Delegate ADA in a few quick steps using the official Daedalus wallet.
Daedalus is a full node wallet. This means that it will download a copy of the entire Cardano blockchain to your computer. This ensures that you have a direct connection to the Cardano blockchain network and you won't suffer from third party network issues (although very rare) that might arise from using wallets such as Yoroi when there is high demand.
It is a balance between the convenience of a light wallet such as Yoroi, or a full node wallet such as Daedalus.
Delegate ADA to a stake pool using Daedalus in a few quick and easy steps.
Staking your ADA to get rewards is the backbone of the Cardano network. The proof of stake protocol allows users to be rewarded in ADA for helping to validate blocks on the network, similar to how Bitcoin and Ethereum validate their networks with mining, rewarding miners in their respective tokens.
The process of staking is easy and has next to no risk in the process.
Users that are holding ADA can simply load a wallet using Daedalus or other popular Cardano wallets such as Yoroi, delegate ADA to a Stake Pool and receive rewards in the process.
Follow these easy steps to get started with delegating your ADA to a Stake Pool.
Total Time: 15 minutes
Firstly, download the Daedalus and create a wallet.
Ensure that you are downloading the Daedalus app from the official website.
If you haven't created a wallet before and transferred ADA to it, please follow our tutorial on creating a wallet in Daedalus. The process is quick and easy to do. Just ensure that you secure your passphrase when creating your wallet.
From the side menu, choose Delegation Centre.
On the delegation screen, click on choose Stake pools, from the top menu.
In the search bar, type in the pool name that you want to delegate ADA towards.
In this case, we are searching for ADAOZ, our ticker name for our Stake pool.
The slider bar can be used to match the size of your delegation and wallet to a suitable pool. Changing the size of your wallet will give you different options to delegate.
Click the number and ticker of the pool to see more information about the pool and select "delegate" if you wish to delegate ADA to that pool.
Ensure that you use a pool that is not over Saturated as your rewards will diminish.
Keep in mind, that each time you delegate ADA to a pool, there is a small fee to start delegating to a pool or swapping from one to another.
Now you just need to wait for a few epochs for your wallet to be staked and then rewards to be calculated the following epoch.
You sure can, you are not locked in unlike staking on exchanges like Binance. You can delegate and then sell right if there is a big spike in the price and take profits at any time. There is no lock-in period.
It is very safe as long as your wallet seed and passwords are safe. When delegating to a pool, you only 'point' your ADA wallet to a pool, you don't actually transfer it to a pool or someone else's wallet. Your ADA is always under your control.
In the end, it doesn't really matter which pool you delegate to, as, over a period of a year, you will get your average 5% return on your ADA. That is the way the network is designed to work, but you should ensure that the pool that you chose is active, not going to shut down and is actively minting blocks to ensure that you are getting a return on your ADA delegation.
Moving from pool to pool to try and game the system simply doesn't work over a long term period.
Looking at past performance doesn't exactly correlate to good or better performance in the future although looking at a pools average performance over a 6 month period of time is a good long term measure of performance.
We recommend choosing a pool that has helped you in the community or choosing a pool that has a mission such as a charity pool that aligns with your views.
No, your ADA does not leave your wallet. Delegating simply assigns the staking process to a pool of your choice.
If you ever find yourself being told to stake to a pool by transferring ADA to an address, then it is most likely a scam.
ADA should never leave your wallet.
If you lose your seed phrase which is generated when you first create your wallet, or if that seed phrase is stolen from your computer then your wallet can be compromised and your ADA stolen from your Daedalus or Yoroi wallet.
Ensure that your wallet seed phrase is not stored online. Ensure that it is safely stored off your computer in a safe and secure location.
Using a hardware wallet such as a Nano Ledger or a Trezor will ensure that your secret key which is used to transfer funds is never online and always on the physical hardware device.
1. Ledger Nano X (Hardware Wallet)
2. Ledger Nano S (Hardware Wallet)
3. Trezor Model T (Hardware Wallet)
4. Daedalus Wallet (Desktop)
5. Yoroi Wallet (Browser extension, Mobile)
6. ADALite (Browser)
We have done a review on the best wallets for Cardano.
The minimum amount of ADA that you will need to stake from Daedalus is 5 ADA + transaction fee but you will find that it will take a very long time to recover the ADA that you have used for transfer fees to get it to a wallet.
I would personally recommend not transferring and delegating anything less than 100 ADA purely because of the time it takes to recover the ADA from transfer and wallet delegation registration.
Listen to our latest podcast episode, all about staking and delegating to a pool. You'll also learn about how the rewards distribution works once you've learned how to delegate ADA.
We're a small, independent single stake pool operator. We've got a long way to go before we are completely self-sufficient and continuously producing blocks for the community. Our stake pool infrastructure costs money and time to support. Search for us with ticker: ADAOZ.
Learn how to delegate to us using Daedalus or delegate with the Yoroi wallets.
How to Stake ADA on Yoroi Wallet
Podcast: How to Stake Cardano & Understanding Rewards Payout
Calculate How Much ADA You Will Get From Staking
Use ticker: ADAOZ
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