Start your staking journey or explore more information about staking on Polkadot's Home Page. Discover this new Staking Dashboard that makes staking much easier and check our extensive article list in the Overview article to help you get started.

This article explains how to change your controller account using the Staking Dashboard. You may want to change your Controller if you don't have any funds left in your old controller account to pay transaction fees, you cannot access it, or it was compromised.

In this example, we are using the Westend testnet, but the process is the same for Polkadot and Kusama.

How to change your controller account

1. First, connect your accounts to the Staking dashboard.

2. Navigate to the Nominate tab. Click on the "Change" button under "Controller account":

3. A new screen will appear where you can select a new Controller account from your available imported accounts.

If you have a lot of accounts, you can type in the search box to find the account you want. You cannot choose an account that doesn't have enough transferrable balance. Once you choose an option, you will see the estimated transaction fee for the change.

4. Choose the account you want to make the Controller, and click on "Submit" to sign the transaction:

That's it! You have now changed your controller account.

If you are more of a visual learner, check the video guide below. It covers everything you can do after you start staking. You can skip to 4:46 to learn about changing your controller: