So, You Want To Buy An NFT? Here's How To Do It

By now, you are probably more than aware of the craze, neigh, monomania surrounding NFTs. It seems like everyone, from artists to celebrities to even presidents, are dipping their mitts into this unusual, yet incredibly lucrative business venture. NFTs not only help secure creators funding for their projects, but they also revolutionize the way we think about art and ownership. And, in this article, we are going to tell you how to buy, sell, and create your own NFTs.

What is an NFT? 

You might've heard the term "NFT" before, which refers to a non-fungible token. What does any of this mean? Well, for starters, non-fungible simply means something that can't be replaced. So, all put together, this just means a digital token (often an image or video or tweet) that can't be replicated and is entirely unique. Even if someone has a copy of your NFT token, they don't actually possess the original that has all of the value. Think of a photo of the Mona Lisa vs owning the Mona Lisa. 

NFTs came about in 2012 when a bunch of artists started using "colored coins" to represent actual existing assets via crypto blockchains as a stand-in for ownership of an object. The first actual NFT as we know it today came from a man named Kevin McCoy on May 3rd, 2014, with his first NFT "quantum." It wouldn't be until 2020-2021 that the NFT fad exploded into an international success, with millions of people buying, trading, and minting their own tokens on the marketplace.

Buying NFTs 

So you wanna buy an NFT, huh? Then you’ve come to the right article and honestly, it's easier than you think. If you can tie your shoes, you can buy a non-fungible token. First thing is deciding on which NFT market you are going to use for your shopping. There are a good bit of options out there, like NonFungible and Binance, though the most popular at the moment seems to be Opeansea, which has plenty of NFTs available to buy at different price levels.

Now that you've picked a market, the next step would be to get an ethereum wallet, so that you can actually buy NFTs. An ethereum wallet is basically like your real life money wallet, only this allows you to purchase and use ethereum for blockchain based purchases like NFTs. You can get a crypto wallet at the ethereum website or another third-party developer like Metamask and Coinbase. All of these applications can be used on both browser and mobile.

Once you have your wallet and have made your wallet account, you can then buy your NFT. For OpenSea, this is as simple as clicking either "buy bundle" or "make an offer," depending on if there are current competing offers or not, similar to how Ebay's offer system works. When buying NFTs, be aware of gas fees, which are applied whenever buying or selling an NFT.

Creating NFTs

Creating NFTs is just as easy as buying them. You can do this on the same websites where you would buy them. For OpenSea, it will be under the "create" tab, which then leads you to a page where you can fill out the details of your NFT, along with the ability to upload photos of it, determine how many can be minted, and much more. Minting fees (gas fees) will apply when creating any new NFT, so be aware of this.