The growth of NFTs and decentralized finance has given rise to a global digital asset market. For the first time in history, we have an alternative to the traditional financial system. We know blockchains represent a way to sidestep intermediaries via open databases.
2021 was an exciting year for the uptake of NFTs. This is in part by the adoption of play-to-earn gaming and primary and secondary NFT artwork sales. Blockchain technology is on its way to more retail adoption in 2022. Besides, blockchains’ scalability issues and expensive gas fees on Ethereum have caused frictions. An added friction to interacting with the NFT world.
The primary reason for high gas fees on the Ethereum network is congestion. Ethereum is the most popular blockchain network. Users have to pay miners to process their transactions faster and place them above the queue. Thus, jacking up the fees for everyone. Once Ethereum moves to the proof-of-stake model, we should see a downward trend in prices.
Till then, we know about many ways to avoid expensive blockchain gas fees. We can direct our attention to the factors that play a role in verifying new transactions. The below section highlights some of the most popular ways to save gas fees when minting NFT artwork.
Use Layer-2 Sidechains and Blockchain Networks
We remember the most popular play-to-earn game, Axie Infinity. Unknown is the fact that it had to build the Ronin sidechain before the game shot off to success. If the Axie team had relied on Ethereum, we would have seen many people unable to afford the high gas fees. As a result, there would have been lower levels of user activity and total value locked in the network.
Currently, the most popular layer-2 sidechains and networks include Polygon Technology (previously Matic Network), Arbitrum and Optimism.
Check the Prices Before NFT Minting
When you’re about to make a transaction to buy or Sell NFTs, make sure that you check the ETH chart or the Polygon chart. We can expect users to get a fair idea about what their gas prices could be in the next few hours. Furthermore, you can also check the projections for that week or month.
Once done, calculate how much it would cost in fiat currency by checking tools like the ETH gas station. As a result, we can time NFT submissions to the days or times when there are low levels of network congestion.
This method is very useful when you are knowledge-ready about the NFT project’s plans. For instance, the day and time when your favourite or chosen NFT will is to drop. This avoids rush hours for an NFT transaction that you believe you can wait for a little more.
Find an NFT Tool that uses Lazy Minting
Lazy Minting is the process through which an NFT marketplace defers the gas fees to the buyers instead of the creators. This is a powerful feature since it does not inhibit the market’s potential. Especially for the Ethereum network, since most of the liquid trades for NFTs transact on it. Furthermore, users will need to find out the fees for using the marketplace and secondary sales commissions.
Use Different Blockchain Networks
The NFT asset market is expanding fast. Over the coming years, transactions and user activity will expand beyond the Ethereum blockchain. Other blockchains like Solana, Avalanche, Cosmos, Tezos, and others are seeing growth in developers, decentralized applications, and users.
Secondly, other chains work on consensus mechanisms that do not rely on proof-of-work, the main reason for the high gas fees on Ethereum. Gas fees are a fraction of the transaction cost on other chains.
You can search for NFT projects and teams from other blockchains and potentially expand the number of good projects that lie within your sight. In time, your familiarity with the NFT space will help you spot the best ones.
Adjust Your Settings
Today, we have a plethora of applications and tools available at our fingertips. Their default settings can sometimes not be suitable for our requirements. This means we have to change the settings parameters to suit our gas fees budgets. Apps factor in the user’s device specifications to determine the standard settings. They set gas fees to a flat model most of the time.
Under the advanced tab of wallet settings, let gas fees be customizable per transaction. As a result, users will see a separate window that now shows gas fees for each transaction.
Conclusion
At the present rate of development, we can hope that 2022 will be the last year of expensive gas fees. Apart from proof-of-work on Ethereum being phased out slowly, we know that user activity and developers on other chains are at an all-time high. Furthermore, the growth of layer-2 scaling solutions like Polygon and Arbitrum shows why we’re on the way to mass adoption of NFTs.
NFTically is a software-as-a-service company that works with creators, brands and enterprises to create and launch their own customized NFT marketplaces. For further information, you can connect with the NFTically team on Discord and Telegram.
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