Yuga Labs dominated NFT sales in 2022 with more than $3.75 billion
Quick take:
- Otherdeed recorded the highest number of transactions with over 77,000.
- Bored Ape Yacht Club had the highest transaction volume at over $1.4 billion despite only recording 6,320 transactions.
- April witnessed the highest ETH coin total boosted by the Otherdeed NFT national sale.
Yuga Labs maintained its status as the most popular NFT project in 2022 with its own collections topping the sales charts after raising more than $3.75 billion. This figure does not include sales from Meebits and Cryptopunks, which it acquired from Larva Labs in March.
According to data provided by Crypto analytics and data platform Cryptoslam.io, Bored Ape Yacht Club monitored 611,734 ETH approximately $1.42 billion in transaction volume, despite only recording 6,320 transactions.
In 2021, the BAYC NFT collection generated just over $1 billion in sales after its launch in April.
Mutant Ape Yacht Club also crossed the 10-figure mark, coming in second with $1.067 billion, while the Otherdeed NFTs brought in $1.047 billion after an oversubscribed auction in April.
The data shows that no other collection sold more than $1 billion in NFTs, with Chiru Labs’ Azuki and Moonbirds by Kevin Rose taking fourth and fifth place with $828 million and $599 million, respectively.
Nike’s CloneX (by RTFKT) at $574M, Doodles—$360M, Beanz—$229M, Bored Ape Kennel Club—$219M and Meebits—at $164M completed the top ten list, the latter two being part of Yuga Labs’ NFT family.
NFT Worlds, which took a big hit in July after Minecraft banned all NFTs and crypto integrations from its platform, entered the top 20 list with a total volume of 46,161 ETH ~$129.6 million, placing it 15th. place. Cool Cats, Cool Pets, and World-of-Women also recorded hundreds of millions in sales, placing them on the top 20 list.
Otherdeed, Azuki and Moonbirds dominated coin volume
On the bull in 2021, 2022 began with a bang with Azuki’s January 12, 2022 selling out in four minutes for a whopping $30 million.
This gave the collection the big start it needed for a journey that would see it reach a transaction volume of $828 million by 2022, placing it second among the best collections minted during the calendar year.
Out front, of course, was the Otherside metaverse’s Otherdeed NFT by Yuga Labs, which raised $1.047 billion. The collection sold 55,000 Otherdeed NFTs and raised nearly $320 million from primary sales.
Kevin Rose’s Proof raised nearly $66 million after selling out Moonbird’s NFT collection. By the end of 2022, the collection reached $599 million, making it the third highest transaction volume among collections minted during the calendar year.
Beanz and Hape-Prime moved up the top five list with $229.6 million and $160.6 million respectively, while Karafuru, a collaboration between Indonesia’s Toy Museum and pseudonymous NFT artist WD. Willy was minted on February 4, grossing $133 million, the top ten list was completed by Projectpxn with $125.7 million, Invisible Friends – with $123.9 million, Pixelmon – with $119.8 million and Cool Pets with 106 .5 million dollars.
Other notable projects marked during 2022 that made the top 20 included World-of-Women Galaxy with just under $100 million, Goblintown with $93.9 million and VeeFriends 2, which oversaw a transaction volume of 78.8 million dollars.
No NFT collection minted after May made the top 20 list
With the impact of the crypto winter already visible in May, no NFT collections minted after May 2022 generated enough sales to make the list of top 20 collections by transaction volume.
Although January wasn’t the biggest in terms of sales volume, it had the highest number of collections in the top 20 list – perhaps because they had more time to generate sales over the 12-month period.
Azuki topped the charts in January, followed by Hape-Prime, while v1-Cryptopunks – later deemed fake by the original Cryptopunks creator, Larva Labs also made the list with $80.6 million.
Collectively, NFT collections minted in January 2022 realized a total transaction volume of more than $1.38 billion.
However, that wasn’t enough to topple April, which despite only three NFT collections in the top 20 list, saw projects minted during the month generate a staggering $1.725 billion in transaction volume for the calendar year.
The three projects that stood out in April included Otherdeed, Moonbirds and VeeFriends Series 2, with the first two also in the top 5 list in total ETH volume.
February and March were relatively average months with $471.8 million and $512.7 million respectively, while the two projects marked in May (at the beginning of crypto winter) collected just under $220 million.
Otherdeed NFT recorded over 77,000 transactions
With Otherdeed NFT minted before the Ethereum merger, the auction cost investors over $100 million in gas fees. According to reports, the collection was significantly oversubscribed, pushing the cost of completing transactions on the Ethereum blockchain higher.
In total, the pool has recorded 77,102 transactions, followed by a distance of one second by the anonymous Goblintown NFT pool with 35,529 transactions. Chiru Labs’ Azuki NFTs came in third with 34,140, while Cool Pets and VeeFriends Series 2 rounded out the top five list.
NFT projects minted in January had time to garner enough transactions to top the list overall, while Otherdeeds and VeeFreinds Series 2 generated enough volume to ensure collections minted in April took second place with 125,853 transactions in 2022.
NFTs minted in February and March were again closer to each other with 81,931 and 89,095 respectively, while those minted in May registered just over 60,000 transactions.
Was Polygon late to the party?
Although the crypto winter put a damper on the NFT market during the second half of the year, there were a few projects that stood out.
Reddit NFTs sold out for $2.5 million, before galloping to a total volume of $10.4 million by the end of the year. The collection has also recorded more than 48,000 transactions, but did not make the top 20 list due to its low sales volume.
In particular, Reddit is imprinted on the Ethereum Layer 2 scaling blockchain Polygon, which has quickly grown to become one of the largest blockchains for mainstream brands looking to offer NFTs.
Global restaurant chain Starbucks also launched its NFT loyalty program at Polygon, with the beta version already in testing.
More recently, Solana’s largest NFT pools y00ts and DeGods said they were migrating to Polygon and Ethereum respectively in 2023, and also dropped SOL as their ecosystem currency.
Polygon saw the number of first-time buyers of NFTs on its platform increase from just 1,858 on October 5th to a whopping 43,761 in December. The platform had a cumulative NFT sales volume of 338 million MATIC, worth $305 million as of December according to blockchain data analytics platform Nansen.
Polygon has benefited from working with global brands such as Reddit, Starbucks and Nike. However, while this accelerated adoption, it has not necessarily led to an increase in transaction volume. Nansen cryptanalyst tweeted on December 9th.
Conclusion
Overall, the NFT market was on track to smash last year’s sales figures in April, having delivered a number of better-than-estimated sales volumes.
In January, the market set a new all-time high for monthly transaction volume at nearly $5 billion compared to $4.6 billion set in August 2021, according to Cryptoslam data.
However, the market slowed from June to December, with the top 20 NFT pools by transaction volume managing only $7.8 billion in transaction volume, according to Cryptoslam data. Overall, the industry amassed a global total of just under $22 billion by 2022.
In comparison, the market generated over $25 billion in sales in 2021, according to a report published by Reuters. Bloomberg estimated the figure at around $40 billion, while Cointelegraph reported $17 billion.
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