I just opened my Phoenix wallet to find my channel closed. After looking through the log, this is what happened.
- My initial funding transaction was this one, mined 30JUN2024: a92fa6bbe2cd8642f3cfc53fcc6170447ebe4cf5b99a0ea01109a4348a1ad418 .
- Yesterday, on 07SEP2026, without me having Phoenix wallet opened, that transaction was spent in tx 29e9570757c1ca5e63a372f913f8fbc8b55d05c6d71200dcd32931437025f56f . Output #3 is consistent with my balance on the channel.
- Today, 08SEP2026, after opening my Phoenix wallet, a new transaction was automatically created, spending the UTXO of the previous transaction: 5f9565876ddf53d0156751f8dc8399495a969609fae30e268cf0b3a3e840adcb , presumably into the on-chain wallet in Phoenix. The post-fee output of 691,652 sats is shown in my Phoenix as on-chain balance.
Could anybody explain to me why the lightning channel was closed initially? I went looking for other similar stories, but could not find anything. Thanks in advance. My last lightning transaction happened on 09MAR2026, so the period of no activity was 182 days, or almost exactly half a year.
It is conceivable to me that Phoenix closed the channel due to inactivity, but I am not exactly sure. Phoenix website states vaguely that channels may be closed "if the wallet has been inactive for a long time". Perhaps half a year is a long time?
Phoenix's LSP does enforce an inactivity timeout, roughly six months of no HTLCs or channel updates will trigger a cooperative close. Your 182-day gap lines up.
The exact same thing happened to me a few months ago, and the reason for the closure was inactivity. I hadn't used it for over six months. The site's documentation explains that—that it can be closed if it goes unused for half a year. That is one of the reasons why it might be shut down.
https://phoenix.acinq.co/faq
Half a year is a long time, yes.
Phoenix is my backup wallet so I rarely need to use it but I do make sure to open it and do some transactions from time to time - at least once every 1-2 months. It's worth keeping it open.
I completely agree; I do exactly the same thing. Every now and then, I send and receive a few sats between my own wallets to keep the channels active.
u are not using it, why all of a sudden worried?
likewise, it follows that u either learned to NOT EAT or DRINK for extended periods of time... or u just don't use bitcoin/LN because fiat is much more comfortable; that's either an idiot, psycho, or a man completely oblivious to nostr markets;
why were u expecting someone else to keep the channel uptime for u indefinitely for a measly one-time 10k sat fee? this ain't google, baby!
That is useful to know. I would not have expected six months of inactivity to be enough for a channel to close. It is a good reminder that even a backup Lightning wallet may need a little activity from time to time. For someone like me who is planning to set up a Lightning channel, this kind of information is genuinely useful. Thanks for sharing your experience.