Electrum is one of the oldest and most trusted Bitcoin wallets available today. It is a lightweight desktop wallet known for its speed and efficiency, as it does not require downloading the entire blockchain to verify transactions. However, if you are reading this, you are likely trying to recover old funds and have discovered that the current version of the software cannot open your ancient wallet files.
To access these funds, you may need to revert to the version of Electrum that was used when the wallet was first created.
Versions 1.8 and newer
For versions 1.8 or higher, the process is relatively simple. The Electrum developers host an archive of these binaries on their official website. You can find them by visiting https://download.electrum.org
Versions older than 1.8
Finding versions released prior to 1.8 is more difficult because the binaries are not hosted on the official Electrum website. To use these versions, you must download the source code directly from the project’s GitHub repository at https://github.com/spesmilo/electrum and compile the source code by yourself. Please note that compiling software from source is a complex process that requires a certain level of technical knowledge.