The Onchain NFTs Cheat Sheet: A Collector's Guide
NFTs in the Ethereum ecosystem are catching bids once more as bullish momentum has returned to crypto. Floor prices are rising, making notable overlooked pieces harder to acquire again.
That said, many people downsized their attention and holdings around NFTs over the past few years as a natural response to the bear market. The main thing was to survive.
But with a risk-on environment returning, so are digital collectors’ appetites. I did a decent amount of NFT collecting since the last bull run, and even I’m feeling personally offsides right now in wishing I’d grabbed more great pieces near the bottom.
So maybe you’re feeling offsides, too. Where should you be looking then?
Naturally, the price action of the largest PFP giants like CryptoPunks, Bored Apes, and Pudgy Penguins will probably grab the most headlines in the near future. But the majority of people can’t afford these collections' impressively high floor prices.
You also don’t want to just dive in and spray-and-pray on the first trending projects you see. You ought to have a thesis!
For example, one of my main theses in crypto is that onchain NFTs are going to rise in significance. And I mean that in various senses, from culturally to usefulness.
The good news? There are a wide variety of onchain NFTs to explore, and many of them are affordable and already historically notable for pioneering in the context of Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) artifacts. We’ll still be discussing at least some of these efforts 10 years from now and beyond.
Accordingly, below let’s dive into why exactly “onchain” matters and a selection of my favorite projects here that you can start exploring for yourself.
First, why onchain?
Every NFT has associated metadata, like its imagery, attributes, etc.
The only way you shouldn’t store this data is in a private server. When companies wane and turn the lights off, the data in these servers go offline, rendering any associated NFTs as essentially blank receipts. We saw this with Digital Objects in 2018, we saw this with FTX in 2022, and we’ll see it again if others opt for this approach.
Everything else is fair game and just depends on a project’s needs. You can store your data in the popular file-sharing network IPFS, which offers great redundancy possibilities. You can store it in other specialized Layer 1 (L1) chains, like Arweave or Filecoin. Or you can store it fully onchain, e.g. such that the NFTs and metadata spring from the same smart contract on Ethereum.
None of these approaches are inherently right or wrong. I’ve seen all of them used in compelling ways. But what particularly sets onchain NFTs apart here is 1) their lack of external dependencies, and 2) runtime composability.
On external dependencies
When it comes to external storage solutions for NFTs, more trust assumptions are involved. For instance, with IPFS you need active long-term data pinning, so a casual holder trusts that this pinning will continue. And with Arweave and Filecoin, you must trust their cryptoeconomics will continue to work many years from now.
Conversely, with onchain NFTs you only have to trust that Ethereum will continue to exist rather than if Ethereum will continue to exist and IPFS (or Arweave, or Filecoin, or a private server, etc.) will also continue to operate as expected.
That’s a subtle but powerful difference, considering how Ethereum is the most battle-tested blockchain behind Bitcoin and seems well-poised to thrive for many decades to come. Will the KnownOrigin cryptoart you bought in 2021 still be pinned on IPFS in the 22nd century? It seems unlikely. There’s a much better chance you’ll be able to access onchain NFTs then, though.
On runtime composability
Another one of the most compelling aspects of onchain NFTs is their potential for runtime composability, i.e. the programmable expressiveness made possible when all NFT data is stored and generated within an “always-on” smart contract.
When an NFT's metadata lives onchain, it becomes readily available and interactable by other smart contracts. This opens up entirely new possibilities for experimentation and collaboration that aren't simply achievable with NFTs whose data resides offchain.
For instance, consider a fully onchain NFT that dynamically evolves over time based on user interactions and Ethereum block data. Another smart contract could tap into this runtime data to build entirely new experiences, like a generative gaming environment. This “live” accessibility means other developers can layer new creations or functionalities onto the NFT seamlessly, without relying on centralized servers or APIs.
This approach opens the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) up as a boundless cultural playground, making onchain NFTs a foundation for an entire ecosystem of interconnected creativity and ensuring they’ll be relevant and reusable far into the future.
Onchain NFTs to explore
Runtime composability and lack of external dependencies are why I think onchain NFTs will continue to rise in significance in crypto. So now you understand the basics of my argument.
But what are some specific onchain projects that feature one or both of these pillars? Where should you begin looking if you’re just ramping up here?
Below, I’ve made some rough “starter pack” categorizations you can use to start surfing through some of my favorite onchain NFTs. Most of the hyperlinks go to reports from the On-Chain Checker tool, which features links to other resources like OpenSea, Etherscan, and beyond. All floor prices mentioned are from the time of writing… 👇
🪙 Low Floor Price
Interested in collecting neat onchain projects that are affordable? Here’s a selection of options that all currently cost ~$100 or less in ETH.
- Etholvants — A collection of deflationary, evolving digital creatures (0.018 ETH floor)
- EtherOrcs — Created as characters for one of the first 100% onchain games (0.028 ETH)
- the reliquary — A collection of evolving glitch-pixel animations (0.018 ETH)
- OKPC — An onchain etch-a-sketch toy that holders can draw on (0.001 ETH)
- Shields — An onchain design system for creating personalized emblems (0.029 ETH)
- Merge — A celebration of Ethereum’s Merge update by Pob Studio (0.002 ETH)
- Buterin Cards — A collection of digital cards commemorating Vitalik Buterin, created using an innovative technique called JPEG Mining (0.022 ETH)
- the metro — An interactive evolving onchain metro map (0.0069 ETH)
- Baby Pepes — A collection of 20,000 pixelated Pepe characters (0.0039 ETH)
- Crypto Coaster — A collection of 2,000 randomly generated and interactive rollercoaster tracks (0.005 ETH)
- onchain dinos — An onchain derivative collection of the tiny dinos project (0.0035 ETH)
🧑🚀️ PFPs
In the market for a new profile picture? Here are some onchain avenues you can consider.
- Chainfaces — Randomly generated ASCII characters, one of the first fully onchain NFTs on Ethereum (0.027 ETH)
- Avastars — Another one of the first onchain NFT collections, it pioneered the onchain traits bank system (0.01 ETH)
- CyberBrokers — Created by Josie Bellini, these cyberpunk characters used a similar traits bank design to Avastars (0.125 ETH)
- 1337 Skulls — A fully onchain CC0 free mint collection (0.03 ETH)
- CrypToadz — An iconic collection by Gremplin that was later brought fully onchain after originally launching in 2021 (0.75 ETH)
- Nouns — Generated and auctioned daily, these NFTs offer membership to the experimental headless brand Nouns DAO (3.7 ETH)
- OnChainMonkey — One of the first onchain generative 10k PFP collections, this series now has pieces on both Ethereum and Bitcoin via burns (0.63 ETH)
- Moonbirds — Like CryptoPunks, this collection was later retroactively brought fully onchain (0.57 ETH)
- The Bold Ones — A collection of characters filled with references to other NFTs (0.006 ETH)
- Scapes — These aren’t PFPs but rather onchain backgrounds for your social media accounts (0.044 ETH)
🎨 Cryptoart
If you’re more of an art collector type, there are plenty of iconic onchain pieces to consider. Some of my favorite series here are as follows.
- Brotchain — A generative art collection, the first to generate and render bitmaps entirely onchain (0.39 ETH)
- byteGANs — A fully onchain version of Pindar Van Arman’s bitGANs series (0.37 ETH)
- Checks — The series by Jack Butcher and the Visualize Value team that caused a sensation in 2023 (0.37 ETH)
- GOLD — A dynamic art collection by James Bloom released in collaboration with Fingerprints DAO (0.24 ETH)
- First First NFTs — A series of generative texts satirizing the 2021 NFT market (0.05 ETH)
- LITTLE BLOCK MACHINE — A generative dynamic art system created by the artist Sten (0.028 ETH)
- Little Lyell Machines — Another series by Sten featuring generative rubble (0.115 ETH)
- the_coin — A data-based visualization of Bitcoin’s history by Takens Theorem (none listed!)
🎴 Hypersculptures
My favorite style of onchain NFTs personally. Hyperstructures are open, programmatic sculptures that serve as artworks and creative infrastructure simultaneously.
- Terraforms — The most artistically significant onchain NFT collection to date in my opinion, regarded as the seminal work in the field of hyperstructures (0.86 ETH)
- Chaos Roads — Created by Chainleft, this is an EVM-generated collection that evolves and where each piece is an artwork, poem, and song simultaneously (0.22 ETH)
- Perfect Imitations — Created by Proportio, this is a series of 180 dynamic canvases that can lead to endlessly unique paintings (0.05 ETH)
- Cycles — The first release by the Material Protocol Arts studio, this upcoming work is an onchain kinetic sculpture being released through private sales (not launched yet!)
🔮 Dom
Dom Hofmann, a founder of Vine, Sup, and beyond, left a huge mark on the onchain NFT space in 2021 with a series of groundbreaking projects. Here are some of the main standouts.
- Corruption(s*) — Launched stealthily during the 2021 NFT bull run, Corruption(s*) is an avant-garde cryptoart project featuring textual portals that evolve over time based on their “Insight” trait (0.027 ETH)
- Loot — A collection of minimalist, CC0 text-based “loot bags” containing randomized gear descriptions that has since spawned a large ecosystem of direct and indirect derivative projects, including Realms World (0.17 ETH)
- Blitmap — A CC0 art collection that involved a unique, customizable minting flow and contributions from a series of notable pixel artists, it’s since led to the creation of the Blitmap sci-fi universe featuring Blitnauts and Logos (0.49 ETH)
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