Comparison of Rarible, OpenSea, and Foundation

Rarible, OpenSea and Foundation Comparison

The development of the digital art market began in 2017 when the American studio Larva Labs released CryptoPunks, a collection of NFT illustrations on the Ethereum blockchain. At the same time, there was a massive interest of users in NFT. As a result, very quickly tokenization of various files entered many areas of our life. Nowadays, you can tokenize into an NFT form:

  • texts;
  • Images
  • audio and video files;
  • digital paintings;
  • 3D sculptures;
  • game characters;
  • domain names and more.

Technically, an NFT token is a password-protected link to an object with a set of metadata and a smart contract. The difference between NFT tokens and cryptocurrencies is the uniqueness of each token and the fact that they are not equal in value in their species group. It is this meaning that is embedded in the name “non-fungible token”.

At the end of 2017, another project was released called CryptoKitties. It was a blockchain-based NFT game that quickly became a popular and attractive $12.5 million investment. This was followed by other projects that attracted significant investments.

A Brief Overview of Rarible, OpenSea and Foundation Sites

Over the past four years, the NFT market has grown tremendously. The high popularity of NFT has contributed to the creation of a large number of NFT marketplaces. These are trading platforms that allow you to create, buy, sell and store NFTs. Let’s take a look at the three large and popular platforms Rarible, OpenSea, and Foundation.

OpenSea

The OpenSea platform was founded in November 2017. Place of registration — USA, New York. OpenSea is by far the largest shopping and service marketplace by numbers and numbers. The platform offers over 300 types and over 10,000,000 items.

OpenSea supports the trading of ERC-721 and ERC-1155 tokens, which are used to create over 4 million unique digital items.

The platform sells a variety of playable characters, digital art, collectible cards, Aavegotchi lottery tickets, postage stamps from Austria, postcards from the Binance exchange, and more.

According to DappRadar, in August 2021, the trading volume on the OpenSea platform exceeded $ 3.5 billion. According to information, this is an absolute record for the entire history of this trading platform.

This NFT platform was the very first and continues to thrive. In September 2021, OpenSea  launched a mobile app for iOS and Android, which has the following features:

  • search for works of artists using filters;
  • viewing them and saving to “Favorites”;
  • NFT collection statistics;
  • links to exclusive editions.

OpenSea allows users to list NFTs for sale that was not built on the platform itself. Also available on the platform is an automatic NFT listing created on other platforms integrated with OpenSea.

The peculiarity of the turnover on the exchange is that the user must necessarily carry out two commissions that require payment for GAS. The first transaction activates the account to place the tokens for sale. The second transaction launches a smart contract to gain access to the item being sold.

OpenSea’s audience is comprised of users interested in the wide range of possibilities offered by this major marketplace for selling NFTs.

Rarible

The first version of Rarible was released at the end of 2019, but the service was fully operational in 2020. Place of registration — USA, Wilmington, Delaware. The Rarible developers decided that they did not want to create another typical project, so they developed their ideas in the direction of the NFT marketplace.

Although the NFT system is still young, Rarible is already investing in NFT creation transactions to drive the platform’s growth. In the organization, the future is to move to the DAO form. It is necessary to create a fully decentralized platform.

Like several other platforms, Rarible is integrated with OpenSea. However, unlike OpenSea, Rarible only allows NFTs issued on the platform itself to be listed for sale.

On the Rarible site, just like on OpenSea, you can buy and sell all kinds of digital objects. Also, sellers can create more than one NFT for one image by selling it more than once.

Rarible’s user interface is straightforward enough for those new to cryptography. Users who have tried working on similar NFT marketplaces (for example, OpenSea) can easily cope with the Rarible interface.

The user can log in using various crypto wallets such as MetaMask, Coinbase Wallet, MyEtherWallet, or any mobile wallet using WalletConnect. The user has the option to fund his wallet with fiat currency via bank transfer or debit card.

Rarible has its own cryptocurrency RARI, which was created to manage the site. It allows the user to participate in votes on the further development of the platform. RARI rewards are awarded to those users who buy or sell NFTs at least once a week.

According to DappRadar, at the end of September 2021, Rarible is ranked fifth in terms of trading volume of all time.

The Rarible audience is users interested in this marketplace to easily create, sell, or collect digital items secured by the blockchain.

In August, Rarible announced the Rarible Protocol, an open-source zero-fee toolkit that simplifies the process of bringing NFT projects and ideas to market. The Rarible Protocol’s mock stack included the Ethereum, Polkadot, Tezos, Flow, Polygon, and Binance blockchains in this announcement.

Foundation

The new Foundation platform emerged to sell digital art in February 2021, registered in the USA, Santa Monica. Foundation crossed the $ 1,000,000 threshold in the first two weeks of the sale.

The Foundation focuses on exclusive digital art. As a result of this concept of the Foundation site, the user can get there only through a personal invitation (invite) from a participant already inside the site and has an NFT sale. With the help of verification and invites, the Foundation restricts the selection of authors and tries to attract only trusted artists to auctions.

Foundation is a resource where, first of all, you need to show your work with the maximum involvement of the future audience. For this, the user is invited to leave links to the profiles of their social networks.

The Foundation platform, like Rarible, is integrated with OpenSea.

The Foundation’s audience is creators, collectors, curators, and trendsetters looking for an exclusive blockchain-based art marketplace.

What is the difference between Minting on Rarible, OpenSea, and Foundation

The release of its NFT (tokenization of an object) is called minting. It has some differences on Rarible, OpenSea, and Foundation:

  1. Rarible allows users to create NFTs quickly and easily, but users have to pay for GAS right away. This is the risk because the creator doesn’t know if he can sell his NFT. The size of the commission depends on the load on the Ethereum network. At maximum load, the commission can be over $ 80.
  2. OpenSea  uses lazy minting. The author pays for the creation of the NFT upon sale, when the actual release of the NFT occurs with a record in the blockchain and, accordingly, the GAS is consumed.
  3. The Foundation permits creation of NFTs for sale only to authors who already have at least one NFT deal. The Foundation charges a minting fee, just like the Rarible site. The user must have ETH in their wallet to pay for GAS every time they issue an NFT, update the reserve price, or put their item up for auction.

Differences in Rarible Concept, OpenSea, and Foundation

NFT trading platforms can be classified according to two criteria:

  • complex (general purpose);
  • specialized.

Rarible and OpenSea are complex marketplaces. They provide the ability to trade any NFTs. On such sites, authors can create their own NFTs and put them up for sale, regardless of their content. It could be:

  • digital art;
  • game objects and characters;
  • video and audio files;
  • sports cards;
  • virtual lands and virtual real estate;
  • domain names;
  • charity NFTs and more.

Foundation is a specialized art platform. Specialized platforms focus on trading specific types of NFTs (e.g. digital art or project-specific in-game NFTs).

Also, NFT marketplaces can be divided into the following types:

  • open;
  • supervised;
  • closed (private).

Rarible and OpenSea are open marketplaces. They are essentially like Etsy or eBay. Rarible and OpenSea do not restrict users from creating NFTs and putting them up for sale. Also, users do not have to submit an application and go through the verification process. The user must connect the wallet to start issuing their own NFTs. Holders of pre-existing NFTs can list their tokens for resale.

Foundation is one of the most popular curated platforms around. Such platforms decide which NFTs can be issued, exhibited, and sold and are more exclusive. The need to apply on the platform and have an invite (a personal invitation from the platform participants) is a way to combat fraud and maintain a high quality of work. Foundation is managed by users who invite other NFT creators to the platform. Also, users can join the official group of the marketplace on Discord and share their work there. The invitation option becomes available to the user after the first sale of his NFT.

Rarible, OpenSea  and Foundation Platform Interface

Rarible, OpenSea, and Foundation, like most NFT platforms, offer users a similar interface:

  • registration on the platform;
  • installation of a digital wallet for storing NFT, which must first have ETH;
  • creation of own assets (NFT);
  • selling and buying NFTs;
  • the ability to choose the method of selling your NFTs (fixed rate or auction);
  • the ability to select payment tokens for the sale of their NFTs;
  • instructions for working with the site;
  • technical support.

In addition to the differences already discussed above, the sites under consideration also have the following differences:

  1. Foundation only works with the MetaMask wallet, unlike Rarible and OpenSea, which work with many different wallets.
  2. The Foundation pre-moderates the NFT, and only after the approval of the NFT can they be sold. Rarible and OpenSea do not pre-moderate NFTs.
  3. OpenSea and Foundation train the site using instructions. Rarible also has online training.

Rarible, OpenSea, and Foundation platforms have similar basic functionality:

  1. Showcase. The sites in question have a showcase showing users all the product information: bids, owners, previews, price/bid history, etc.
  2. Filters. Using filters makes it easier to navigate the site, especially in the case of a marketplace with a lot of collectibles. Using filters, users can select products by payment method, listing status, category, and collection.
  3. Search for items. The sites support tagging and category management so that users can search for collectibles without wasting time.
  4. Creation of an ad. Users can create and submit collectibles. Using this function, the user uploads files and enters information about the token – name, tags, description.
  5. Buying and Bidding. The platforms allow you to buy and place bets on the NFTs that are listed on them. The bidding feature includes a bid expiration date and allows you to view detailed information about the current bet status.
  6. Purse. The NFT Marketplace connects to users’ wallets so that they can store, send and receive NFTs. The easiest way to integrate this feature is to provide users with the ability to connect to a popular wallet that they already use, such as MetaMask.

Prospects for NFT-sites

According to NonFungible, the total value of NFT transactions in 2020 increased by 299% compared to 2019 and exceeded $250 million. In the first half of 2021, trading volumes in the NFT market were over $ 2.5 billion, adding another 1000% to the growth. According to the estimates of the analytical resource DappRadar, in August 2021, the capitalization of the NFT market crossed the threshold of $14.2 billion.

Experts predict that non-fungible tokens will become the backbone of a virtual economic infrastructure in the next ten years. However, the user should consider that each NFT platform has many different nuances in its concepts, interfaces, and functionality. Therefore, the user should carefully study the information about various sites before choosing any specific one. An NFT platform must meet the needs and capabilities of the user for the most successful result.

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