Importing Paper Wallet Keys in Bitcoin Core Issues

I'm using bitcoin core qt v26 on Ubuntu. Trying to importprivkey from a paper wallet and I keep getting this error: "Only legacy wallets are supported by this command (code -4)". What gives? Wasn't this easier in older versions? I read they switched to descriptor wallets and those aren’t compatible for this. Any tips on how to get around this?

You gotta create a new legacy wallet, man. Not a descriptor one. Just hit up the console and run this command:...

But will that even work with v26? The option to skip descriptor wallets was removed in the GUI after v25, right? I'm getting this other error too: "Error parsing JSON: blank=true".

Yep, I saw you mention that here too. Just to clarify, the old command used to derive Native SegWit addresses from the private keys. If you want all address types, switch to "combo(L…privkey)" instead of just that one. And don’t forget to re-calculate the checksum with getdescriptorinfo.

Importing a private key with descriptor wallets is so much harder now. Like, it used to be simple. Honestly, I’d just use Electrum to sweep the private key instead.

Check this guide out for importing private keys using importdescriptors. It has all the steps laid out... Plus, if this feels too tough, you could always go back to v23 or older where legacy wallets were still an option.

Tried the steps from your post and it worked! It’s kinda nerve-wracking, but thanks a ton for the help!