TL;DR
NFTs (Non-Fungible Tokens) on Solana are unique digital assets stored on-chain, commonly used for art, collectibles, gaming items, and membership passes, with near-zero minting costs.
Solana NFTs are typically SPL tokens with a supply of 1, following Metaplex’s metadata standards. Each NFT has on-chain metadata pointing to off-chain content (images, videos) stored on IPFS, Arweave, or other permanent storage. The Metaplex Token Metadata program handles the standard that wallets and marketplaces use to display NFTs. Minting an NFT on Solana costs ~$0.01, compared to $50-200+ on Ethereum.
Compressed NFTs use Solana’s state compression to store NFT data in Merkle trees, reducing costs by 1000x or more. Minting 1 million cNFTs costs roughly $100 vs $1M+ for standard NFTs. This enables mass-distribution use cases: gaming assets, loyalty points, event tickets, and social badges. The trade-off is that cNFTs require indexers (like Helius) to read the Merkle tree data, adding infrastructure dependency.
Major marketplaces: Tensor (trader-focused with pro tools, AMM pools), Magic Eden (largest by volume, multi-chain), and specialized platforms for specific collections. NFT trading involves floor price watching, rarity analysis, and collection narrative tracking. The Solana NFT market is closely tied to the broader Solana ecosystem momentum.