NFT trading volume rises by 230% in the 1st quarter, reports Nansen

by James · May 10, 2023

A leading blockchain analytics firm, Nansen, analyzed NFT market and suggested a resurgence in the sector in Q1 2023. The analysis showed that sales increased by over 230% compared to Q4 2022 when comparing market performance in terms of trading volume.

According to Nansen’s 2022 report, the NFT market traded over 1.5 million ETH, worth more than $1.97 billion, resulting in an NFT sales volume of 9,036,778 in Q4 2022. In comparison, Q1 2023 showed a significant increase in transaction volume, with market volume reaching over 2.83 million ETH, or $4.54 billion.

In the first quarter of 2023, the total number of NFTs transacted was 11,498,022, with a volume increase of 230% compared to the fourth quarter of 2022. Nansen data indicates a lull in April, despite the first quarter of 2023 showing a significant increase in sales volume compared to the fourth quarter of 2022. March saw $1.7 billion in transactions, while the next 30 days saw a drop in volume, generating roughly $1.2 billion. This trend continues to be observed in May, as illustrated below.

Data shows a decline in NFT volumes in April and May
Source: Nansen

The number of users has also decreased slightly, with data for the last few weeks lower than last year’s records. However, it is worth noting that Q1 registered 13,999,528 users, a significant increase from Q4 2022, which had 11,233,872 users.

A visualization of NFT sales and wallets between January 2022 and April 2023.
Source: Nansen

During the last quarter of 2022, OpenSea contributed significantly to the NFT market with 219,992.50 ETH in volume, equivalent to $272,415,866.4 and a total of 1,413,780 NFTs sold on the platform.

During the last quarter of 2022, OpenSea was the prominent platform with 1,413,780 NFTs sold and 219,992.50 ETH in volume, equivalent to $272,415,866.4. In addition, LooksRare, Mint, CryptoPunks and X2Y2 also recorded significant sales volumes during the period.

In Q1 2023, Blur became a dominant NFT marketplace with a sales volume of approximately 1.9 million ETH, surpassing OpenSea’s volume of 661,547.79 ETH, or about $1.02 billion, from the sale of 3,727,299 NFTs.

NFT marketplace Blur, launched in October 2022, has become a prominent player in the industry. The platform, which operates on Ethereum, saw $2.93 billion in NFT sales, equivalent to more than 1.8 million ETH. In addition, the platform was responsible for 1,999,688 of the total quarterly NFT sales.

Blur’s increase in sales volume reflects the ongoing growth of the NFT market, as traders and collectors show interest in exploring established and new platforms.