 5 October 2026, its incident FAQ still listed that portal as under development. Follow that process and treat the affected keys as compromised. For everyone else, Yoroi is non-custodial and keeps no copy of your keys or recovery phrase, so the team can’t restore your wallet or reset it from their side.

How do I restore my Yoroi wallet on a new phone?

Not into Yoroi. Check the wallet’s status with SecondFi’s official checker first; if it is not affected, install a maintained Cardano app on the new phone that supports your backup format, such as Lace, choose its restore option and type your 15- or 24-word recovery phrase. Then move the balance to a wallet you create with a new phrase. You don’t need the old device.

Why does Yoroi say my recovery phrase is invalid?

Usually a mistyped word, the wrong order, or the wrong length. Yoroi only accepts words from the BIP39 list, so anything off gets flagged, and testing close variations of the word or order in question can find the valid phrase.

Can I recover my Yoroi wallet without the recovery phrase?

Recovery may still be possible from an accessible installation or preserved encrypted wallet data. A forgotten spending password can sometimes be tested against those data. An incomplete or misordered phrase may also be assessable. If neither usable wallet data nor a phrase, key export or other valid backup survives, there is no material from which to restore access.

Is my ADA safe while I’m locked out?

Losing your phone or the app doesn’t move ADA. It stays recorded on the Cardano blockchain, and losing access blocks you from moving it, not from owning it. One exception matters after June 2026: if your address was among the affected ones, the balance is at risk from whoever holds the rebuilt key, so check SecondFi’s official checker and follow the official process rather than waiting.