user95422: I am installing a mobile wallet and it ask me what type of address I want to use, I want to try and use a segwit address but is there a risk that my coins will be lost if I try to transfer fund from an exchange if they dont support it, or if I want to transfer coins from my segwit address to a legacy one.

user7272: There are, broadly, three types of addresses in use at the moment:

P2PKH - Pay to public key hash addresses start with a 1, and should be accepted by essentially any service in the Bitcoin ecosystem
P2SH - Pay to script hash addresses are commonly used for multisig, but as of the segwit activation, they are also used for wrapped segwit addresses. These start with a 3. In the wrapped segwit version, you get the advantage of lower fees, while still being able to send to the address from nearly all services.
Bech32 addresses - Starting with a bc1, these are also known as native segwit addresses, and offer the greatest savings in fees. However, a sizable number of services do not support withdrawals to these addresses.

Generally, P2SH segwit addresses offer the best of both worlds at the moment.
When sending coins to a service, your choice of address does not matter. It only plays a role when receiving coins.

95422: <p>I am installing a mobile wallet and it ask me what type of address I want to use, I want to try and use a segwit address but is there a risk that my coins will be lost if I try to transfer fund from an exchange if they dont support it, or if I want to transfer coins from my segwit address to a legacy one.</p>
 7272: <p>There are, broadly, three types of addresses in use at the moment:</p>

<ol>
<li>P2PKH - Pay to public key hash addresses start with a <code>1</code>, and should be accepted by essentially any service in the Bitcoin ecosystem</li>
<li>P2SH - Pay to script hash addresses are commonly used for multisig, but as of the segwit activation, they are also used for wrapped segwit addresses. These start with a <code>3</code>. In the wrapped segwit version, you get the advantage of lower fees, while still being able to send to the address from nearly all services.</li>
<li>Bech32 addresses - Starting with a <code>bc1</code>, these are also known as native segwit addresses, and offer the greatest savings in fees. However, a sizable number of services do not support withdrawals to these addresses.</li>
</ol>

<p>Generally, P2SH segwit addresses offer the best of both worlds at the moment.</p>

<p>When sending coins to a service, your choice of address does not matter. It only plays a role when receiving coins.</p>
