NFTs are taking the world by storm, but high prices can make them inaccessible to many. Many crypto users are exploring cheaper NFT opportunities, especially the prospect of scoring free NFTs.
In this guide, we'll discuss the concept of NFTs and common ways to get them for free.
You'll have multiple options to try and score NFTs free of charge, including playing play-to-earn NFT games and participating in giveaway campaigns.
To promote new launches and grow engagement quickly, NFT projects and influencers often conduct free NFT giveaways on social media platforms such as Discord, Twitter, Telegram and Reddit.
You're typically required to complete a series of simple tasks like following the project's social media channels, dropping a comment and tagging your friends to earn the NFT.
The best way to find free or discounted mints would be to get active in the NFT community. Do this when you:
If you're new to the NFT space, start by searching hashtags or terms related to NFTs on Twitter and look out for active giveaways. Stay vigilant by checking for legitimacy before participating.
A whitelist is a list of verified individuals, programs or crypto wallet addresses that are pre-approved to be sent a token or coin. For NFT giveaways, the whitelist is typically randomly generated from current users, or may be reserved for early adopters of a project.
NFT airdrops are when crypto projects distribute free NFTs directly into users' wallets. They're sometimes included with token launches to incentivise early adopters.
For example, companies may airdrop free NFTs periodically to wallets holding a set amount of the native tokens without selling them, over a specific period.
Like airdrops and giveaways, NFT projects may also offer limited free mints to garner interest.
Giving out free mints doesn't cost a project team anything since users have to cover the gas fees required to mint the piece to the blockchain.
Some blockchains may have higher gas fees than others — for example, gas fees on Ethereum may be more than $100 due to network congestion.
If you're looking to pad out your wallet with NFTs, consider creating NFTs yourself. This means you'll be the project owner of your own NFT collection, mint any amount of cool or weird designs, and send them to anyone you like.
For starters, your creation has to be minted on the blockchain and verified as a nonfungible token to be considered an NFT.
Some NFT wallets impose a basic fee between US$70 and US$120 to mint your NFT, but top NFT marketplaces like OpenSea, Mintable, and Rarible offer free mints.
However, the slight caveat here is that you'll almost always have to pay a gas fee to mint your NFTs, even on low-fee blockchains like Polygon or Solana. This nominal fee is used to pay network miners to hash the transaction and record it to the digital ledger.
Explore NFT minting in more detail
New blockchain games without a huge player base often give out free NFTs to incentivise players to join their P2E game ecosystem.
Here are common ways to get NFTs from P2E games:
Businesses can use NFT projects as a Marketing campaign to get off the ground and promote their products. And giving out freebies is one of the best ways to do so.
As such, NFT projects often announce free NFT giveaways and airdrops to gain a quick following, while collectors can benefit from free NFTs or tokens that may prove valuable in the future.
Airdrops usually don't have any out-of-pocket costs since they are sent directly to your crypto wallet. However, free mints require gas fees, which can range anywhere from cents to hundreds of dollars depending on the blockchain. So even if the NFT itself costs you nothing, you may have to fork out gas fees to get them into your wallet.
NFTs — whether you shell out good money for it, or get it free — are highly speculative assets.
Their demand and value depend on a myriad of factors, ranging from the project's success to the collective effort from its community. It's also possible that a free NFT may not be worth anything if the project doesn't take off.
But opportunities do exist — in fact, the highly sought-after Cryptopunks collection was given out for free to anyone with an Ethereum wallet back in 2017. As of February, 2022, the floor price for Cryptopunk is 66.95 ETH (US$208,003).
Wherever there's crypto, there are giveaway or airdrop scams.
Scammers often lure crypto enthusiasts through brand impersonation (e.g. posing as employees from famous NFT projects or marketplaces), offering free tokens, NFTs, whitelist and other giveaway campaigns via social media. Some even pose as fake tech support to phish for the private keys to your wallet.
If it's too good to be true, it probably is. So always DYOR — do your own research.
Read our complete guide on NFT scams
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