I Have my Recovery Pass Phrase but Brave won't accept it

Please only post Brave Wallet inquiries in this category – visit the Brave Rewards category for all related rewards issues.

The Brave Team will never ask you for your recovery phrase or private key.


Description of the issue:

Is the issue occurring on a specific network? No

What operating system are you using? Windows 10

Brave Version (check About Brave)
Version 1.71.118 Chromium: 130.0.6723.70 (Official Build) (64-bit)

Additional Information:
I set up my Brave Wallet a long time ago and haven’t checked it for probably a year or more. When I recently tried to check it, it appears that I no longer had a Wallet connected to Brave. When I tried to recover my Brave Wallet, Brave doesn’t accept my 12 word pass phrase. I have a hard copy of my pass phrase so I know that it is correct. I’ve tried the recovery process numerous times but Brave says my pass phrase is not correct. I’m thinking that something has changed that I am not aware of that is creating this problem for me that’ related to my not using my Brave Wallet for a long time. I do have assets in this wallet that i don’t want to lose.

25th word for Brave Sync time-limited words

there is a classic phenomenon with brave recovery sync phrase is that you have to add the 25th word of the day right after the 24th word to get it synced, explanation here: Recovery key not accepted on fresh install - had to start from scratch! - #12 by Alexey

Im not sure that is the issue as my pass phrase only had 12 words

@elvisvan you provided details on sync phrase. They are speaking of Wallet seed phrase which is something completely different.

@hendrix207 are you inserting it all in lower case and with spaces between each word?

I’m not aware of the difference between a Sync phrase ad a Wallet seed phrase. When I created the Wallet, I only saw what I wrote down as a Brave Wallet Recovery Phrase and it consists of 12 words not 24 words. Its been awhile but I don’t recall a 24 word phrase being shown and I’m sure that If I’d seen such a phrase I would have hard copied it. Thx for the help…

And yes… All lower case with spaces.

@hendrix207 one is for sync and other is Wallet. So the sync phrase as they mentioned is for brave://sync/ which is how we share our bookmarks, passwords, etc with multiple profiles or devices. But Wallet is not one of the things synced. For example:

Whereas when you create a new Wallet, it tells you:

The sync phrase changes the 25th word daily and would be to whatever information is saved on that profile.

The Wallet phrase is a permanent.

Neither should ever be shared with anyone as it gives them access to anything on it.

When I started with Brave, I recall having 2 wallets that interacted with it. The 1st wallet was (I thought) internal to Brave and it was set up with a 12 word recovery phrase. I bought BAT and sent it to the 1st wallet. The 2nd Wallet was on Gemini and I linked it to Brave so that BAT earned via using Brave could be sent to it. I’m trying to recover the 1st wallet and Brave keeps saying I have an invalid pass phrase for it.

I’m going to tag in @steeven and @Evan123 to see if either can provide more specific assistance.

Hello! Just to clarify, you shouldn’t need a space anymore with the current import screen. Using a space will add an extra character after each word.

Can you try entering each word in lowercase and using tab or your mouse to go to the next word. Avoid using spaces. Also, the recovery phrase needs to be entered in the same order as when it was backed up. It cannot be in any other order.

Let me know if you have trouble. Thanks!

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