Solana’s monthly NFT sales surpass Ethereum for the first time

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Solana’s recent growth spurt has produced surprising results in the NFT market: Solana NFT monthly sales exceeded Ethereum NFT sales in December 2023 for the first time.

according to data According to data from analytics platform CryptoSlam, Solana’s NFT sales in December were approximately $366.5 million, while Ethereum’s sales were $353.2 million. CryptoSlam’s “organic” sales figures exclude suspicious transactions labeled as “wash trades,” Ethereum NFT sales exclude $381 million, and Solana NFT sales exclude only $10.1 million.

According to CryptoSlam, Solana’s total transaction volume was $366.5 million, nearly matching the network’s all-time high, which was around $373.5 million in October 2021 when the space was just heating up.

Solana also saw the number of unique buyers and sellers double in December, and the total number of NFT transactions also increased significantly. CryptoSlam reports that approximately 218,000 sellers and 279,000 buyers conducted nearly 6.6 million NFT transactions on Solana. Ethereum, meanwhile, has about 114,000 sellers and more than 143,000 buyers, with 698,000 transactions.

Ethereum NFT sales were fairly steady in December compared to November’s total value of nearly $350 million, while Solana surged from around $83 million at the time.

Of course, Solana’s price has increased significantly in recent years. SOL is up more than 71% in the past month and has more than quadrupled in price over the past three months. In comparison, Ethereum is up 9% in the past 30 days and around 44% since the past three months.

Solana price chart. Source: TradingView

Solana’s price surge may have been part of the reason for its surge in NFT sales in December, but that doesn’t take into account that the number of independent traders nearly tripled and monthly NFT trading volume increased sixfold. Additionally, the average NFT sales on Solana actually dropped from around $74 in November to less than $56 in December.

The increase in users and transactions is likely due to the broader momentum surrounding Solana as well as the hype surrounding specific projects related to airdrops and other benefits. For example, Tensorians, an NFT project associated with leading Solana marketplace Tensor, had a transaction volume of $28 million in December, while Mad Lads had a transaction volume of $24.5 million.

According to CryptoSlam, the number one Ethereum NFT project in December was Bored Ape Yacht Club, with an NFT transaction value of $19.5 million, followed by Pudgy Penguins, with an NFT transaction value of approximately $18.3 million.

At first glance, data from CryptoSlam suggests that Bitcoin Ordinals transactions, the protocol that allows NFT-like media to be included in the Bitcoin blockchain, generated more transaction volume over the past year than Ethereum and Solana combined. More than 493,000 transactions valued at $881.2 million.

However, the way CryptoSlam tracks Bitcoin ordinal numbers differs from NFTs on other networks. The data includes BRC-20 token transactions, which are minted through the Ordinals protocol but act as fungible tokens that can be interchanged on other chains. CryptoSlam does not track transactions for Ethereum ERC-20 tokens or Solana SPL tokens, similar to BRC-20 tokens.

Unclassified Ordinals (that is, various media assets that are not part of an identified project) generated approximately $88.5 million worth of transactions in December, with the largest single Ordinals project being Bitcoin Frogs at $27.7 million.

The second ranked single Ordinals project is the BRC-20 token? Bitcoin Punks, a CryptoPunks knockoff, saw nearly $3.3 million in trade volume in December, and Fungible token transactions make up a large portion of Ordinals transactions tracked on the platform, making it difficult to obtain Bitcoin data at face value.