user1244: What happens to my bitcoins when I die?
Are they lost in the network? 

user659: You leave them in your will, along with the gold you buried in a secret location.

user6767: Most of us will probably want our bitcoins to go on to our family members when we die.
If you're the only one with access to your private key, however, that is unfortunately impossible.
The best solution to this is to "shard" your private key into shares and distribute those shares to various members of your family. With Shamir's Secret Sharing Scheme, you can require that M shares of the N total shares created be required to reconstruct the private key.
Here is a very straightforward, easy to read python implementation of Shamir's Secret Sharing: https://github.com/rxl/secret-sharing.
All you need to do to shard your private key is the following:
>>> from secretsharing import BitcoinToB32SecretSharer
>>> shares = BitcoinToB32SecretSharer.split_secret("5KJvsngHeMpm884wtkJNzQGaCErckhHJBGFsvd3VyK5qMZXj3hS", 3, 5)
['B-RJ6Y56OSUWDY5VAAGC6XLSTM64CAJ2LPBNB7NKATJCWC7VSHIP5DQIVMR6OGJ4GB', 'C-CT5R24XAR5B732JWYQKSYOYBSF5VHI73HLY24QCFRJR5XUW64C4JWYN6SRGWVCUG', 'D-T54KX27OPEAGZ7TNK5WOFK4WFPZKEXUHNKPWLWDXZQNYPT3WPV3P5IGQTD7HAJDG']

In this case, 3 out of 5 of your family members would have to come forth upon your death and combine their shares in order for your private key (and your bitcoins) to be recovered.
The process for recovering private keys would be as follows:
>>> BitcoinToB32SecretSharer.recover_secret(shares[0:3])
'5KJvsngHeMpm884wtkJNzQGaCErckhHJBGFsvd3VyK5qMZXj3hS'


user1218: Eventually, technology advances may enable cracking of the keys allowing access to your Bitcoins. This would be the digital equivalent of salvage or treasure hunting.
Until then, they're lost.

user1221: It's up to you what you want to happen with your bitcoins when you die. The bitcoins are in the possession of whomever has the wallet and the passphrase needed for it. If you want someone else to inherit your bitcoins, you need to arrange for a way for them to obtain the wallet and passphrase. Perhaps a safety deposit box containing the password or a memory stick containing the wallet.
Bear in mind though that a backup of the wallet will only contain 100 future addresses. If you perform more transactions than that since the backup was taken, they won't be stored on the memory stick unless you ensure you send your bitcoins only to addresses that will have existed when the wallet was backed up.

user1247: You may just store your bitcoins with the method also used by https://www.casascius.com/ ... so it will be like paper-money stored in a sock under your bed.

user817: You can set up a transaction/contract that would express your will to transfer specific bitcoins to another person:
Contracts. Example 4: Using external state:

Scripts are, by design, pure functions. They cannot poll external
  servers or import any state that may change as it would allow an
  attacker to outrun the block chain. But we can make transactions
  connected to the world in other ways.
Consider the example of an old man who wishes to give an inheritance
  to his grandson, either on the grandson's 18th birthday or when the
  man dies, whichever comes first.
To solve this, the man first sends the amount of the inheritance to
  himself so there is a single output of the right amount. Then he
  creates a transaction with a lock time of the grandson's 18th birthday
  that pays the coins to another key owned by the grandson, signs it,
  and gives it to him - but does not broadcast it. This takes care of
  the 18th birthday condition. If the date passes, the grandson
  broadcasts the transaction and claims the coins. He could do it before
  then, but it doesn't let him get the coins any earlier, and some nodes
  may choose to drop transactions in the memory pool with lock times far
  in the future.
The death condition is harder. As Bitcoin nodes cannot measure
  arbitrary conditions, we must rely on an oracle. An oracle is a server
  that has a keypair, and signs transactions on request when a
  user-provided expression evaluates to true.
...

I'm not sure whether this mechanism is flexible enough to be used if you are not certain which amount should be transferred or from which address (because you may want to perform some operations with the bitcoins after you have set up the "inheritance transaction"; perhaps, you can simply generate and store such a transaction every time the amount or the address changes).

user22: This depends a lot on how you handle your wallet. If you are careful about it and make sure you have an off-site backup of your wallet (or use a deterministic or paper wallet, etc) then you can easily pass your wallet and all the coins it contains to anyone you choose in the same ways that you can pass on other property.
Of course if you're the only person with access to the wallet and have not planned anything then yes, your bitcoins will be "lost in the network."

1244: <p>What happens to my bitcoins when I die?
Are they lost in the network? </p>
 659: <p>You leave them in your will, along with the gold you buried in a secret location.</p>
 6767: <p>Most of us will probably want our bitcoins to go on to our family members when we die.</p>

<p>If you're the only one with access to your private key, however, that is unfortunately impossible.</p>

<p>The best solution to this is to "shard" your private key into shares and distribute those shares to various members of your family. With Shamir's Secret Sharing Scheme, you can require that M shares of the N total shares created be required to reconstruct the private key.</p>

<p>Here is a very straightforward, easy to read python implementation of Shamir's Secret Sharing: <a href="https://github.com/rxl/secret-sharing" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/rxl/secret-sharing</a>.</p>

<p>All you need to do to shard your private key is the following:</p>

<pre><code>&gt;&gt;&gt; from secretsharing import BitcoinToB32SecretSharer
&gt;&gt;&gt; shares = BitcoinToB32SecretSharer.split_secret("5KJvsngHeMpm884wtkJNzQGaCErckhHJBGFsvd3VyK5qMZXj3hS", 3, 5)
['B-RJ6Y56OSUWDY5VAAGC6XLSTM64CAJ2LPBNB7NKATJCWC7VSHIP5DQIVMR6OGJ4GB', 'C-CT5R24XAR5B732JWYQKSYOYBSF5VHI73HLY24QCFRJR5XUW64C4JWYN6SRGWVCUG', 'D-T54KX27OPEAGZ7TNK5WOFK4WFPZKEXUHNKPWLWDXZQNYPT3WPV3P5IGQTD7HAJDG']
</code></pre>

<p>In this case, 3 out of 5 of your family members would have to come forth upon your death and combine their shares in order for your private key (and your bitcoins) to be recovered.</p>

<p>The process for recovering private keys would be as follows:</p>

<pre><code>&gt;&gt;&gt; BitcoinToB32SecretSharer.recover_secret(shares[0:3])
'5KJvsngHeMpm884wtkJNzQGaCErckhHJBGFsvd3VyK5qMZXj3hS'
</code></pre>
 1218: <p>Eventually, technology advances may enable cracking of the keys allowing access to your Bitcoins. This would be the digital equivalent of salvage or treasure hunting.</p>

<p>Until then, they're lost.</p>
 1221: <p>It's up to you what you want to happen with your bitcoins when you die. The bitcoins are in the possession of whomever has the wallet and the passphrase needed for it. If you want someone else to inherit your bitcoins, you need to arrange for a way for them to obtain the wallet and passphrase. Perhaps a safety deposit box containing the password or a memory stick containing the wallet.</p>

<p>Bear in mind though that a backup of the wallet will only contain 100 future addresses. If you perform more transactions than that since the backup was taken, they won't be stored on the memory stick unless you ensure you send your bitcoins only to addresses that will have existed when the wallet was backed up.</p>
 1247: <p>You may just store your bitcoins with the method also used by <a href="https://www.casascius.com/" rel="nofollow">https://www.casascius.com/</a> ... so it will be like paper-money stored in a sock under your bed.</p>
 817: <p>You can set up a transaction/contract that would express your will to transfer specific bitcoins to another person:</p>

<p><a href="https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Contracts#Example_4%3a_Using_external_state" rel="nofollow">Contracts. Example 4: Using external state</a>:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Scripts are, by design, pure functions. They cannot poll external
  servers or import any state that may change as it would allow an
  attacker to outrun the block chain. But we can make transactions
  connected to the world in other ways.</p>
  
  <p>Consider the example of an old man who wishes to give an inheritance
  to his grandson, either <strong>on the grandson's 18th birthday</strong> or <strong>when the
  man dies</strong>, whichever comes first.</p>
  
  <p>To solve this, the man first sends the amount of the inheritance to
  himself so there is a single output of the right amount. Then he
  creates a transaction with a lock time of the grandson's 18th birthday
  that pays the coins to another key owned by the grandson, signs it,
  and gives it to him - but does not broadcast it. <strong>This takes care of
  the 18th birthday condition.</strong> If the date passes, the grandson
  broadcasts the transaction and claims the coins. He could do it before
  then, but it doesn't let him get the coins any earlier, and some nodes
  may choose to drop transactions in the memory pool with lock times far
  in the future.</p>
  
  <p><strong>The death condition is harder.</strong> As Bitcoin nodes cannot measure
  arbitrary conditions, we must rely on an <strong>oracle</strong>. An oracle is a server
  that has a keypair, and signs transactions on request when a
  user-provided expression evaluates to true.</p>
  
  <p><a href="https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Contracts#Example_4%3a_Using_external_state" rel="nofollow">...</a></p>
</blockquote>

<p>I'm not sure whether this mechanism is flexible enough to be used if you are not certain which amount should be transferred or from which address (because you may want to perform some operations with the bitcoins after you have set up the "inheritance transaction"; perhaps, you can simply generate and store such a transaction every time the amount or the address changes).</p>
 22: <p>This depends a lot on how you handle your wallet. If you are careful about it and make sure you have an off-site backup of your wallet (or use a deterministic or paper wallet, etc) then you can easily pass your wallet and all the coins it contains to anyone you choose in the same ways that you can pass on other property.</p>

<p>Of course if you're the only person with access to the wallet and have not planned anything then yes, your bitcoins will be "lost in the network."</p>
