Report: Over 100% Increase in Number of Ethereum-based NFT Collections in 2022

There are now a total of 80,300 NFT collections on the Ethereum blockchain, up from 15,540 year over year. Meanwhile, Ethereum addresses holding one or more NFTs have also skyrocketed as the industry is getting widely adopted, despite the recent market turbulence in the crypto space.

Interest in NFTs Continues to Increase

Though the broader crypto market has been on a months-long downtrend dating back to November 2021, the enthusiasm associated with NFTs activities has shown consistent strength.

According to the data collected by IntoTheBlock, a blockchain intelligence firm dedicated to on-chain analysis, the number of NFT collections on the Ethereum network has increased by over 100% in 2022. Compared to the number recorded a year ago, with only around 15.5K collections available, more than 80K NFTs are now on the network.

Meanwhile, the total volume traded by NFTs has also increased drastically over the past year, with the daily volume only $622M a year ago, increasing nearly 90 times to the current level of around $54.58B per day.

In terms of Ethereum addresses holding at least 1 NFT, the surge of interest has been conspicuous since September 2020. Also, only 1.4% of the wallets held 1+ NFTs a year ago, but the number now has gone up to 4.64%.

Among all the Ethereum-based NFT collections, BoredApeYachtClub still reigns as the most valuable NFT project, owned by 6,422 addresses, with its market cap reaching 1.05M ETH, equivalent to $3.18B. CryptoPunks and MutantApeYachtClub are the second and third biggest NFT series by valuation, respectively, worth 471.43K ETH and 456.23K ETH.

Solana as a New Home for NFT Collections

Though the most popular NFTs still exist on the Ethereum blockchain, Solana-based digital collections have recently caught up and garnered immense attention. In Solana, transaction costs are usually less than a dollar. Many NFT projects and collectors have migrated to its blockchain for scalability and cheap transaction costs.

By the end of January, the sales volume in the ecosystem crossed the $1 billion mark. Degenerate Ape Academy, a hugely popular collection of 10,000 unique NFT Apes only available on the Solana blockchain, had its highest sale for one single Ape at $1.1 million in September 2021.