What Is a Confirmation?
A confirmation means that a Bitcoin transaction has been successfully verified by the network and included in a block on the blockchain. Each new block that is added after your transaction's block counts as an additional confirmation.
How It Works
When you send a transaction, it is first broadcast to the network. Miners then pick it up and include it in a new block. Once that block is solved and added to the blockchain, your transaction has received its first confirmation.
Why Wait for More?
While one confirmation is often enough for small transactions, waiting for more confirmations increases security. Each new block makes it exponentially harder for the transaction to be reversed.
Secure and Irreversible
After about six confirmations (roughly 60 minutes), a transaction is considered fully secured and practically irreversible. This is the standard many exchanges and services use for large amounts.
Confirmations in Practice
When you use a wallet, you'll often see a transaction as "pending" or "unconfirmed" until it receives its first confirmation. The number of confirmations is a direct measure of a transaction's security and finality on the Bitcoin network.