NFTs are revitalizing our lives just like Facebook, and Instagram did in their time. Several giant players are investing massively in NFTs as they believe they will play a significant role in the metaverse. NFT has recently got such incredible fame that the Collins dictionary phrased it as the “Word of the Year 2021” as they surprised the world with art pieces like Beeple’s “Everydays: The first 5000 days” and “The Merge” selling at incredible prices of $69 million and $91.8 million respectively. Crypto experts believe that NFTs would perk up not just art but also several other industries.
NFTs impact how we create, buy and sell art, music, videos, images, branded products, and many more. This technology is too revolutionary to be written off as it is predicted to overrule the crypto space in the coming years. Therefore, we have compiled this blog to give you an overview of the top NFT trends that will be dominant in 2022. This write-up will help you get the most out of forthcoming opportunities.
NFT Market Growth in 2021 and 2022
From art to landholdings, the NFT craze has not left anything untouched. This NFT craze resulted in getting a huge market last year. CNBC reports that the total worth of the global NFT transactions market hit $17.6 billion in 2021, which was 21,000% more than that in 2020, when the NFT market was just worth $82.5 million. NFT hype is not temporary, as its insane growth has made it the foundation for several projects in upcoming years. With ever-increasing technological innovations, the craze for NFTs is not going to fade out as its global market is expected to hit $21.33 billion in 2022.
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Top NFT Trends in 2022
Based on the incredible growth observed in the NFT market, it is not surprising that you must be anxious to know what NFT trends you are most likely to observe this year. According to Jace Kay, a member of the famous NFT group "Bored Ape Yacht Club," NFTs seem like overruling 2022. To give you an overview of where the NFT market may advance, we present the most cutting-edge existing and new upcoming trends we will likely witness in 2022.
1. NFT Getting Down to Metaverse – Brand NFTs
The metaverse is one of the most trending subjects in technology circles. Metaverse is a simulated digital world mainly involving VR (Virtual Reality) that will focus on our social connections in a digital environment. It is being considered a $1 trillion-dollar business opportunity. Jefferies anticipates that metaverse will be the strongest agitation to our way of living. In virtual worlds, you can join the same events as you would in actual life. You can beautify your homes, meet new friends, and more.
Metaverse Architect is a professional crypto-fanatic, entrepreneur, blockchain enthusiast and avid investor who is passionate about developing innovative solutions in the space. Generally speaking, Metaverse Architect can design the outlook of everything just as they appear in real life. He will be going over how tokenization of assets and digital identities can happen. This means that we are getting closer to achieving an advanced level of artificial intelligence where people will not have to rely solely on AI systems anymore but instead their own asset identities which can represent themselves as individuals or objects.
NFTs are a way of making digital content unique. It’s common in the real world that people like to collect and boast rare items, and the virtual world (metaverse) will be no exception. Experts believe that NFT utility will massively increase in the metaverse, where it will serve numerous significant purposes. Inspired by the NFTs trend, many big brands have jumped on the NFT bandwagon.
Nike- the apparel and footwear giant, has recently demonstrated its interest in the metaverse and NFT space. CNBC reports that in November 2021, Nike arranged seven trademarks to sell the virtual category of its merchandise demonstrating its motive to assimilate metaverse and NFTs into its growing business. In January 2022, Nike posted an ad for five jobs related to the metaverse. Moreover, it has recently bought a digital shoemaking company RTFKT Studio to eventuate its vision of selling virtual shoes. RTFKT succeeded in selling 600 pairs of virtual sneakers raising 3.1 million USD within just seven minutes. This huge revenue perspective inspires many other brands to delve into the world of NFTs to better survive in the metaverse. Therefore, in 2022, we will see industries assimilating NFTs and metaverse in their businesses.
2. NFT Reviving Gaming – P2E Games NFTs
Last year, the gaming industry witnessed massive developments for NFTs. GemeFi, also known as “NFT gaming," facilitated NFT development by introducing play-to-earn games based on blockchain. These games give in-game NFT assets to their players as a reward. The P2E (Play-to-Earn) games like “Axie Infinity” and “My Neighbor Alice” agitated the gaming world in 2021. Such blockchain-based games helped the players make real money. Game players can easily collect and trade their NFTS as they completely own them. The players can easily transfer their NFT assets to an NFT marketplace for selling or trading purpose. At the time, Axie Infinity is the most trending game, worth over 1 billion USD. This game revolves around Pokémon-like creatures called “Axies” that are NFTs with a distinctive blend of capabilities. This online game contains its in-game token like AXS (Infinity Shard)that work like currency to trade NFTs in the Axie Infinity network.
Hence, the games leveraging NFTs are gradually underway. Here is a list of the top five NFT projects that are getting warmed up to shake the gaming industry in 2022. These NFT game projects include:
1. Silks
2. Decentraland
3. Chosen Ones
4. Gods Unchained
5. The Sandbox
These P2E games would be the best and most trending NFTs for 2022. Let's discuss a few of these projects to see how these NFTs would work.
- Silks
Silks– the looming NFT game is set to be launched this year. It is considered an overall best play-to-earn game that gives its players a chance to benefit from an exciting connection between the physical world and the metaverse. It will connect its players with the virtual world with the help of thoroughbred horse racing. This connection will enable Silks gamers to own those digital horses connected to the racehorse of this real world. Silks aim to ensure that each digital horse exhibits feature similar to its real-world counterpart. Silks whitepaper reports that this process will enable its players to make money from their in-game adventures in the form of race rewards. Whenever a real horse wins the racing game, $STT will be awarded to the player who owns the digital silk horse associated with the real thoroughbred horse. Moreover, being featured as NFTs, the owners of Silks' horses could also get value increase benefits by selling them in the secondary market.
This state-of-the-art gameplay will possibly attract a massive viewer of potential gamers who will get Silks avatars and collaborate with other game players. Last but not least, as Silks is based on the mechanism of Proof-of-Stake to authenticate Silks’ data, rewards can be generated through mining as well.
- Decentraland
Decentraland is another NFT project creating hype in the media. Since its launch in 2020, its popularity has been shooting up. In this game, virtual land and several other in-game stuff are structured as NFTs. These NFTs allow their players to develop a marketplace powered by $MANA. Game players can make money by using their virtual land smartly.
- Chosen Ones
It is another exciting and anticipated P2E game developed on BSC (Binance Smart Chain). This game was created by Fork Gaming and is expected to be launched in April 2022 with 10,000 NFTs. These non-fungible tokens will carry the avatar of the player. Every "Chosen One” will exhibit rare features and capabilities. This uniqueness will ensure that the game is challenging and rewarding at the same time. The “Chosen Ones” team is working to integrate NFT artwork with the features of “auto-battler” to provide the players with an intriguing gameplay experience. All NFT owners will enjoy multiple perks like giveaways and airdrops because of their access to the Heroes Club.
NFT games will be creating incredible hype in 2022 while revolutionizing the P2E gaming industry.
Besides P2E games, text-based games are also using NFTs. "Loot NFT project" is a good example capturing attention based on its creativity and enthusiastic fan base. The Loot game template structures 8000 "loot bags. "These loot bags carry lists of items (collectible NFTs), including weapons or some other unique equipment. These NFTs are designed by an online group of people and used in the game for free. This Loot NFT project is under development, and we will see its advancements in 2022.
3. NFT Spicing up Artwork – Fractional NFTs
NFT art dominated the crypto space in 2021 and is expected to continue this trend in 2022 when the fractionalized NFTs of art pieces will be purchased and sold out tremendously.
In 2022, one of the most awaited occasions is the auction of non-fungible tokens of graffiti artwork named “Gorilla in a Pink Mask” (depicting mural) by famous artist Banksy. This artwork (mural) initially hung on the wall in Bristol (England) was removed from there in 2020. The company Exposed Wall that removed this piece of artwork is now planning to arrange an auction for selling the graffiti wall in 2022. This wall will be sold out as a compilation of 10,000 fractionalized NFTs. The sale price for each NFT would be just about $750. Once all the NFTs are sold out, one lucky winner will get a chance to win another Banksy mural named “Refugees” that would be given either as an NFT or as a physical version.
Particle is another company set to sell the NFT collections of the most magnificent pieces of fine arts collected across the globe. Same as Exposed Wall, this IoT platform, Particle, has also divided each masterpiece into a group of 10,000 NFTs. Last year, Particle acquired the physical piece of Banksy named “Love is in the air” for about $12.9 million. The company plans to fractionalize this artwork into 10,000 NFTs. Each NFT part will be sold out for $1400, adding up to $14 million.
The main idea of Exposed Wall and Particle is that the NFT buyers will have ownership of the physical piece of art, but the selling company will be bound to display their NFTs publicly. Both the enterprises will get 1% of each NFT edition. This approach will avoid the control of the artwork in the hands of a single buyer. The companies allow investors to purchase fractionalized shares of million-dollar artwork that are easily affordable with limited funds by fractionalizing assets.
All these initiatives indicate that the NFT craze for artwork will overrule 2022, focusing mainly on fractionalized assets.
4. NFT Penetrating the Social Groups – Profile Picture NFTs
Non-fungible tokens are going mainstream in social groups. You would have recently observed some variations of animals like a giraffe or a monkey in the profile pictures on Twitter and Instagram; these are NFTs. In January 2022, the online news and social network "Twitter" allowed users to interchange their profile images as NFTs. Several crypto-enthusiasts have set their NFT as their profile picture. The company is by far allowing just iOS users with a Twitter Blue subscription to set NFTs as their profile image. However, it claims that this support will later be provided to Android and web users because Twitter is determined to embrace NFTs fully.
5. NFTs Taking Off the TV/Film Industry – NFT TV Shows
The covid-19 Pandemic brought several transformations worldwide. Change in the mode of releasing and monetizing money from movies is one. You have observed blockbuster movies going direct to streaming, which has entirely changed the content delivery. Besides movies, the TV industry is also experiencing transformations through streaming. But the crypto experts believe that non-fungible tokens are the upcoming frontier that would transform how the content is used in the TV/film industry. You would be able to get access to a TV show/movie by holding the ownership of an NFT. NFTs are already supporting several TV/movie projects to make money and raise funds online. Let's look at a few TV shows that would be the most trending NFTs to look for in 2022.
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- Stoner Cats
Stoner Cats is a cute and funny animated adult series produced by Mila Kunis, a Hollywood actress. This blockchain-based web series released in mid-2021 has also added a crypto star Vitalik Buterin, the Ethereum creator, as the voice of one of the cats. One can get access to this short web NFT series if they own a stoner cat NFT. First, the audience has to buy an NFT to watch just the initial five minutes of the first episode. This NFT includes a digital art piece of one of the characters playing in the series and a ticket to watch all episodes of the series. CoinDesk reports that this NFT would be sold out for 0.35 ETH. NFT owners will get access to the spectrum of the community, content, and token creator.
As this project has become a big hit, Orchard Farm Productions plans to create new shows following this model, as they report. They believe this would be a fantastic way for creative and exclusive stories to be communicated in upcoming years.
- GenZeroes
It is another NFT TV series that is expected to release in April 2022. This sci-fi adventure series can be viewed by those who purchase NFTs. The viewers will get access to multiple benefits based on their NFT collection. These benefits include distinctive collectibles, comic books, and fractionalized ownership of the series.
NFT has found its way into Television!
NFTs are also bumping into the televisions with Samsung's recent announcement of the "NFT Aggregation Platform." The world's largest electronic company claims that it will induce this NFT platform into its latest smart TV models going to release in 2022. Users of this smart TV can use this induced platform of their smart TV to search and find NFTs available for sale on different marketplaces and purchase them instantly through their TVs.
This saturation of NFTs indicates that the year 2022 will be dominated by NFTs trending in TV/films and smart TVs.
6. NFT Transforming Music Industry – NFT Albums
As the TV and film industry is catching the NFT bug, the music industry is no exception. In the existing system, it's hard for musicians to earn money as the artists get a fractional amount per stream. This low income has compelled the musicians to use non-fungible tokens as their new financial model. In 2022, we are likely to see a trend of more NFT songs and albums as they provide more creative freedom to musicians.
Daniel Allan, a well-known artist, has recently earned thousands of dollars by selling online copies of his various songs as NFTs. Allan mostly uses a video streaming medium, "Glass," to present his work, where each video is an NFT. The creator of this video would be the owner of this NFT, who has to decide how he could earn money from his content without any middleman.
Band Royalty NFTs is another project in the music industry that supports music lovers to get a handsome share of income. Whenever the song is performed from the platform's catalog, the NFT owners would get a decided share. Brand Royalty platform has a collection of 3,000 NFTs and plans to get a total of 12,000 NFTs by mid-2023.
The EDM producer DJ 3LAU is the first musician who successfully sold his NFT albums. He earned $11.6 million within 24 hours by releasing and selling his 33 NFT albums. His upcoming project is a crypto music platform named Royal. This platform will enable fans to buy NFTs and get a share of the royalties of the original musicians.
The famous band “Kings of Leon” has also launched the NFT album. This band offered tokens of three types:
1. A distinct album package token.
2. Token offers perks such as concert seats for the front row.
3. Unique audiovisual art token.
Rapper Meek Mill is another renowned artist interested in NFTs. Last year he announced that in 2022 he would release an NFT mixtape. Keeping in view all the success stories of musicians releasing NFT songs/albums and what they have in store for 2022, it would not be wrong to say that the music industry will flourish this year where NFTs will be trending the most.
Wrap Up!
NFT ownership is rising and transforming the mode we deal with digital stuff and the blockchain. With technological advancements, the future of non-fungible tokens is overflowing. NFT tendencies will accelerate and globally become more pervasive in 2022. However, different people have different opinions regarding the NFTs' potential. Some believe that it's just another fad that will die down soon. For others, NFTs are the future of the metaverse and the crypto space. Despite all the negative concerns, one thing is sure these digital assets will continue positively impacting the crypto space in 2022. The domains involving gaming and the metaverse are the most obvious where NFTs will bring value. Movies and music are also among the major industries endorsed for remodeling through NFTs. In recent times, art and selling artwork contribute to most of what we witness in the NFT space. NFT trends and their wide-range applications imply a dynamic future full of opportunities, and hopefully, we are prone to see numerous other uses of NFTs in years to come. As far as 2022 is concerned, numerous NFT trends discussed with endless opportunities are all set to pop up. So, anticipate more of the above-discussed NFT trends to take off and capitalize on your business opportunities.