Can you send a message to a Bitcoin address?

Not directly — an address is not an inbox. What works is sending that address a tiny payment in a transaction that also carries your text in an OP_RETURN output. The payment makes the transaction appear in their wallet; the text travels with it and is readable by anyone who opens the transaction.

Can the message be deleted or taken back?

No. Once it is mined it is in every copy of the blockchain, permanently, along with the address you sent it to. Nobody can remove it.

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Send a message to a Bitcoin address

An address is not an inbox. Here is what actually works.

The short answer

You cannot write to a Bitcoin address the way you write to an email address. Nothing is listening. What you can do is send that address a very small payment in a transaction that also carries your text in an OP_RETURN output.

The payment is what makes the transaction show up in the recipient's wallet. The text is what you actually want to say. Both are in the same transaction, permanently, and anyone who opens it can read the message — including the person you sent it to, if they look.

How small can the payment be?

Small, but not zero. Bitcoin refuses outputs below a dust limit, and that limit depends on what kind of address you are paying:

Smallest payment the network will accept, by address type
Address starts with	Type	Minimum
`1…`	P2PKH	546 sats
`3…`	P2SH	546 sats
`bc1q…` (42 chars)	P2WPKH	546 sats
`bc1q…` (62 chars)	P2WSH	573 sats
`bc1p…`	Taproot	573 sats

Getting this wrong is not a warning, it is a rejected transaction — and if you paid for it first, you have paid for something that cannot be broadcast. SatWire checks the limit for the exact address you type, before quoting you anything.

What it costs

Three parts: the payment to the recipient, the Bitcoin network fee for the whole transaction, and the flat 2,000-sat SatWire fee. At the cheapest fee rate, paying a bc1q address the 546-sat minimum:

Total, service fee and the 546 sats to the recipient included
Your message	Transaction size	Total
50 bytes — one line	202 vB	2,950 sats
100 bytes	253 vB	3,052 sats
200 bytes — a paragraph	353 vB	3,252 sats
500 bytes	656 vB	3,858 sats

Roughly 3,000 sats to put a sentence in front of an address, of which 546 arrives as money. The composer on the front page shows the exact figure for your address and your text before you pay anything.

Will they actually read it?

Be honest with yourself about this. Most wallets show the payment but not the message. What the owner sees is an unexpected few hundred sats arriving; to find your words they have to open the transaction in a block explorer. Some people do exactly that, precisely because an unexplained dust payment is strange enough to look into. Many never will.

And if the address belongs to an exchange or a custodian, there is realistically nobody at the other end. Those addresses are swept by software.

What this cannot do

It cannot be taken back. The message is permanent, public, and tied to the address you sent it to — for as long as Bitcoin exists.
It is not private. Everyone can read it, not just the recipient. It is a postcard nailed to a wall, not a letter.
It is not anonymous in the way people assume. The transaction is paid from somewhere, and that trail is public too.
It does not compel anyone. A message on the chain has exactly the weight of what it says. Threats and demands are still threats and demands, and they stay attached to your transaction permanently, where anyone can find them.

How to do it here

Write what you want to say on the front page.
Paste the recipient's address into the recipient field and type an amount. The composer names the minimum for that address as soon as it knows the address — “0, or at least 546 for this address” — and warns you in red if what you typed is below it.
You get a payment address and an exact total. Pay it from any wallet.
SatWire builds the transaction, pays the recipient, embeds your message, and broadcasts it.
You get the transaction id. The message is on the chain, and the payment is in their history.

Write your message →

Questions

Can you send a message to a Bitcoin address?: Not directly — an address is not an inbox. What works is sending that address a tiny payment in a transaction that also carries your text in an OP_RETURN output. The payment makes the transaction appear in their wallet; the text travels with it and is readable by anyone who opens the transaction.
How small can the payment be?: It has to clear the dust limit for that address type: 546 sats for an address starting 1, 3 or a short bc1q, and 573 sats for a long bc1q or a bc1p Taproot address. Below that the network refuses the transaction outright.
Will they actually read it?: Maybe not. Most wallets show the incoming payment but not the OP_RETURN text, so the owner sees an unexpected small amount and has to open the transaction in a block explorer to find the message. If the address belongs to an exchange or a custodian, nobody is likely to look at all.
Can the message be deleted or taken back?: No. Once it is mined it is in every copy of the blockchain, permanently, along with the address you sent it to. Nobody can remove it.

What an OP_RETURN is, how many bytes fit, and how the price is worked out: read the explainer →