Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are becoming popular in the cryptocurrency world as the financial industry shifts gears. As a result, investors are constantly looking for new NFT initiatives with significant growth potential because this is one of the fastest-growing segments in cryptocurrency.
The economy for NFTs experienced an unparalleled surge, particularly in 2022. Moreover, due to notable corporations and celebrities using and minting NFTs, this modern technology has attracted much media interest. It is now one of the most widely contested topics in the online world.
Today, NFT markets like Rarible, OpenSea, and SuperRare advertise tens of thousands of various NFT projects. From January 2022 to May 2022, over $37 billion was transferred from cryptocurrency wallets to NFT marketplaces, indicating that this market is still expanding. Let’s look at some of the best NFTs available for purchase and investment in 2023.
1. Bored Ape Yacht Club
The Bored ape yacht club is a unique punk-based NFT venture that has achieved great success and established itself as a prominent investor in the cryptocurrency market. Yuga Labs LLC developed the Bored Ape Yacht Club NFT collection. It is a compilation of 10,000 randomly generated works of art with 170 distinctive characteristics.
These attributes are shown on OpenSea, the main NFT trading platform. In addition, each NFT’s properties are listed on each page, along with the proportion of NFTs in the database that shares each property. Anything below 1% is typically regarded as rare.
For example, only 46 of the 10,000 apes possess solid gold fur, making them incredibly expensive. Access to member-only perks, including apparel, prizes, and in-person meet-ups, is available to every Bored Ape Yacht Club customer.
Celebrities like Paris Hilton, Jimmy Fallon, Timbaland, Justin Bieber, Steph Curry, and Snoop Dogg are among those that own this NFT collection. The utilization of Bored Apes as avatars is one of their main attractions. Many owners modify the display images of their apes on platforms like WhatsApp, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
The animated apes often have absurd features, such as rainbow teeth and cheetah-printed fur. They wear cowboy hats or big sunglasses, push out their tongues, and consume cigars. When apes are used as avatars, they represent you or some aspect of you in a particular digital environment.
In addition to hosting gatherings in New York and California, the Bored Ape Yacht Club has also hosted events in the UK and Hong Kong. In addition, BAYC holders were given access to Ape Fest in June 2021, a festival that featured appearances by Snoop Dogg, Eminem, and Amy Schumer.
Yuga Labs have already widened its network to incorporate the cryptocurrency Ape Coin. People who own Bored Ape NFTs are hopeful about the company’s capability to break through and fully enter the masses in 2023. It has already worked with companies like Gucci and Adidas, and in 2021 a Bored Ape was featured on the cover of Rolling Stone.
2. CryptoPunks
CryptoPunks NFTs became a household name when they were first made public in 2017 by Larva Labs. Matt Hall and John Watkinson released 10,000 algorithmically created punks. The Ethereum blockchain keeps track of their proof of ownership. These diverse punks had distinctive characteristics and included humans, aliens, and occasionally zombies.
Million-dollar sales have been made for several CryptoPunks NFTs. CryptoPunk #5822 sold for $23.7 million in Ethereum. This NFT collection has produced more than $2.4 billion in trades when all sales are included.
In March 2022, Yuga Labs, the company that developed the BAYC, acquired CryptoPunks from Larva Labs. As a result, Yuga Labs currently controls the two most well-known NFT projects worldwide. CryptoPunks have pixelated, edgy graphics that show both male and female characters, including those that resemble zombies, aliens, and apes. Each punk is unique and sold for exceptionally high prices by private sellers and at renowned auction houses like Sotheby’s and Christie’s.
There are no two identical punks in CryptoPunks. Many are sporting gold chains, while others have bands, caps, little sunglasses, and other accessories. Each punk has unique characteristics, some of which are rarer than others. Simply put, an item’s worth increases with its rarity. For instance, since there are only nine alien punks, their value tends to be higher than that of male punks, which are 6,039.
CryptoPunks flourished due to the rise in demand for collectibles brought on by the COVID-19 outbreak and the growing popularity of cryptocurrencies and other blockchain initiatives. The conditions were ideal for prices to surge.
The major deciding factor in the cost of CryptoPunks portraits is supply and demand. Since numerous of them have been put up for auction, CryptoPunks will likely transition from comparatively niche collectors’ goods to mainstream art. That might attract further bids for them.
Hence, it can be asserted certain CryptoPunks with particularly desired characteristics might see an increase in their value in 2023.
3. Doodles
Doodles NFTs are renowned for their pastel and rainbow-colored drawings of cats, pickles, people, aliens, and flowers. The generative collection uses 10,000 different NFTs created by randomly combining 100 attributes from Burnt Toast’s design.
Each Doodles NFT in the collection is a one-of-a-kind, with some having more value than others due to their unique features. On October 17, 2021, the project’s first 10,000-piece NFT collection went on sale for 0.123 ETH per piece.
When it was introduced, Doodles significantly impacted the NFT industry thanks to its distinctive styling and color palette. As a result, many new projects are now drawn to this specific aesthetic.
It is a collection that Burnt Toast, Poopie, and Tulip made. These three individuals were already known to the NFT community since they helped CryptoKitties, another practical digital project, get off the ground.
The biggest of the many Doodles-related events that have already taken place is arguably Doodles SXSW, an exhibition that Shopify and Doodles created to recreate the Doodles world. All of this seeks to make the brand accessible to the general population.
Doodles is a project that keeps on innovating, too. Each holder of an original NFT Doodles has the option to switch their item with Space Doodles, published a few months ago, to incorporate a unique ship and a movement to it and to always go back to the original form.
Justin Bieber and individuals from the web3 community, like Pranksy and Alexis Ohania, are just a few of the celebrities that have already participated in it.
Doodles, in essence, is a project that fosters interaction and leads to significant NFT breakthroughs. Thus, purchasing Doodles is unquestionably a wise decision for the upcoming year.
4. Axie Infinity
In the NFT industry, Axie Infinity is a true powerhouse. These are the initiatives that have opened doors for other programs and made it possible for them to exist. Sky Mavis, a Vietnamese studio, created it as a play-to-earn game.
Axie Infinity offered users a deal that nearly appeared too tempting to be true when it first rolled out in March 2018. It allows users to play a game and win actual cash. It operates on the Ethereum blockchain, reducing fees and transaction delays with the help of the side chain Ronin. Potential players now have simple access, thanks to this.
Axies are adorable round creatures that you only need to care for if you want them to have offspring whose traits will be decided by their parent’s genes. Axies come in a variety of sorts and are also designed for battle.
Each Axie has unique characteristics that define its place in the fight. The four stats that each Axie has are Morale, Health, Speed, and Skill. Classes are available for Axies. Each class is either effective against one type or not. A player must assemble a trio of complimentary Axies for their squad during a battle.
This game’s setting and gameplay have elements in common with the well-known Nintendo pocket monsters. The primary difference is that Axies are NFTs, which means that you may actually control them and resell them on the market for absurdly high prices.
An Axie, for instance, sold for over $1 million in 2021. Many people may entirely support themselves from this game by earning significant quantities of money from their creatures.
Purchasing an Axie is a simple way to enter into the blockchain and the web3 environment, whose growth was tremendous in 2022 and is continuing to advance positively.
5. Azuki
Azuki is a group of non-fungible tokens created by Chiru Labs, a Los Angeles-based start-up founded by artists and engineers. Azuki is one of the most popular NFTs today. Every single Azuki NFT is a one-of-a-kind, hand-drawn virtual avatar.
They come in various character types, such as samurais and skateboarders. Owners of NFTs can access the metaverse using their Azukis as digital IDs. The designs are what made Azukis popular. They have anime-style artwork. There are about 10,000 Azuki NFTs, and the collection is now being offered for a price cap of 23 ETH.
Each Azuki’s look is based on one of 469 qualities spread across 13 trait categories. Azukis with rarer qualities are typically more valuable since some traits are more uncommon than others. Azuki comes in four different varieties: Blue, Red, Human, and Spirit.
Since there are over 9,000 Human Azukis, they are typically less expensive. However, only 97 Spirits exist, making up less than 1% of the entire collection; hence their costs are substantially higher. These NFTs are created on the Ethereum blockchain. They are kept in NFT wallets and exchanged for and against ETH on NFT marketplaces.
Azuki was initially supposed to be released through a Dutch auction. It is an NFT drop in which the sale starts at a fixed price and decreases gradually to the final price of the sale. The mint price for Azuki was set at 1 ETH in the beginning, and it was programmed in such a way that the value will decrease by 0.05 after every 20 minutes before finally reaching 0.15 ETH. However, Azuki didn’t get to even the first price cut as the whole collection sold out at 1 ETC within three minutes.
Each Azuki NFT grants access to The Garden, a platform that unites culture, artwork, and community under one roof. Users can access fresh NFT releases, live events, unique streetwear collaborations, and more.
Azuki aims to open the door to a completely new genre of media that the public has yet to discover by utilizing the blockchain paradigm of property and community creation. By granting NFT owners a non-exclusive license to commercial usage for their unique Azukis, this NFT really raised the bar. You may publish your Azuki on products that you sell online.
Azuki also has numerous important connections that assist in developing its brand. Azuki and Epik High, a South Korean unconventional hip-hop group, collaborated to promote Asian and Asian-American musicians. The group performed at Coachella 2022 while displaying Azuki NFTs. Moreover, Azuki will collaborate with hardware wallet company Ledger through its BEANZ line.
Final Thoughts
The NFT market is filled with opportunities for people who work smartly. People simply need to take the first step to begin trading. There are numerous unique NFT collections, and new ones are made available every day. Choosing the best NFT project to engage in is, therefore, challenging.
NFTs we have listed above are currently the most popular, and they are expected to retain or increase in value in the next year. Therefore, it can be a wise choice to invest in them.
In addition, the majority of NFTs often depreciate over time. Therefore, it’s crucial to only invest money that you intend to use. Finally, NFTs are high-risk commodities; therefore, never invest your entire life’s wealth in one. Only use the money that you can afford to lose because there is no guarantee that investment in NFTs will yield profit.
