I tried to open an inbound channel like you said but it said I had no sats to pay for it. So I sent 11k sats to the wallet and it ate 10k. Then I sent 98k sats over, and it ate 10k sats. The other custodial wallet didn’t charge a single sat in fees.
Discussion
So you had a second channel opened to you, because your first one didn't have enough capacity to receive the new amount you sent. By default, the just-in-time services gives you 100k sats of inbound on top of the amount you're looking to receive.
Whenever a new channel needs to be opened, the required fee is displayed clearly above the invoice QR.
If you want to be most economical, you can use the advanced channel service through the 'Purchase inbound channel' and specify the amount and duration you need so you can do long term planning.
As far as costs VS custodial. Yes, custodial wallet charges less in fees, but that's at the cost of control of your funds.
Duration of channel? What does that mean? Is this channel going to expire at some point? Yeah I see two channels and that’s not what I wanted. This is way too confusing
Yes, channels expire after some time, but you can renew them in the app.
As for the two channels, you don’t have to worry about them too much, you can use both of them together.
I have a small advice for you in the future. If you’re not sure what you’re doing it’s always better to read the docs so you avoid mistakes especially if you deal with Bitcoin nostr:nevent1qqsy4svf3r4mvv57yutsahkst2yjxhutqsnn6pc4xwhws0pqtlffnlczyq73jv5nqt57u230dzm3hf4zl7wxg4ftajd7jge9d0sh2st6wllksqcyqqqqqqgmxu6zk
Dude I’m not a developer. I shouldn’t have to read all these docs lmao good UX should take care of this. I understand bitcoin and I have a basic understanding of lightning. I know you need channels and inbound/outbound liquidity. But there’s just way too much information here. And I understand why it’s designed that way. Transparency is important but most of this info is overwhelming for the average user and a normie will never sit through reading all these docs.
The docs aren’t for developers! You haven’t even checked what I shared with you before you wrote this note 🤷♂️
Docs are not for ordinary users. They are for devs or the die hard dedicated user. If you need me to look through docs, then the UX isn’t good enough. This is a book I read when I was working in digital marketing and it’s helpful for developers trying to improve UX. It should be straight forward and intuitive. I understand that Zeus is trying to give users all of the options and control but this isn’t ideal for 99% of users. That’s why custodial wallets dominate. It’s not just that it’s cheaper, but it’s braindead easy. Maybe add another option to create a wallet using an extremely simplified UX? I highly recommend this book to anyone that wants to improve UX of their app.
ZEUS v0.11 has a new Cashu wallet. You can get a Lightning address for free and have your a-ha moment on Nostr, with the ability to accept 1 sat zaps.
Then, as you wallet balance grows, ZEUS will provide educational material and prompt you to upgrade to a channel when economic self-custody becomes viable.
Sir, my 10 years old nephew just set up Zeus wallet after reading the docs without having any issues and sending my invoices on daily basis now
Congrats to him. We should just throw away standard UX practices and blame it on lazy users. I’m sure that’s how large tech companies like Google, Facebook, YouTube, and Amazon became as massive as they are. Let them eat docs.
This is one of those times when we have something great in our hands and we don't know what to do with it so we just start hating it 😂
We could say that its about the target userbase being considered by the wallet devs more than standard UX practices. We have so many options now, thanks to the network's open nature, that we don't need to be up in arms about this very much.
For the demographic of Bitcoiners who care about control, customisation and self-custody while using Lightning, Zeus is doing an incredible job. I love their UX. Blixt is a other option.
For people who sort of understand lightning and are okay with giving up a certain degree of customisation but still want self-custody, there's Phoenix.
Aqua is for people who want to minimise fees and maybe go between on-chain and LN very often.
Wallet of Satoshi for people who want to use a wallet without thinking about anything under the hood.
Blink gives a way to get access to Dollars while still using Lightning.
Strike is a great interface with fiat.
Cashu wallets for people who are okay with third parties as long as strong privacy guarantees exist.
Alby for people who want the proper LN experience with full control over literally everything from their desktop.
All of these services will likely exist side-by-side, make money (hopefully enough to become incredibly sustainable) and help people use Bitcoin in the way they see fit.
I don't think we will see a standard UX per se. It's going to be quite diverse.
nostr:nprofile1qqsytuv4el7t3jtjfm7zfrc9q730ked40806he7dx5uctxqk8j4hvfcpp4mhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mqpz4mhxue69uhks6tnwshxummnw3ezumrpdejqh358gt you come to me. I’ll help explain it easily.
I appreciate you. The point I’m trying to make is that if we realistically want the world on a bitcoin standard, the UX should be brain dead easy. I shouldn’t have to look through docs or speak with the actual team about the fact that the app needs to be open to send/receive payments or open a channel.
Agreed 100%. But also, you ever signed for a loan from a bank? Or opened a credit card? Lots of docs. It’ll become more user friendly with time, WE are still early.
You guys are both right.
Self-custodial Bitcoin UX has to get better, but it is progressing each and every day.
But at the same time, to use it to its full potential today you have to do some learning about the nuances. Thankfully there are tons of great resources if you’re willing to put the time in.
Self-custodial VS custodial is all about time preference. Have some pain getting started as you’re getting familiar with the concepts VS have much more pain when you can no longer access your funds.
🙏 did you guys change something so the channels and duration or is that an app thing? My node channels have been open for years. The app only lets me “rent”channels.
But I’m not signing a loan from the bank. I’m just trying to hold a small amount of sats for shitposts on nostr.
Right. But you are your own bank. If you want someone else to make it easier for you then custodial is the faster onboarding. But then you need to trust who you’re using. True privacy and self-sovereignty is a balance of convenience. Everyone has different tolerances.
Most people are inevitably going to be on custodial solutions anyway. I’m just asking for a simpler onboarding experience. I have Phoenix wallet and that feels much easier to use.
Hear you loud and clear. We’re working on it.
Appreciate all the feedback.
I appreciate you not taking this an attack. I do love what Zeus stands for. I’ve had the app downloaded for like 3 years now. Listened to you guys more than once on the citadel dispatch. Every time I do, I reopen the app to try and use it but every time I open the app and try to set up the wallet, I’m just like wtf is all this info it’s overwhelming. Where do I even start? So I close the app and say I’ll come back to it later because it’s early and the UX should improve. But coming back to it years later still feels the same. Today I finally bit the bullet and just did what you said. It doesn’t feel great to pay all those fees without knowing that the channels will eventually expire. I don’t envy the UX work that you guys need to do but it feels like you just have to burn sats to learn or you have to have prior experience running a lightning node. I like the idea of making the current UX a more advanced option and adding a beginner friendly option that handholds you through the process. I highly recommend that book. I think improving UX can massively grow your user base.
Cheers. Thank you.
Tradeoffs. I prefer lightning over liquid. I’m dipping my toes in ecash, there’s a learning curve for sure. I think of L1 as my savings, L2 as my checking. Self hosted holds most of L2 and custodial gets a “per diem” spend that is okay if rugged.
Right now I prefer liquid. The custodial risk is small but trading with it is super cheap and intuitive. No need to manage channels or pay unexpected fees. When your liquid balance is large enough you can pay the fee to send it on chain.
Breez is similar to Phoenix, but better: phoenix devs knows who you are paying (because of their routing mechanism), Breez devs don't
You ended up doing everything the wrong way — no surprise you had bad experience. Forget about the custodial wallet for now. Here’s how you should’ve approached Zeus:
1. Start with an on-chain transaction to your fresh, empty wallet. You can send from cold storage or an exchange. Just make sure it’s a decent amount — I recommend at least 400k sats if you’re planning to use Zeus as your main wallet.
2. Wait for the transaction to confirm in a block. Once that’s done, you’ll see a new option above your balance that says something like “Move sats to Lightning.” Tap that to open your first channel.
3. Make sure to uncheck “Use LSP.” This way you won’t rely on Zeus’ built-in liquidity service. Instead, you’ll open your own channel — no expiration date, and it’s a lot cheaper.
4. Send at minimum 150k sats to open the channel. Pick a reasonable fee for the on-chain transaction — lately, anything between 1–3 sats/vbyte has been fine.
5. After setting the amount and fee, broadcast the transaction and wait for it to confirm. This might take a few minutes to a couple of hours, depending on network conditions — just be patient.
6. Once it confirms, you’ll have your own Lightning channel ready to use. It’ll show up in Zeus like in the screenshot below.
Keep in mind: at first, you’ll have much more outbound capacity than inbound. That means you can send more than you can receive. Every time you send sats, your outbound goes down and your inbound increases. Eventually, once you’ve got decent inbound, you’ll be able to receive sats and re-balance your channel without needing another on-chain transaction. That, in turn, boosts your outbound again. It may look confusing at first but after you do it a couple of times it starts to make sense. Self custodial lightning is all about managing liquidity. It’s harder to learn but when you master it, you’ll own all your payments and thanks to the built in mobile node of Zeus you’ll have levels of privacy while transaction on par with Monero. And unlike custodial lightning, Zeus can’t rug you. Good luck!
Hoping this info gets integrated into the UX flow thanks 🫂
I’ve requested a video tutorial by nostr:nprofile1qqspnzgrfett3asxcuj0gksje6z2zxzpvgd27uvz58m9vsuqh8zzw6cpzemhxue69uhhyetvv9ujuurjd9kkzmpwdejhgqgewaehxw309ac8yetdd96k6tnswf5k6ctv9ehx2ap0p74hj4. Hope he can come to it soon. But don’t wait for it, start experimenting and you’ll see first hand the possibilities and limitations of lighting. It’s not perfect, but it’s pretty powerful ones you get the hang of it. Become sovereign!
This is the most helpful material I have seen regarding Zeus. Thanks. nostr:nprofile1qqsrzsrjc9h6jse7zd60vtjmqtypvw2xa55c48x78v25z5fu98gellcpzemhxue69uhkzarvv9ejumn0wd68ytnvv9hxgqg4waehxw309ash2arg9ehx7um5wgcjucm0d58l2jpv
You’re welcome Timekeeper! Glad to be of help!
Thank you for the insights!
You went down the Zeus rabbit hole, just later to have to hear you did it wrong.
And if you vent out in their telegram group they will call you "lazy who don't want to learn"
Just use Breez+minibits and you will have zero headaches