The Complete Guide To Digital Assets And Inheritance

The word "assets" in estate planning used to mean something you could touch. Property, vehicles, furniture, jewellery, cash. Today, a significant — and in some cases the most significant — portion of a person's wealth and memories exists entirely in digital form. Understanding what digital assets are, how inheritance law applies to them, and what practical steps are needed to pass them to your heirs is one of the most important topics in modern estate planning.

What Are Digital Assets?

A digital asset is any piece of content or account that exists in digital form and has value — financial, sentimental, or practical. The category is broader than most people expect.

Financial digital assets with direct monetary value:

• Cryptocurrency (Bitcoin, Ethereum, and thousands of others)
• NFTs (non-fungible tokens)
• Balances in PayPal, Venmo, Cash App, Wise, and similar payment platforms
• Online investment accounts (Robinhood, Trading 212, eToro)
• Reward points, airline miles, and loyalty program balances
• Domain names and websites with established traffic and revenue
• Digital products sold online (ebooks, courses, templates, music)
• Monetized YouTube channels, Substack newsletters, and Patreon memberships

Personal digital assets with sentimental value:

• Photos and videos in iCloud, Google Photos, Amazon Photos, or Dropbox
• Personal email archives spanning years of relationships
• Social media profiles and their history of posts and memories
• Creative work — manuscripts, music files, design projects, game saves
• Video game accounts with rare items or significant purchase history

Accounts with ongoing obligations:

• Streaming subscriptions that need cancelling
• Software licences with renewal fees
• Website hosting contracts and domain registrations

How Inheritance Law Applies to Digital Assets

Digital assets are generally considered property under the law, which means they pass to heirs under the same framework as physical assets — through a will, through intestate succession if there is no will, or through beneficiary designations where available. However, the practical reality is significantly more complicated.

The core complication is the distinction between owning an asset and having a licence to use it. When you buy a book on Amazon Kindle, you do not own the ebook — you own a licence to read it. That licence typically does not transfer to heirs. The same applies to iTunes music purchases, most video game accounts, and many other digital "purchases." This is not a loophole — it is deliberately written into the terms of service of most major platforms, and courts have generally upheld it.

True ownership — the kind that can be inherited — applies to cryptocurrency held in self-custody wallets, domain names, websites with their content, and original creative works. These can be transferred to heirs in the same way as any other property, provided the executor has both the legal authority and the practical access information.

Cryptocurrency Inheritance: The Highest Stakes

Cryptocurrency presents the most extreme version of the digital inheritance problem. Because self-custody cryptocurrency is controlled entirely by cryptographic keys — with no institutional owner and no recovery mechanism — it can only be accessed by whoever holds the seed phrase. No court order, no platform support team, and no legal authority can retrieve cryptocurrency whose seed phrase is lost. It simply remains in the wallet, permanently inaccessible, forever.

The solution is straightforward but requires action now. Document your seed phrases physically, store them securely, and ensure your digital executor knows where to find them. See our complete Bitcoin inheritance planning guide for step-by-step instructions.

Social Media and Email: Platform Policies Vary Widely

Social media accounts are not property in the traditional sense — they are licences to use a platform's service. This means your heirs cannot legally demand account access as a matter of inheritance right. What they can do is follow each platform's bereavement process to either memorialize or delete the account.

Facebook allows memorialization and designates a Legacy Contact. Instagram allows memorialization but has no legacy contact feature. X (Twitter) offers deletion only. TikTok has no formal bereavement process as of 2026. Each platform requires documentation — typically a death certificate and proof of relationship — and their own forms. See our platform-by-platform guide to social media after death.

Making Digital Assets Inheritable: What You Need to Do

Three things are required to make a digital asset properly inheritable: documentation (your family knows it exists), access (your family can retrieve or access it), and authority (your executor has legal standing to act).

Documentation: Complete a digital asset inventory listing every account and its registered email address. Store it with your estate documents. Update it annually.

Access: Configure a password manager with Emergency Access for your digital executor, document seed phrases for cryptocurrency in physically secure storage, and set up Google Inactive Account Manager and Apple Legacy Contact. See our password planning guide.

Authority: Ensure your will includes explicit language granting your executor authority over digital assets under RUFADAA (or your country's equivalent). Name a digital executor. Reference your digital asset inventory in the will without including sensitive details in the will itself, since wills become public after probate.

What Happens to Digital Assets Without a Plan

Without a plan, the outcomes range from inconvenient to catastrophic. Cryptocurrency is permanently lost without a seed phrase. Financial platform balances become unclaimed property. Cloud photos are deleted after inactivity periods. Income-generating accounts are abandoned rather than transferred. Subscriptions charge the estate for months. And your family spends hundreds of hours trying to piece together an account of your digital life with no starting point and no legal authority.

Start with our free 30-item digital estate checklist to ensure every digital asset you hold is covered.