Coinbase Wallet now opens onto a feed. The update behind the Base app keeps the self-custodial wallet and wraps a social timeline, a search tab of mini apps, swaps and creator coins around it, and CryptoSnake's December 23, 2025 review is positive on the result. He says neither Coinbase Wallet's team nor the Base app paid for the coverage. What stays with me is that custody has become the quiet part of the product, while the features built on top of your balance are where money actually moves.
What the Base update made of Coinbase Wallet
The host has covered this wallet since his live streams started in 2018, and he says earlier guides on it have run to hundreds of thousands of views. That history shapes the review, which comes from a long-time user rather than a first look.
Jesse Pollak, the creator of Base, introduces the app as an all-in-one platform for social activity, trading, financial interactions and payments. Base is Coinbase's own network, and the app is the wallet's front door to it. A decentralized application, in plain terms, is software that runs on a blockchain and connects to your wallet, so your keys authorise what happens instead of a company account.
The host's framing goes past a product review. He calls this the first genuinely usable version of that kind of app, and describes it as a user-directed model of the internet rather than a set of centralized services. That is a statement of ambition, and an app with a feed and a token launchpad still has to show it can deliver.
He narrows the walkthrough to the wallet, the search tab and the social feed. That split is right, because each one carries a different kind of risk.
Self-custody, one address and ten networks
| What the review covers | What it says |
|---|---|
| Custody | Self-custodial |
| Networks | 10, with more planned |
| Regional currencies | 16 |
| Address | One across every integrated chain |
Self-custody is the first thing to understand, because everything else sits on top of it. In a self-custodial wallet the keys stay with you on your device, and you deal with the software directly instead of logging into an account a company controls. Nothing can freeze your balance. Nothing can reset it for you either, and whoever holds the recovery phrase holds the money.
One address across every chain is the feature I would explain to a friend first. Instead of asking which network to use before someone pays you, you hand over a single QR code that works on all ten. That cuts the number of things that can go wrong on the receiving side. It does not remove the need to check which network a payment is coming from, and a token sent on the wrong chain will not appear where you expect it.
These are the networks named on screen in the review:
- Arbitrum
- Avalanche C-Chain
- Base
- BNB Chain
- Gnosis Chain
- Fantom Opera
- Optimism
- Polygon
- Solana
- Zora
Swaps happen inside the wallet, so you can move from one asset to another without sending funds to an exchange first, and the host describes them as fast. Setup and fees are not covered, so check Coinbase's own documentation and fee schedule before you move a large balance.
Sixteen regional currencies
The wallet supports 16 regional currencies, and a Base post shown in the review lists XSGD and AUDD alongside 16+ local currencies. On paper that is a payments feature. In practice it decides who can use the app without thinking about exchange rates: a local-currency token is built to track the value of a national currency, so someone in Singapore or Australia can hold and send money in a unit they already know. It also gives the app a reason to be used for ordinary transfers, which is volume a social feed on its own will not produce. At the time, more chains were planned.
Search: mini apps, a browser and verified profiles
Search is the part of the app that looks least like a wallet. It surfaces mini apps, games, community tools and incentive platforms, and the list on screen runs through Perps, Wealth, Bankr, Aerodrome, Playtoshi Mini, Cat Town, Squabble, CODY, Paragraph, Bond, Coins and Control The Stream. A built-in browser sits in the same tab, so a link does not have to leave the app.
Creators can verify outside accounts, and at the time only X and TikTok were on offer. The host linked his own profiles and said he hoped YouTube verification would follow. Verified profiles matter more than they sound. A feed with money in it attracts people who copy a well-known handle and a matching avatar, and every platform that can be checked makes that harder.
Mini apps are third-party software, and that is the sentence I would keep in mind. Coinbase builds the wallet; the app you open inside it is somebody else's code, and it usually asks for permission to move a specific token on your behalf. Read each request before you approve it, and think twice about a token approval for an app you have not looked up.
The feed, creator coins and the copy-trade button
The feed is where the app stops behaving like a wallet. The host describes it as a token-enabled hybrid of Instagram and X, built so that every post keeps a monetary value belonging to the user rather than the platform. That is his description of the design goal, not a promise about what any post will be worth.
Creator coins are the mechanism. A supporter buys a creator's token, which gives them price exposure to that creator's audience and, in the host's account, lets a community share the upside together. The app also lets users follow traders and duplicate a position as soon as they see it. Pollak demonstrates the flow by buying ten dollars of Avantis after a friend bought it.
Short is the right word for that path. Ten dollars is small enough to be harmless and clear enough to show the shape of the trade: a feed, someone else's position, a button. That is also the sequence that goes wrong when the amount is not ten dollars. I would set a rule before scrolling, such as a cap per week, instead of deciding while a chart is moving.
Why BitClout is the comparison that matters
Creator coins are not new, and the review is honest about the earlier attempt. BitClout, on the DeSo blockchain, tried something similar. The host's summary is that it struggled with a poor interface, mobile limitations and spam. His argument is that Base arrives polished, mobile-native and backed by an established organisation, so the same idea has a better chance.
That argument assumes the interface was what held the idea back. The assumption is reasonable and incomplete. A clean app can bring in the first few thousand users. It cannot make anyone want to hold a particular creator's token a month later, because demand for those tokens follows attention, and attention moves. Spam is the other half: when a post carries money, posting attracts bots, and keeping a feed clean is a cost you pay forever. I think the interface is the easy part of what BitClout got wrong.
None of that makes the model a failure, and the Base version clearly looks better. The question is whether the tokens keep trading after the novelty.
What the review liked and what it wants changed
The praise is mostly about craft. The host finds the interface accessible and the team behind the wallet capable, and he points to one address across every chain, swaps inside the app, and creator coins that arrive as a finished mobile product rather than a browser experiment. He has used the wallet since 2018 and says the team has never paid him, which explains the familiarity in the praise and is a reason to read it as a long-time user's enthusiasm with nothing behind it.
His prediction is that the app will lead consumer adoption across crypto networks. That is a forecast, credited to him, and it depends on people wanting a social feed and a wallet in the same place, which is not settled.
Where he pushes back is small and specific. Profile verification covered X and TikTok at the time, and he wanted YouTube on the list. He also said his Base profile handle, cryptosnake.base.eth, would become his main social hub, with the handle appearing in future video descriptions. A reviewer with a profile in the product has a stake in the product doing well, and that is worth knowing when you weigh the verdict.
The risks I would weigh
Self-custody puts the recovery phrase at the centre of everything. Whoever has it has the funds, and no support line can reverse a transaction. Write the phrase on paper and keep it offline. Never type it into a website, and treat any message that asks for it as an attack, whatever logo is attached. If you plan to hold a balance large enough to hurt, a hardware wallet is the usual answer, bought from the maker or an authorised seller and never from a marketplace listing.
The feed adds a second layer. Creator coins are speculative by design: the price is whatever the next buyer will pay, early and late buyers are not in the same position, and a token with a small following can be hard to sell without moving the price. Copying a trade removes the reasoning and keeps the risk. You see the entry, not the size of the other person's position, their plan for getting out, or how much of their portfolio it is.
There is a concentration problem too. A wallet holding ten networks, a feed, a browser and a dozen mini apps is one device away from all of it at once. Spreading funds across two places, checking the address bar before you connect, and starting small on anything new cover most of the ways this goes wrong. When a creator's profile appears in the feed, check the handle against the account you already follow, because a verified badge is only as good as the name next to it.
Who it suits
Coinbase Wallet in this form suits someone who wants one app for holding, swapping and following along, and who accepts that the recovery phrase is theirs to protect. It suits creators who want a token and a feed attached to their audience, and people already active on Base who want a profile that ties their handles together.
It is a poor fit for anyone who wants cold storage, meaning keys kept on a device that stays offline, since a phone app that also runs a social feed is the opposite of that. It is also a poor fit for someone who would buy a creator token because a stranger in a feed bought one. The app makes that easy, and easy is the risk.
What to check before you move funds
- Confirm the network you are sending on is one of the ten listed above, and that your token lives on that chain.
- Send a small test amount first, wait for it to arrive, and only then send the rest.
- Write the recovery phrase on paper, store it offline, and never type it into a website.
- Open the app by typing the address yourself instead of following a link from a message or a post.
- Look at a creator's token before buying: who holds it, how much trades, and whether the price has ever survived a quiet week.
- For a large balance, buy a hardware wallet from the maker or an authorised seller.
The number worth remembering is ten: ten networks behind a single QR code, the most practical part of the update and the one least likely to cost you money. In the demo, ten dollars of Avantis took one tap after a friend bought it. With your own money, that same tap carries the risk, and the feed is built to make it feel small.
