THORChain Swap Without KYC: BTC to ETH Guide (2026)

Every instant exchange that says "no KYC" still routes your coins through a company: the swap partner receives the deposit, runs an automated AML score on it, and can pause the order and ask for documents if the score is bad. That is true for Swap.bz Standard and Private too, and we say so. The THORChain route removes the company from the path altogether. This guide explains what actually happens, which coins qualify, which wallets work, what it costs, and the two mistakes that make people lose network fees.

What makes the THORChain route different

THORChain is a decentralised cross-chain protocol. Instead of sending BTC to a partner’s deposit address, you send it to a THORChain vault — an address controlled jointly by close to a hundred independent nodes through threshold signatures. Your transaction carries a short memo that says which asset you want and where to deliver it. Liquidity pools (BTC, ETH, USDC, LTC, DOGE…) perform the swap on-chain and the network signs the outbound transaction to your address. There is no operator account, no dashboard where someone could click "hold", and no compliance desk. The protocol can pause a chain when its nodes decide it is unsafe; when that happens your deposit is refunded, not held.

• No company custody at any point — vault in, pool swap, payout out.
• No AML scoring, no documents, no source-of-funds request, because there is nobody to ask.
• Refunds are automatic and protocol-level: wrong memo, price outside tolerance or paused chain all return the deposit to the sending address minus network fees.
• Swap.bz’s 1% is written into the memo as a THORChain affiliate fee and paid by the protocol. Nothing is added after the quote.

What you can send and what you can receive

THORChain only supports chains it runs a node for, and the sending chain must let a normal wallet attach a memo. That gives an asymmetric list: fewer coins you can send than coins you can receive.

You can send (memo-capable chains)

• Bitcoin (BTC), Litecoin (LTC), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), Dogecoin (DOGE) — memo as OP_RETURN.
• XRP — memo in the native Memo field (not the destination tag).
• Cosmos (ATOM) — memo in the native Memo field.

You can receive (any active pool)

• Native L1 coins: BTC, ETH, LTC, BCH, DOGE, XRP, ATOM, AVAX, BNB (BSC), SOL, TRX, ETH on Base.
• Stablecoins with a pool: USDT and USDC on Ethereum, plus the chains listed in the widget at the time.
• Not on THORChain: Monero and most alt-L1 tokens. For XMR use Standard or Private.

The Swap.bz widget in THORChain mode only lists assets that have an active pool right now and hides chains the network has paused, so if a pair does not appear, the protocol cannot serve it today — switch to Standard for that pair.

Step by step: BTC to ETH on THORChain

1. Open swap.bz, pick THORChain · 1% in the mode selector. The coin lists shrink to what THORChain serves.
2. Choose BTC to send and ETH to receive, enter the amount. The quote is the live pool price with the 1% fee and the expected slippage already included.
3. Paste your Ethereum receive address (0x…, a wallet you control). There is no refund address field for BTC — refunds go back to the address you send from.
4. Confirm. The order page shows a vault address, a memo and the exact amount. The vault address rotates over time, so never reuse one from an old order.
5. In your wallet, send the exact amount to the vault address and attach the memo as OP_RETURN. Check the memo ends with your ETH address.
6. Wait for confirmations. After the swap the order page shows the outbound ETH transaction; the coins land in your wallet.

The memo, and which wallets can add it

The memo is the entire instruction. A typical one looks like =:ETH.ETH:0xYourAddress::swapbz:100 — the target asset, your address, then the affiliate name and fee. On Bitcoin-family chains it is stored as OP_RETURN data, which is limited to 80 bytes; that is why the Swap.bz affiliate name is short and why BTC orders have no separate refund address.

• Sparrow (desktop): the send form has an "Add OP_RETURN" option. Works with Ledger, Trezor, Coldcard and other hardware wallets connected to Sparrow — the recommended setup for large amounts.
• Trezor Suite: enable OP_RETURN in the advanced send options, paste the memo.
• Electrum: supports OP_RETURN outputs, but expects the memo in hex — use Sparrow unless you know the syntax.
• Ledger Live alone does not support OP_RETURN. Pair the Ledger with Sparrow instead.
• XRP: Xaman (formerly XUMM) has a Memo field. Cosmos: Keplr has a Memo field.

For Bitcoin and Litecoin, Swap.bz scans the vault for your memo and marks the deposit as seen automatically. For other source chains the order page asks you to paste the transaction hash so it can follow the swap on THORChain.

Fees, slippage and timing

Three things are in the quote: the pool price, the 1% Swap.bz fee taken from the input, and the outbound network fee THORChain charges to pay you. Slippage is shown as well and depends on pool depth against your amount. THORChain also enforces a minimum: a deposit smaller than the outbound fee cannot be refunded, so respect the minimum the widget shows.

Timing is set by the source chain. Bitcoin needs its confirmations first, so a BTC swap typically completes in 10–30 minutes; Litecoin and Dogecoin are faster; XRP and ATOM confirm in seconds and the swap usually finishes within a few minutes. Large amounts may be streamed by the protocol in several sub-swaps to reduce slippage, which adds a few minutes and improves the price.

The two mistakes that cost network fees

• Sending from an exchange. Withdrawals cannot carry the memo, and any refund returns to the exchange’s address, not yours. Always withdraw to your own wallet first.
• Editing or truncating the memo. If the network cannot parse it, it refunds the deposit minus fees. Copy it exactly; do not add spaces or line breaks.

THORChain, Standard or Private: which one?

• THORChain (1%): you want zero intermediary and your pair is native BTC/LTC/BCH/DOGE/XRP/ATOM into a native L1 or a major stable. Nobody can screen or freeze it.
• Standard (0.5%): you need XMR or a long-tail token, you are sending from a chain THORChain does not accept (e.g. ETH or SOL as the source), or the partner quote is simply better on that pair right now.
• Private (1%): you want extra hops, usually through Monero, so the sending and receiving wallets are not visibly linked. Still goes through partners, so their AML rules apply.

Compare the receive amount for the same input at the same moment: the widget quotes all three modes live, so switching the mode selector is the only test you need.