Install Electrum Bitcoin Wallet On Your Raspberry Pi

LAST UPDATED NOVEMBER 2, 2015
These short steps assume you are using the Raspbian OS and already have it installed and running. If you need help getting to that point use the DIY steps for installing a Bitcoin full node but stop before installing Bitcoin Core or dependencies.

PRELIMINARIES

Electrum is a Simplified Payment Verification (SPV) wallet. This means it is fast and lightweight (it doesn't need to store the full blockchain, just headers). Electrum depends on other full nodes in the Bitcoin network to verify whether a particular bitcoin payment can be made. You can find more information about Electrum on their wiki or their website.

DOWNLOAD ELECTRUM

Install needed dependencies:

pi@raspnode ~ $ sudo apt-get install python-qt4 python-pip -y

Use the Python installer (pip) to download and install Electrum:

pi@raspnode ~ $ sudo pip install https://download.electrum.org/2.5.2/Electrum-2.5.2.tar.gz

Launch the desktop:

pi@raspnode ~ $ startx

To launch Electrum you can either open a terminal and run:

pi@raspnode ~ $ electrum

Or you can find the Electrum application in the menu by going to Menu > Internet > Electrum Bitcoin Wallet.