Coinbase launches NFT marketplace in Beta

It’s official! Coinbase NFT is here.

Coinbase is the fourth largest crypto exchange globally, and similar to other big companies joining the NFT hype train, they have released their own NFT marketplace.

There’s a new NFT marketplace coming out every other day, so what makes Coinbase NFT special?

It’s the only NFT marketplace to focus on social media community creations, marking a new age of NFT marketplace features that might disrupt the NFT environment.

Today, you’ll learn about Coinbase NFT’s beta launch and what features make it stand out from other NFT marketplaces:

What is a crypto exchange?

Cryptocurrency exchanges are digital platforms where you can purchase, sell, and trade crypto. To buy crypto from a crypto exchange, you need to create an account on one of their trading platforms to exchange your currency of choice for digital assets. There’s the option to cover cryptocurrencies back into fiat currency to be withdrawn to a bank account.

You can also exchange crypto for another in a cryptocurrency exchange, similar to how foreign exchanges work.

Some major cryptocurrency exchanges include Binance, Gemini, Kraken, and, of course, Coinbase.

NFT marketplaces use crypto for their transactions. This means that crypto exchanges are necessary for NFT marketplaces to thrive, as it’s impossible to find an NFT marketplace that supports credit card transactions in the present day.

Though sometimes the terms are used similarly, crypto exchanges and NFT marketplaces aren’t the same.

What is Coinbase?

Coinbase is a crypto exchange where users can buy, trade, and store almost all cryptocurrencies and altcoins, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, LiteCoin, etc. There are roughly 50 cryptocurrencies available on Coinbase.

Coinbase is considered easy to use for crypto amateurs, and it allows you to exchange cryptocurrencies quickly. It also supports the feature of earning interest on eligible balances or earning cryptocurrency through Coinbase Earn. On the other hand, transaction fees can be slightly more expensive than in other marketplaces on the primary Coinbase platform. This is because the faster and easier for users to trade cryptocurrency in an crypto exchange, the higher the fees to be paid.

What is Coinbase NFT?

Coinbase NFT aims to provide a better way to discover NFTs, a better way to find the right communities, and better spaces where people can feel connected.

Coinbase NFT has some essential features that haven’t been implemented in the beta yet but will be implemented in the coming weeks and months. Depending on how each possible beta tester got into the waitlist, they’ll be added to test the platform.

They also expressed the intention to decentralize some of their features by transferring them from Coinbase tech to decentralized solutions.

How can I join the Coinbase NFT beta?

Beta testers have been commenting “gm” (good morning) all over the beta marketplace to try out the commenting function available for NFT projects.

Beta testers on Coinbase NFT can create a Coinbase NFT profile to trade NFTs using a self-custody wallet. It could be a Coinbase Wallet, which is already a convenient possibility, as it could also be any other wallet. The beta testers were those at the top of Coinbase NFT’s waitlist, where they were allowed to create a profile to showcase their traded and created NFTs. In the coming weeks, it’ll be made available to everyone over the age of 18.

Coinbase NFT has some essential features that haven’t been implemented in the beta yet but will be implemented in the coming weeks and months. Depending on how each possible beta tester got into the waitlist, they’ll be subsequently added to test the platform.

Will Coinbase NFT have marketplace fees?

They haven’t added fees yet, but they’ll soon be providing them once the marketplace goes live and provides notice before anything changes. Fees on Ethereum blockchain-based marketplaces are necessary to be in-line with Web3 industry standards. It’s said that their fee will be a low single-digit fee. Let’s remember that each marketplace has their own marketplace fee on top of the miner’s fee from the blockchain they are based on.

Since Coinbase NFT is based on Ethereum, this essentially means that the market will have a double fee: one for using Coinbase NFT’s service and another for Ethereum’s gas fees.

Among the collections they are showcasing in their beta launch, we can mention Doodles, Azuki, and World of Women. As Coinbase NFT is based on Ethereum, any Ethereum-based collection will be accessible on their marketplace. Alex Pulitzer, product lead at Coinbase NFT, stated that more blockchains would be available on Coinbase NFT too, similar to how OpenSea has recently implemented blockchain integration with Solana.

Coinbase NFT will support Ethereum-based ERC-1155 and ERC-721 standards, all NFTs being on-chain.

What makes Coinbase NFT special?

Coinbase NFT is unique in that it also wants to implement a web3 social marketplace modality. It allows users to buy and sell NFTs just like any other NFT marketplace would, but it also features the option of engaging with creators from the NFT communities they own.

Think of it as a Facebook or Instagram profile. Other marketplaces only provide you with essential information about the NFT artist, related projects, and some flavor text in each NFT description. Coinbase NFT proposes a marketplace where users can comment, follow and interact with each other.

Community in the world of NFTs is critical. There’s a reason why some of the most significant NFT projects have a dedicated team for social media, Discord, and sometimes even Reddit, constantly uploading updates on the project, milestones from their roadmap, and important alerts about their blockchain.

Managing so many channels causes segregation of resources for NFT project creators. NFT projects must be on top of their marketplace(s) of choice while also answering user questions, hosting Q & A’s, lives, and moderating Discord groups.

Imagine having all of that in one place. This is why Coinbase NFT’s proposal seems to revolutionize the standard of NFT marketplaces in 2022.

Their release article posted in The Coinbase Blog described how you’d create a profile representing your digital self and curate it with NFTs you own. You can connect a self-custody wallet to select the NFTs you wish to highlight on your profile. Their screenshots show icons similar to those other social media platforms use, representing a heart, a chat bubble, a share button, an expand option, and three dots.

One could infer that this means that Coinbase NFT seeks to add likes, comments, shares, and possibly other social media integration tools to spark conversations instead of listing static NFTs on the web.

Comments have the option to be upvoted or downvoted. Users will also have access to a Discover feed that provides AI-based personalized NFT recommendations, similar to how Instagram’s algorithm shows you content based on the content you tend to search.

How will Coinbase NFT fare against the competition?

Coinbase NFT’s main competition, OpenSea, has seen better days. Despite still standing strong as the leading NFT marketplace in terms of sales volume in 2022, OpenSea has seen a fall in NFT sales of 67.2% in the last month. It might be Coinbase NFT’s opportunity to present a new format on NFT marketplaces and possibly climb to the top.

On top of that, search interest in NFTs has also declined ever since its boom in October 2021. Some think that Coinbase is getting late into the NFT’s game, but considering the new features that set them apart from other marketplaces, they might be responsible for heralding a new age of social NFT marketplaces.

Coinbase isn’t the only crypto exchange creating its own NFT marketplace. Binance, another major crypto exchange, also has its own centralized NFT marketplace. However, none of Coinbase NFT’s rivals have developed a marketplace with inbound social media features.

Coinbase NFT’s team has expressed possible collection drops by partnering with famous NFT artists to promote their platform. Sanchan Saxena, VP of Product. They are already listing NFTs from significant collections such as World of Women, and their team has expressed interest in giving birth to the next Bored Ape Yacht Club.

Final words about Coinbase NFT

The Coinbase NFT marketplace is a big deal because it’s the only one that focuses on social media community creations. This opens up new possibilities for users and creators alike to engage in direct ways that bypass social media platforms.

Those who join Coinbase NFT as their primary marketplace might opt out of Discord, Instagram, and Twitter and instead focus on promoting their work using the social web3 features.

On the other hand, others might choose to promote their NFTs on the traditional channels while also growing a following on Coinbase NFT. As Coinbase NFT is still in the beta stages, it might be too early to tell what will be the best course of action for an NFT artist trying to make it big there.

If you want to learn more about Coinbase NFT, check out their website here. Also, learn more about NFT marketplaces in our special guide here.