September 2020, Binance launched the Binance Smart Chain, an Ethereum-Virtual-Machine compatible smart contract blockchain, and in only 5 months it has surpassed Ethereum in daily transactions. With transactions taking only 5–10 seconds, as opposed to 5–10 minutes, and costing only .05c-.15c each, as opposed to $15+, its no wonder why its seeing such massive growth. Existing smart contracts, and Solidity developers can easily migrate to BSC, and pickup right where they left off. Investors can also “wrap” any of their favorite ERC-20 tokens, and use them on Binance Smart Chain. While a few are clamoring for “scaling” solutions for Ethereum, others, like you, have now discovered the problem has already been solved. Welcome to Binance Smart Chain.
Getting started with BSC is pretty easy, and I will try my best to guide you through the process. The steps below can be skipped if you have already completed any of them on your own.
Setting up your wallet for Binance Smart Chain
You will need to first create a wallet, most begin with MetaMask. From the Google Chrome extension store, search for and install MetaMask Wallet.
Once you have installed MetaMask, it will walk you through creating a new wallet. Make sure you write down, and save, the 12-word seed phrase thats given to you upon setup. That seed phrase, will help you get back into your wallet if you ever get logged out or lose your device. Once you are all setup, you will need to add the Binance Smart Chain settings to MetaMask.
Up at the top of your wallet, you will see a section with the network and a drop down arrow, click on that and choose “Custom RPC”. MetaMask by default has Ethereum’s main network and test networks, so we will add Binance Smart Chain manually.
Network Name: BSC Mainnet
New RPC URL: https://bsc-dataseed.binance.org/
Chain ID: 56
Currency Symbol: BNB
Block Explorer: https://bscscan.com/
Once you have typed that all in, click on save. Now on the wallet homepage, you will be able to use the drop down menu and select BSC Mainnet. You are now on Binance Smart Chain. Keep in mind, all transactions require BEP-20 BNB in your wallet to pay for the gas costs, exactly like ETH and Ethereum.
Getting Money onto Binance Smart Chain
In areas of the world that still have access to Binance.com, getting your tokens swapped to BEP-20 Binance Smart Chain compatible tokens is very easy. Simply deposit your tokens into your Binance wallet, and when you choose withdrawal, make sure to select BEP-20 BSC as the transfer network option, and your newly created wallet address in your MetaMask wallet.
For Americans’ and others without access to Binance.com, at the moment it isn’t as easy. Binance.US has not updated their exchange yet to support BEP-20 withdrawals, so we will use a work-around that I have found to work well. There are a couple options, using SafePal Wallet and the Binance Bridge. The first option is much simpler, so lets go over that one first.
SafePal Wallet
Click on this link to be directed to your appstore to download SafePal Wallet, https://www.safepal.io/download. Once you have installed the wallet, open it up and import your wallet address that we created earlier on MetaMask, into SafePal Wallet, using your 12-word seed phrase. Once you have done that, you will be presented with the SafePal Wallet homepage.
Now you can deposit your ERC-20 tokens, or anything else such as BTC/LTC etc. and “wrap” them, to make them compatible with Binance Smart Chain (this can always be un-done if you want to go back). Once you have tokens in your SafePal Wallet, you can then click on the Swap button at the bottom (4th one over), and begin the swap process.
In the “Pay” field, choose the tokens that you want to convert to BSC compatible tokens. In the “Receive” field, make sure you choose BEP-20 BNB. Then go ahead and proceed with the swap. Once completed you will have Binance Smart Chain compatible BEP-20 BNB tokens in your SafePal Wallet. They will also be accessible in your MetaMask that you created earlier.
Binance Bridge
Binance has a website called the Binance Bridge, that will allow you to convert your non-BSC compatible tokens, to BEP-20 versions. It currently blocks users in countries that don’t allow Binance.com accounts, however it is pretty easily fooled by a VPN. I installed “SetupVPN” from the Chrome extension store, chose the free account, and set it to UK. Once you have done that, you will be able to access the Bridge, by going here; https://www.binance.org/en/bridge.
Once you connected your wallet, choose the “asset” that you are trying to convert, and make sure the “from” and “to” networks are correct. Click on max, and then copy/paste your wallet address from MetaMask/SafePal, and then you should be able to click on “next”. Binance Bridge will then direct you to send the exact amount of tokens, to a unique wallet address, and once they receive your tokens, they send you back the same amount, but BSC compatible versions. Keep in mind the unique address they give you can only be used once.
Now that you have a mobile wallet that is setup for Binance Smart Chain, and you have some BEP-20 BNB tokens, its now time to explore what Binance Smart Chain has to offer.
PancakeSwap Decentralized Exchange
The largest decentralized exchange is Pancakeswap.finance, so go ahead and head over there and you will be presented with the option to “connect” your wallet. That will allow the exchange to see what tokens you have available and allow you to trade them easily.
You will now be able to start trading tokens.
Jetfuel Finance dApp
You can also explore some popular DeFi apps such as Jetfuel.finance, try going to Jetfuel.finance and connecting your wallet. Jetfuel Finance is a popular dApp that allows you to earn interest passively and has some of the highest APY’s in all of cryptocurrency.
Your wallet should now be set up, and you should be all good to go. If you have any questions or need any assistance, you can find me on Twitter/Telegram/Discord at @TheDevil100x.
How To: Moving from Ethereum to Binance Smart Chain: https://thedevil100x.medium.com/how-to-moving-from-ethereum-to-binance-smart-chain-17ef2d9021b2
How To: Buy and Sell FUEL on Pancakeswap and Streetswap:
https://thedevil100x.medium.com/how-to-buy-and-sell-fuel-on-pancakeswap-and-streetswap-a6a64c81542e
How To: Add Liquidity on Pancakeswap and Streetswap:
https://thedevil100x.medium.com/how-to-add-liquidity-on-pancakeswap-and-streetswap-56c6d5045a16
How To: FUEL staking on Jetfuel Finance
https://thedevil100x.medium.com/how-to-fuel-staking-on-jetfuel-finance-1983c8bd1832
