How to buy Bitcoin in Paxful
To buy BTC, do this:
- Create a Paxful account (if you don’t have one yet)
- Verify it with your national ID or passport (very important)
- Click on “Buy”
- Choose your preferred payment method
- Look for a vendor with a good reputation (you can get one with hundreds or even 1,000+ reviews)
- Pay the vendor
- Get your bitcoins
How to sell Bitcoin in Paxful
Selling is simple as well.
Here’s the procedure:
- Create and verify your Paxful account (If you already have a verified account, skip this)
- Click on “Sell”
- Choose how you want to receive the cash (bank transfer, M-Pesa, Wise, etc.)
- Look for a vendor whose rates are above market rates but who also has fantastic reviews
- Only release the bitcoins once you’ve received the payment. Never ever release before you get the payment.
Advantages of Paxful
Why do people love Paxful that much? Here are the advantages:
- Ease of use: It’s easy to navigate through the site and transact without any assistance.
- Safety: Despite being a marketplace with all sorts of people, Paxful does its best to keep your money secure. It keeps displaying messages and popups to help you stay safe during a transaction.
- Rates: At a glance, you can see if the rate you’re getting the Bitcoin at is above or below the market rate. If your client pays you in Bitcoin and you sell here, you can end up getting the cash at 2+ percent above market rate. Imagine getting paid $1000 and getting value worth $1020 in your pocket. This is why I love it as a way to get paid.
- Support: There are tons of tutorials on how to do stuff on the site. You can also reach out to the customer support team in case of anything.
Disadvantages of Paxful
Nothing’s perfect. Here are the cons of Paxful:
- Some people experience verification delays even after submitting valid identity documents
- When there are high volumes of tickets, customer support may take time to respond to queries
Paxful review in a nutshell
Paxful is a huge peer-to-peer (P2P) Bitcoin marketplace.
In other words, Paxful provides a place where Bitcoin buyers and sellers meet and transact.
It operates in most countries worldwide. Its main office is in New York.
People love Paxful since it is secure and easy to use. It has a beautiful interface and makes it easy for you to choose a vendor. If you choose vendors wisely, you can get excellent rates.
The best part?
Paxful has over 300 payment methods. I won’t bore you by listing them all here.
Just note that you can buy or sell bitcoins using most of the payment methods you can think of, such as PayPal, M-Pesa, Western Union, Payoneer, Wise (formerly TransferWise), name it!
Some users struggle with issues like verification and choosing the right person to transact with. If that’s you, don’t worry, this guide will make it easy for you.
First, you need to know what Paxful does to protect you.
Paxful escrow protection
To prevent scam, Paxful offers escrow protection.
Let me explain using a selling scenario.
So, your awesome client has paid you in Bitcoin. You want to sell it on Paxful so that you can go buy your favorite watch.
You go to the Paxful marketplace and get this amazing vendor who’s buying at a fantastic rate. He’s paying you via M-Pesa. Let’s call him Sam.
Sam needs to be sure of two things:
- You have the bitcoins
- You won’t run away with the bitcoins once he sends money to your M-Pesa account
Paxful protects Sam by first holding the bitcoins on escrow. Sam is now sure that the money is held securely by Paxful. He can freely proceed to send you the cash via M-Pesa.
With this in mind, you DO NOT release the bitcoins till you get that M-Pesa confirmation message.
As soon as Sam pays you via M-Pesa, you can safely release the bitcoins to him.
In case of any issue, Paxful mediates and releases the bitcoins to the justified party.
For example, if Sam refuses to M-Pesa you, the bitcoins will be returned to your account so you won’t lose a dime.
If Sam sends you the M-Pesa cash and you don’t release the bitcoins on time, Paxful can transfer the bitcoins to him. This way, Sam doesn’t lose a dime.
At the end of the day, you can both trade with confidence. And you’re assured that Paxful support will mediate in case of any issue.
Like any marketplace, you need to avoid getting scammed. I’ll talk more about this. But first, let’s see how the buying process works.
HOW TO BUY BITCOIN WITH M-PESA
M-Pesa is one of the biggest mobile-based money transfer, financing, and microfinancing service in Africa and other developing world. M-Pesa allows users to deposit, withdraw, transfer money and pay for goods and services easily with a mobile device
In addition to all the existing services, now you can also use M-Pesa to buy bitcoins in Paxful. Paxful makes the process of purchasing BTC with M-Pesa whole lot simpler. Pay with M-Pesa to have bitcoin in your Paxful wallet in less than an hour.
You can either buy from one of many offers listed by vendors for selling their BTC using M-Pesa or create your own offer to sell your bitcoin in M-Pesa balance. At Paxful, vendors can set their own rates and decide their margins. Select the offer that suits you the most while buying and create offers that have the best chance of converting.
