Why Do My BEP20 And ERC20 Wallets Have The Same Address?

Last updated on February 23rd, 2023

If you have a cryptocurrency wallet that supports both the ERC20 network and the Binance Smart Chain (BEP20), you may have noticed that the deposit address is the same for both networks.

For example, if you are sending SHIB to your Trust Wallet account, you can send SHIB to the ERC20 or BEP20 networks using the same address.

Since both of them have the same address, would your tokens be sent to the correct wallets?

Here’s what you need to know.

Why do BEP20 and ERC20 wallets have the same address?

The BNB Smart Chain (BEP20) is compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), which means that it is a modified Ethereum fork that is compatible with the Ethereum (ERC20) network. Since both blockchain networks are somewhat similar to each other in terms of their infrastructure, they have the same deposit address for depositing cryptocurrencies into your wallet.

You can find out more in my video here:

The BNB Smart Chain is sort of like a modified code from Ethereum’s code. As such, most of the infrastructure and algorithms are very similar on both networks.

You will have the same deposit address for both BEP20 and ERC20

If you have a wallet or exchange that supports both the BEP20 and ERC20, both of them should have the same deposit address.

For example, here’s the ERC20 deposit address on the Ethereum Mainnet for my Metamask wallet,

and here is the BNB Smart Chain (BEP20) deposit address.

You can see that the deposit address is exactly the same for both the ERC20 and BEP20 networks!

This applies to other platforms which support both the ERC20 and BEP20 networks, such as:

1. Binance
2. Crypto.com
3. Trust Wallet

Since the deposit address is exactly the same, what matters more is the network that you’ve selected to withdraw the tokens to your address.

The address doesn’t matter, but the network does

If you are withdrawing a cryptocurrency from a platform that supports both the BEP20 and ERC20, you will usually be given the option to select which network you would like to use to withdraw that cryptocurrency.

Usually, the withdrawal fees on the BNB Smart Chain (BEP20) are cheaper than on the ERC20 network. This is because the BNB Smart Chain is usually less congested.

This is a very important step, especially since both the BEP20 and ERC20 have the same address. There are some platforms that only support ERC20 deposits, but not BEP20 ones.

Some of these platforms include:

1. Gemini
2. Nexo
3. Coinbase
4. Kraken

If you are looking to deposit BNB on Nexo, you will have to use the Binance Chain (BEP2), instead of the BNB Smart Chain (BEP20)!

As such, you should only be sending cryptocurrencies to these platforms via the ERC20 network, and not the BEP20.

If you do so, your cryptocurrencies may be lost forever!

What happens if you send a BEP20 token to an ERC20 address?

If you send a BEP20 token to an ERC20 address, you will still be able to view the BEP20 token if the platform that you’ve sent your token to supports the BNB Smart Chain (BEP20). However, if your platform does not support the Binance Smart Chain, your tokens may be lost forever.

When you are sending cryptocurrencies from one platform to another, it is important to ensure that the platform you’re withdrawing to supports the network that you are using to withdraw.

For example, you may want to send SHIB from Binance to Trust Wallet. Since both platforms support the ERC20 and BEP20 networks, it depends on which network you’ve selected to withdraw from Binance.

However, if you’re sending your SHIB from Binance to KuCoin, KuCoin only supports ERC20 deposits of SHIB. This means that you should only be sending SHIB from Binance to KuCoin via the ERC20 network.

If you send it via the BEP20 network, your SHIB may be lost since KuCoin does not support the BNB Smart Chain.

Some platforms separate BEP20 and ERC20 deposits, while others aggregate them together

There are some platforms like Trust Wallet which segregate the BEP20 and ERC20 versions of the token from each other.

However, there are other platforms like Binance where both BEP20 and ERC20 deposits will be aggregated into the same wallet.

This is something that you may want to take note of. If you send the ERC20 version of a token to another platform, the transaction fees can be quite high.

By sending it to a platform that aggregates both BEP20 and ERC20 deposits, you still are given the option to use either network to withdraw later on.

However, if you deposit an ERC20 token to platforms like Trust Wallet, you can only use the ERC20 network to withdraw from this platform. This may make the transaction fees really costly!

Adding the Binance Smart Chain on Metamask

If you’ve sent a BEP20 token to your Metamask wallet, you will need to add the BNB Smart Chain first so that you can view the tokens you’ve sent.

You can find out more about adding the Binance Smart Chain to Metamask with this guide from Binance.

The next step you’ll need to do is to import the token that you’ve sent over to your Metamask wallet. This allows you to view your token in the wallet.

Otherwise, you will only be able to see your BNB balance in your account!

You can find out more about importing a token on the Binance Smart Chain to Metamask, such as SHIB, BTCB or TITANO.

What happens if you send an ERC20 token to a BEP20 address?

If you send an ERC20 token to a BEP20 address, you will still be able to view the ERC20 token if the platform that you’ve sent your token to supports the ERC20 network. However, if your platform does not support the ERC20 network, your tokens may be lost forever.

In most cases, a platform that supports the BEP20 network should support ERC20 deposits.

However, there are times when this is not necessarily true!

For example, Crypto.com only supports BEP20 or BEP2 deposits of BNB, and not ERC20 deposits of BNB. If you send BNB using the ERC20 network to Crypto.com, there is a possibility that your BNB may be lost!

It would be good to double-check that the platform that you’re withdrawing to supports the ERC20 network, before you choose to make the withdrawal.

Both ERC20 and BEP20 are EVM-compatible networks, and you can find out more about them below:

Conclusion

Both ERC20 and BEP20 have the same deposit address, as BEP20 is a fork (aka a copy of the code) of ERC20.

However, it is important to take a look at the networks that are supported by the platform you’re withdrawing to.

If the platform only supports ERC20, and you send a BEP20 token to the ERC20 address, your tokens may be lost forever!

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