What are sats?

You don’t have to buy a “whole Bitcoin.” The real unit Bitcoin moves in is the sat, and thinking in sats makes everything click.

Basics·Beginner·4 min read

2 of 8 · Get your first bitcoin

Here’s the single most common thing that scares people off Bitcoin: they see one Bitcoin costs more than a used car and assume the door is closed. It isn’t. You were just looking at the wrong unit.

Meet the satoshi

A Bitcoin can be split into 100,000,000 tiny pieces. Each piece is a satoshi, or “sat” for short, named after Bitcoin’s pseudonymous creator, .

So you never have to buy a whole Bitcoin, the same way you never have to buy a whole bar of gold. You can buy 5,000 sats. Or 2 million. Whatever fits your budget this week.

Don’t think in Bitcoin. Think in sats.

Try it

Bitcoin

Sats

US dollars

1 BTC = $77,334 · price as of Sep 2, 2026, 04:15 UTC

Why sats make life easier

Pricing a coffee at “0.00006 BTC” is a headache. Pricing it at “6,000 sats” feels like normal money again. Whole numbers. Pocket-sized. Human.

That’s why Big Bad Wallet is sats-first by default: your balance, your history, and the amounts you send all read in sats, with the dollar value sitting quietly alongside for when you want it.

Quick math1 BTC = 100,000,000 sats. 1,000 sats is about a hundred-thousandth of a coin. You’ll stop converting in your head within a week, promise.

The one thing to remember

One Bitcoin is 100 million sats. You can own sats today without owning a whole coin.

Next in this path

3 of 8 · Get your first bitcoin

Basics · 3 min

BTC, sats, or dollars?

The same balance can be shown three ways, and the unit you pick quietly shapes how you think. A quick guide to switching gears.

Beginner

← Get your first bitcoin