What is an NFT marketplace?

What is an NFT marketplace?

An NFT marketplace is an online platform where anyone can buy and sell their favorite NFT. With the rise in popularity, several marketplaces have emerged in recent years. They all have the same purpose, yet there are important differences.

NFT marketplaces use blockchain technology; different networks that each have their own blockchain. The largest network currently is that of Ethereum. This means that the buying and selling of NFTs is done using Ether as a means of payment. Because of its popularity and the large number of users, the network is overloaded. As a result, users pay high transaction fees.

Paying a few hundred dollars for a transaction is unfortunately no exception.

Therefore, other NFT marketplaces have now been developed with a different blockchain. As a result, they have significantly lower transaction costs and are therefore more interesting. Please note that an NFT can only exist on one blockchain. You cannot just send your digital art from one blockchain to another blockchain.

What can you do on an NFT marketplace?

On an NFT marketplace, you can look for NFTs that are interesting to you. Of course, with the goal of keeping them or trading them (with a good profit margin). Potential investors thus digitally search for their favorite items and hope to do gold business with them. Here you can filter by different categories:

• Digital art
• Music
• Collectibles
• Photography
• Metaverse

How do you use an NFT marketplace?

An NFT marketplace is open to all.

All you need for this is a software wallet such as MetaMask. This is a Chrome extension that connects you to your favorite NFT marketplace so you can buy or sell an NFT. Once on the NFT marketplace, MetaMask will prompt you for access. Do you have enough money in your wallet? Then from this moment you can buy an NFT!

More and more NFT marketplaces are emerging that don't require you to have a separate software wallet. They use a built-in wallet that you automatically create when you sign up.

Note: Each marketplace has a dominant network that is used. At OpenSea and at Rarible, it is Ethereum, but at NFTb, for example, it is Binance. So they have a different payment currency.

Best NFT marketplaces

There are several NFT marketplaces, some more popular than others. Essentially, they all have the same goal: to enable trading in NFTs. We will now go through the best NFT marketplaces.

But before we do that, here's what you need to know: each marketplace has a dominant network that it uses. At OpenSea, it's Ethereum, at Rarible also, but at NFTb, it's Binance. So they all have a different payment currency.

OpenSea

OpenSea is by far the most popular NFT marketplace. We can see this in both the supply of NFTs but also in the trading volume on OpenSea which is reaching extraordinary proportions. Never before has there been so much trading in NFTs as in January of 2022. OpenSea was founded in 2018, well before the NFT hype we currently know. Despite Ethereum still being the most popular network, OpenSea now supports multiple blockchains:

• Ethereum
• Polygon
• Klaytn

Rarible

Rarible is also currently one of the better NFT marketplaces. Unlike OpenSea, Rarible has fewer categories available and its offerings are also smaller. As a result, Rarible has fewer users. Like OpenSea, Rarible also supports different networks:

• Ethereum
• Flow
• Tezos

NFTb - Binance NFT marketplace

Binance could not be left behind and developed NFTb. This is an NFT marketplace on the Binance Smart Chain (BSC) network. They want to provide the solution to Ethereum's overloaded network to promote trading of NFTs on its own network. There are fewer transaction fees and the transaction speed is also significantly better.

Nifty Gateway

Nifty Gateway is a large marketplace that puts security first. Unlike other NFT marketplaces, Nifty Gateway does not use a software wallet; instead, they secure everything with proprietary wallets. So in addition to enhanced security, you also pay no transaction fees.

The downside is that this gives NFT owners limited freedom. You cannot trade your NFT in other places. Nifty Gateway, on the other hand, is one of the few NFT marketplaces where you can buy an NFT with euros and dollars, not just crypto.

NBA Top Shot

NBA Top Shot is an NFT marketplace exclusively for sports-related items. Here you buy and sell unique sports moments from basketball history in the form of an NFT. For example, here you can buy a video clip of American basketball player LeBron James for more than $500,000.

The platform was developed by Dapper Labs, the same team behind the well-known CryptoKitties. To invest, you need to create an account on Dapper. So there is no need to have a software wallet here.

NBA Top Shot is a popular NFT platform for all basketball-related sports clips, but it also has its limitations. For example, you won't find digital art or other types of NFTs here.

Mintable

Mintable is similar to OpenSea, with the major difference being that Mintable requires you to create an account before you can trade. Like OpenSea, Mintable is built on Ethereum's network, so you buy and sell NFTs with Ether. Again, these come with high gas fees.

Mintable's platform is suitable for easily creating and listening to an NFT yourself. This is more complex with other NFT marketplaces such as OpenSea. At Mintable, you list your first 50 NFTs completely free.

Axie Marketplace

Axie Marketplace is the NFT marketplace for the video game Axie Infinity. Axies can be compared to tamagotchis of the 1990s. Through the game, players can duel with each other and earn money in the process. On this marketplace, players can buy axies as well as other NFTs that they can use in the game. Axie NFTs are built on Ethereum's blockchain and therefore tradable on different NFT marketplaces.

This marketplace trades only NFTs used in video games. You will not find NFT art or metaverse NFTs here.

SuperRare

SuperRare was launched in 2018 on Ethereum's blockchain. The platform focuses on exclusive digital art. When you exhibit your digital art digitally, you pay a 15% gallery fee here as an artist. For the buyer, this fee is 3%. These are additional costs that other NFT marketplaces do not have, but SuperRare itself says this is minimal compared to gallery fees in a physical gallery.

To maintain exclusivity, it accepts only 1% of applications. In this way, SuperRare aims to be a high-end NFT marketplace.

Conclusion - which one do you choose?

There are several NFT marketplaces, each with its advantages and disadvantages. Ethereum's network is by far the most popular and widely used, so you often pay high gas fees when purchasing your NFT.

In response, other networks are increasingly available to avoid these transaction costs. Therefore, it is an important trade-off to make for yourself. We also see more and more NFT marketplaces doing their own management of their wallets. For some people this can be an advantage, where for others this is just another big disadvantage.

The largest NFT marketplace is currently OpenSea, thanks to its large and diverse selection of NFTs. Here you can find everything from digital art to music NFTs and much more. And that's also marketplace I personally use.