Did Solana actually surpass Ethereum with 136% higher NFT volume

According to a recent retweet by Santiment, it seems that the volume of Solana-based NFTs exceeded that of Ethereum. Well, in reality, the volume differs with a tiny yet critical factor.

It is Solana and not Ethereum

The volume charted in the tweet is not calculated in USD but in the blockchainā€™s native token. Thus, despite Ethereum observing only 550k ETH worth of NFT transactions, the total volume exceeds $550 million. However, 1.3 million SOL worth of NFT transactions, only amounts to $43.39 million.

Put simply, in no way did Solanaā€™s NFT surpass that of Ethereum. Well, except on one front. The total transactions conducted throughout the week on Ethereum came up to a little under 500k, while Solana noted almost 630k transactions this week alone.

This 32.6% higher activity on Solana does show that lower costs can attract higher usage, but it doesnā€™t amount to much.

Solana NFT transactions this week | Source: Nansen

On the macro time frame, Solanaā€™s NFT marketplace has been observing a gradual decline in terms of daily volume.

In the last two months, the highest volume noted on MagicEden, the NFT marketplace, which dominates 98.5% of all Solana NFT volume, was 380k SOL ($12.6 million) that too back in May.

Solana daily NFT volume | Source: Dune ā€“ AMBCrypto

Notably, over the same time period, the daily NFT purchases on Solana have decreased by 78.85%. But Solana is not alone in this, as OpenSea on Ethereum is also experiencing a similar conundrum.Ā 

Solana daily NFT purchases | Source: Dune ā€“ AMBCrypto

The daily volume of NFT transactions on Ethereum from their peak of $476 million in May, dropped to just $15 million on 3 July. In fact, the dropoff in transaction volume from April to May was surprisingly high as figures sank from $2.59 billion to $696 million.

Additionally, as of press time this month, OpenSea has already registered $43 million worth of volumes. At this rate, by the end of this month, the marketplace would only record $344 million in transactions.

Opensea monthly NFT volume | Source: Dune ā€“ AMBCrypto

Besides, with the broader market treading downwards, investors will only keep themselves farther away from NFTs, so the figure might end up being correct.