Coinbase’s NFT Marketplace Beta with Social Networking features now live

Coinbase has announced the launch of its beta NFT marketplace. As of now, anyone can visit the first version of the marketplace and explore the vast collection of NFT on the Ethereum blockchain for now.

Coinbase NFT Marketplace

After nearly seven months, Coinbase’s long-awaited NFT marketplace arrives to showcase its magnificence to the Web3 community. However, NFT enthusiasts and traders seem to be unimpressed with Coinbase NFT’s interface and improvements over its larger competitor, Opsensea.

Especially considering Coinbase NFT’s current lack of decentralized features relative to its platform. For now, the Web3 community remains skeptical about Coinbase’s ability within the NFT market. However, Coinbase’s vision for the future of its marketplace may provide some much-needed traction to compete with the larger marketplaces.

Beta testers

However, only a small group of beta testers – based on their position on the waiting list – will be invited to experience full access to the marketplace. They will be able to create a profile to buy, sell and store NFTs using any custodial wallet, including the popular Metamask, or the Coinbase wallet.

For now, the Coinbase team is working tirelessly to extend more features to the public and get their marketplace up and running at full capacity. Coinbase will showcase various NFT collections such as Doodles, World of Women and Azuki during the beta launch.

Sanchan Saxena, vice president of product at Coinbase, said:

“We’ve learned that people don’t just want better tools to buy and sell NFT. They want better ways to discover them, better ways to find the right communities and better spaces where they can feel connected to each other. That’s why we’re building a product that’s much more than a transaction. We’re looking to empower people to create, collect and connect.”

There will be no transaction fees for a limited time, although Coinbase will eventually begin charging fees in line with Web3 industry standards. Coinbase says it will notify users before anything changes.

Coinbase started as a cryptocurrency exchange, which now ranks number two on CoinMarketCap’s top cryptocurrency point exchanges by volume. The exchange now has approximately 89 million verified users.

The platform’s entry into the NFT market poses a challenge to Opensea, which currently dominates the market with one million active user wallets. Once fully launched, Coinbase’s NFT marketplace will be able to leverage some of the exchange’s large user base to attract creators and drive volume. The company says it will give users the option to purchase NFT with their Coinbase account or by credit card in partnership with Mastercard.

To differentiate itself from existing marketplaces, Coinbase NFT incorporates social networking features so users can engage with their communities. Users can create a profile and curate it with NFTs representing them in an Instagram-like interface.

To do so, users simply connect any self-curated wallet to select the NFTs they want to highlight or hide on their profile. Once logged in, users can also follow other profiles and comment directly on NFTs, and can upvote/downvote comments as conversations unfold.

Coinbase wrote in a blog post:

“The rise of NFT communities has shown us that online conversation goes far beyond the moments surrounding transactions. We are building a place that serves more than just buying and selling. We want Coinbase NFT to be a place that helps creators and collectors build and engage their communities.”

Users can also search for NFT for sale in the custom “For You” feed. Like Instagram’s “Explore” feed, recommendations in Coinbase NFT’s “For You” feed are algorithmically generated based on what the user buys, what’s trending and who they follow.

There is also a “Shop” tab, which gives users a look at all NFTs for sale, including a wide range of projects from featured creators such as Doodles, Boss Beauties and Azuki.

In the coming months, Coinbase will be adding more features that will gradually bring its vision of a Web3 social marketplace to life, such as drops, minting, token communities and multi-chain support.

Coinbase NFT Marketplace: Beta doesn’t seem so popular

Last week, Coinbase finally launched the beta version of its long-awaited NFT marketplace. However, the most recent data from the platform revealed lower than expected user activity.

This news comes as some members of the NFT community doubt the marketplace’s potential. However, Coinbase is only taking its first steps in its NFT trading sector, but is this a good thing?

Coinbase NFT marketplace: new activity data revealed

Since October 2021, collectors have been anxiously waiting for Coinbase to launch its NFT marketplace. When its beta version was launched, the platform already had 4 million people on its waiting list.

Considering its innovative features and advancements, people expected the platform to be a success. However, recent activity data from cryptocurrency analytics company Dune shows otherwise.

Thus, the Coinbase NFT marketplace recorded less than 900 transactions from 650 users since April 20. Moreover, its trading volume was 73 ETH.

The data had been routed through Ox Project. Basically, this is the open protocol used by Coinbase for the back-end of the NFT market.

How was the beta version received?

Shortly after its launch, the Coinbase NFT marketplace received several criticisms from the community. For example, some users pointed out its lack of decentralization.

In addition to this issue, the platform’s innovation should help users take NFT trading to the next level. This is especially difficult with competitors like OpenSea around.

“We learned that people don’t just want better tools to buy and sell NFT,” said Coinbase VP of product Sanchan Saxena. “They want better ways to discover them, better ways to find the right communities and better spaces where they can feel connected to each other. That’s why we’re building a product that’s much more than a transaction.”

However, Coinbase remains the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the United States. Thanks to its user-friendly experience and support, the platform maintained its popularity over the months. Therefore, its NFT marketplace could be equally revolutionary in the future.

Until then, the project developers are continuously working on improving the platform’s functionality. For example, the Coinbase NFT marketplace comes with a so-called social function. This function will facilitate socializing between artists and collectors of NFT.

This innovation has already attracted several flagship NFT projects. For example, users can find Cool Cats and Doodles among other collectibles. Of course, the list of projects continues to grow, thus facilitating NFT minting and trading.