How to use Marinade with a Ledger wallet

Participate in liquid staking and DAO governance from the safety of your hardware wallet.

Crypto users are finding more peace of mind by owning and using a Ledger hardware wallet. With Ledger, you can navigate the day-to-day security of crypto with additional layers of security like its “secure element” feature and the requirement of approving all transactions from the device itself.

However, new users still have questions and confusion over what types of transactions can take place on a Ledger, and which chains and assets are supported. In fact, using a Ledger in the Solana ecosystem at the moment has one very big complication in the user experience: While there are thousands of SPL tokens and NFTs (like mSOL, MNDE and the Chef NFTs), if you send these assets to your Ledger’s Solana address, in Ledger Live, neither the tokens nor your transaction history or balance will appear.

Don’t worry, it’s easy to remedy this. In fact, Ledger users can interact with Solana DeFi, including all things Marinade, like:

Liquid stake and unstake SOL for staking rewards-bearing mSOL

Acquire MNDE and lock them to mint a Chef NFT

Vote on Marinade governance with your Chef NFTs

To view a Ledger wallet’s SPL assets, you will need to import your Ledger wallet into a web extension wallet like Solflare or Phantom. This process will not expose your Ledger seed phrase at any time.

Using Marinade with a Ledger is simple once set up and you know how to approve transactions from a Ledger. Here is how:

How to view your mSOL, Chef NFTs and other SPL assets from Ledger

Let’s say you send your Chef NFT from your Solflare wallet to your Ledger’s Solana public key address. You go to Ledger Live and don’t see anything besides your SOL balance.

The Chef is there, you just can’t see it in Ledger Live. For now, you must import your ledger to an online Solana-compatible wallet like Solflare or Phantom to view it.

To start, connect your Ledger to your computer and open Ledger Live. Then, with your Ledger still connected, import your Ledger to a web extension wallet.

For Solflare browser extension: Click on the accounts icon (top left) > Click on Add New Account > then Import Ledger Wallet.

For Phantom wallet, click on the accounts tab (top left), click on “Add Wallet” and “Connect hardware wallet.” Be sure to follow the correct deviation path ((44'/501'/0') or your funds will not show up. (Currently available for Chrome and Brave browsers only).

View the latest instructions on how to import Ledger:
*Phantom *| Solflare

Once you have done this successfully, you will be able to see all SPL assets. You can also easily send SPL assets from hot wallets to this address and interact with Solana DeFi and NFT DApps.

How to liquid stake SOL for mSOL using a Ledger

Connect a Ledger device to your computer and enter the device’s passcode. Make sure you are on the Solana network on your Ledger Live app.*

Open a web browser, go to your browser extension wallet’s account screen and select the Ledger wallet account.

Go to the Marinade.finance/ DApp and “Connect wallet.” From the browser’s dropdown menu, click on this web wallet provider.

From the staking page, click on “Stake” and enter how much SOL to stake.

Click “Approve transaction” in your browser wallet extension. The transaction will be pending.

Then go to your Ledger device and select “Approve.” (you may need to scroll to the right on your device to see the “Approve” prompt).

You will then see the mSOL balance in your web wallet’s Ledger account, as well as on your wallet’s public key URL in Solana Explorer.

*Blind signing: If you are getting transaction errors, it may be because “Blind signing” is not enabled. You must enable this feature in order to transact with a Ledger in DeFi:

Ledger instructions for enabling “Bling Signing”

Staking and unstaking on Ledger: Ledger offers SOL staking from individual validators but you cannot liquid stake mSOL at this time. You can instantly unstake a stake account on a Ledger by connecting to the Marinade DApp. Read this article to learn more about Instant Unstake from any validator.

How to participate in Marinade governance with a Ledger wallet

Connect a Ledger device to your computer, enter the device passcode and open Ledger Live. Make sure you are on the Solana network on your device.

Open a browser, go to your browser extension wallet’s account screen and select the Ledger wallet.

Visit Marinade’s Proposals page and connect to this wallet.

Click on Cast Vote > Select how you will vote > Click “Cast [position] Vote.”

Click on “Approve” in your browser extension. The transaction will be pending.

Then, go to your Ledger device and click “Approve” there (you may have to scroll right to view the approve prompt.”

Back on the web wallet, you will see a “Vote Confirmed” box. If transaction fails, make sure your ledger is unlocked and blind signing has been enabled from the device.

This process is similar for the Liquidity Mining and Validator Gauges.

Remember that whatever activity you do with SPL tokens or NFTs will not be reflected in the Ledger live app, and only viewable from your online wallet’s interface. Or, you can visit your wallet’s public key address at explorer.solana.com and scroll down to the “tokens” tab to view all your SPL assets and balances (including NFTs).

Someday soon, it is expected that Ledger will enable visibility of all SPL assets in Ledger Live, creating a more seamless experience for Solana DeFi and NFT users. Until then, you just need to take an extra step to be able to connect and unlock your Ledger, add the address to a web wallet, and approve each transaction from the device itself.

Some final tips about Ledger and Marinade

What happens if I lose my hardware wallet? Let’s say your dog ate your Ledger Nano. Coins lost? No, you need to simply recover your seed phrase and import it into a new Ledger device. Read more at Ledger’s blog.

Keep in mind that if you store your Ledger seed phrase on your hard drive, or worse, in the cloud, you are defeating the purpose of a secure, cold or hardware wallet. A seed phrase should be stored securely in a protected, analog environment. Here are some of Ledger’s tips for storing a seed phrase safely.

Ledger is a multi-chain device. Make sure you are sending SPL assets to your Solana network public key.

Keep in mind sending assets between your hot and cold wallets does incur a gas fee. Fortunately, as Solana users know by now, that fee is minuscule compared to Ethereum.

Marinade recently integrated Wallet Connect, a DApp that enables access to over a dozen multichain wallets. While Ledger is integrated with Wallet Connect, it is not yet compatible with Solana, so Marinade won’t work connecting this way for now.

Keep in mind that approving transactions from a Ledger when using compromised or scam sites will expose your funds, so only use a Ledger with trusted DApps.

Still have questions? The Marinade Support Chefs are well versed in connection and wallet questions. You may jump into the Discord or ask the Crisp Notifications chat icon at the bottom righthand corner of the Marinade.Finance site. And remember, a Marinade support chef will never DM you first.

How to use Marinade with a Ledger wallet

How to view your mSOL, Chef NFTs and other SPL assets from Ledger

How to liquid stake SOL for mSOL using a Ledger

How to participate in Marinade governance with a Ledger wallet

Some final tips about Ledger and Marinade

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