Address Reuse
Two complementary reuse lenses. The first is the share of active addresses that are reused (an address transacted before) - a behavioural gauge of on-chain privacy hygiene, structurally declining as wallets adopt fresh-address standards. The second is the share of circulating supply held in reused addresses - a proxy for custodial and exchange concentration, since institutional infrastructure tends to reuse deposit addresses. Diverging trends separate retail privacy behaviour from custodial structure.
What is it?
Bitcoin recommends using a fresh address per transaction - reusing an address degrades privacy by linking transactions together. This chart measures reuse from two complementary angles. The first is the share of active addresses that are reused (previously seen on-chain): a behavioural gauge of the network's privacy hygiene, structurally declining as wallets adopt the fresh-address standard. The second is the share of circulating supply held in reused addresses: a proxy for custodial concentration, since institutional infrastructure (exchanges, custodians) heavily reuses its deposit addresses. Together they separate retail behaviour from custodial structure.
How to read
Two percentage curves. The first (active addresses reused) tends to decline over the long run - the network's gradual privacy-hygiene improvement. The second (supply in reused addresses) tends to stay high and reflects the share of stock held by structures that reuse (custodial). Read the GAP between the two: when reused supply stays high while reused active addresses fall, it indicates that reuse is concentrating in custodial actors while retail improves. The price overlay situates these dynamics within the cycle.
Key zones
Relative, structural read - no trading thresholds: • Reused active addresses in durable decline: improving network privacy hygiene (healthy underlying trend). • Reused supply share high and stable: strong custodial component of the stock (exchanges, custodians). • Widening gap (high supply, low active): reuse migrating toward custodial structures while retail adopts fresh addresses. • Rebound in reused active addresses: often tied to waves of exchange or service activity reusing intensively.
What to observe
• Underlying trend of reused active addresses: the long-run decline validates adoption of modern privacy standards. • Plateau or rise in reused supply during a bull: inflows toward exchanges (custodial reuse), consistent with a distribution posture. • Divergence between the two curves: separates retail behaviour (privacy) from market structure (custodial). • Sudden breaks: often a behavioural change of a large custodial actor (infrastructure migration).
Historical context
Address reuse was the norm in Bitcoin's early days, when on-chain privacy was poorly understood. The gradual adoption of HD (hierarchical deterministic) wallets, the fresh-address standard, then SegWit and Taproot, structurally declined the share of reused active addresses. In parallel, the rise of exchanges and custodial infrastructure after 2017 kept a high share of supply in reused addresses - the divergence between the two curves tells this tension between retail improvement and growing intermediation.
Expert notes
An address is 'reused' if it has already been involved in a prior transaction. The first series (reused active addresses) is 24h-smoothed. The second (supply in reused addresses) is a share of circulating supply. Note: reuse is a privacy degradation, but a high share is not 'bad' per se - it largely reflects the market's custodial reality (exchanges reuse by design). The useful information is the trend and the gap, not the absolute level.
Common mistakes to avoid
• Believing high reuse is 'bad': it mostly reflects the market's custodial structure, not a flaw. • Reading reused supply share as a security risk: it is privacy/structure, not protocol security. • Conflating the two curves: one measures behaviour (addresses), the other concentration (supply) - they do not say the same thing. • Expecting a timing indication: this is a long-term structural metric, not a short-term trading tool.
Programmatic access
REST API
curl -sS \
'https://api.trinityinsights.io/api/v1/onchain/address-reuse-rate/history?days=90' \
-H 'X-API-Key: $TRINITY_API_KEY'MCP server
{
"tool": "get_chart_value",
"metric_id": "address-reuse-rate",
"timeframe": "1y"
}Required tier: pro. See the pricing grid for the tier list and the MCP documentation for multi-client configuration.
Related metrics
Institutional disclaimer
Trinity Insights is an educational and analytical tool. The metric above does not constitute investment advice. Trinity Insights is not a Crypto-Asset Service Provider (CASP) registered under MiCA Regulation (EU) 2023/1114. See the full disclaimer.