Best NFT Projects to Follow

With the metaverse boom, many people are expecting the NFTs to take over the digital world in the coming future. As stated in a survey by blockchain specialist site Chainalysis, cryptocurrencies worth more than $44.2 billion were spent in 2021 on NFTs alone.

As more people are becoming aware of the earnings that investing in NFTs open doors to, their popularity continues to rise in 2024. Many artists are putting out their best works as NFTs to get recognized and rewarded. In the same way, buyers too have been trying to find those projects that could provide the most value to their investment portfolio. In this guide we’ll review the best NFT projects that could return a high ROI.

Top NFT Projects to Watch

While all the projects mentioned are being widely embraced by the NFT community, they differ from each other hugely. The time of launching, use-case if any, platform traded on or blockchain used etc can vary from project to project. In this guide we will review these top NFT projects and categorize them into current, new and upcoming.

Best NFT Projects

Our recommendations for the best NFT projects to invest in starts with a project currently on presale now, followed by a new NFT project launched in 2024:

Milady Maker

With its collection of 10,000 generative PFP-NFTs inspired by neo-chibi aesthetics and street-style tribes, Milady Maker is one of the top NFT collections on the market.

The anime-like aesthetic of the project speaks of its cultural influence, and the unique utility holders of Milady Maker NFTs gain access to speak of its ubiquity in the NFT space.

Those who get their hands on the Milady Maker NFT collection from OpenSea will be eligible for a host of perks. These include access to bootleg markets with merch made from commissioned knockoffs, raves, parties, and more.

One of the more digi-centric utilities of this project is the Milady VRTube, which allows users to use their MiLady Maker NFTs as 2D avatars during streaming. It is done in collaboration with Hologram Labs using the Hologram app.

The other utility within the virtual space is the metaverse. A Minecraft server was created specifically for the Milady Maker community. Here, they can trade lands and assets, explore, and create. While the assets themselves aren’t necessarily decentralized, they are NFT-gated.

Milady Maker’s user-centric approach, which focuses heavily on community, is why it is one of the top-rated NFTs of 2024.

Froganas

One of the more community-centric NFTs that have come out in 2024 is Froganas. Designed by renowned artist Tee, Froganas is a collection of 5555 NFTs featuring anthropomorphic frogs with unique traits and scarcity levels.

The lore of Froganas makes them akin to the Ninja Turtles, in which exposure to chemicals gave many frogs a human-level intellect.

Froganas arrived as an airdrop in the early days of March 2024. Shortly after, it went live on Uniswap. Even though this NFT collection does not have a dedicated website, its Twitter and Discord following is exceptional, with people sharing memes and their own Froganas online.

Also, in terms of utility, according to its creator, Froganas’ main focus is just art.

Being a Solana-based NFT, Froganas is currently live on Magic Eden.

DeGods

With its stylistic artwork that focuses on incorporating all the cultural aspects of the current ecosystem into transcending standard artworks, DeGods is a project that focuses on art style as well as utilities.

Dubbed as the #1 NFT community on the internet, DeGods is a multi-chain NFT collection of 8982 NFTs with varying traits for background, clothes, eyes, head, mouth, neck, skin, and more.

The project’s aesthetic appeal aside, DeGods also has staking, which rewards users with DePoints. The platform also has multiple clubs that holders can join to engage with various communities. Events are organized, and there are also branding opportunities within this space.

Available on Magic Eden as well as OpenSeas, DeGods has a floor price of 1.74 ETH at press time.

Pudgy Penguins

Pudgy Penguins is a unqiue NFT collection of 8,888 penguins with proof of ownership on the Ethereum blockchain.

With simplified artworks that can be described as cute, Pudgy Penguins emerged as one of the most resilient NFTs on the market, thanks to their unique attributes and a bolstering community.

Producing everything from content, merchandise, toys, and digital collectibles, Pudgy Penguins has an impressive collection of GIFs and physical artwork.

The project’s physical collection can be found in winterwear, which is currently running. Other collectibles offered by the Pudgy Penguisn ecosystem include plushies with unique traits. That said, these plushies can also be bought using fiat, indicating Pudgy Penguin’s disposition to bring Web2 and Web3 space together.

Lil Pudgys

Even though Pudgy Penguins are one of the top NFTs in the market in their own right, Lil Pudgys have also emerged as suitable candidates within the NFT space.

Initially introduced as an NFT drop—which is still running—to eligible Pudgy Penguins holders, Lil Pudgy is now available to purchase on OpenSea.

Lil Pudgys is a collection of 22,222 Pudgys. They have some of the same aesthetics as Pudgy Penguins, except for the fact that they are smaller and rowdier. The official website describes their attitudes as warrior-like, trying to fight the negativity caused by the bears on the market.

For now, Lil Pudgys has revealed many utilities outside of being associated with Pudgy Penguins. However, it may be possible that the parent NFT group will integrate these into the physical product marketplace in the future.

CryptoPunks

Created by Co-founders John Watkinson and Matt Hall, the CryptoPunks NFT project launched in June 2017. As one of the first NFT collections to be made that was successful to this extent, the developers tried to showcase the anti-establishment and raucous spirit within the early blockchain era with a punk look.

Created on the Ethereum blockchain, CryptoPunks are 10,000 unique 24X24 size one-of-a-kind pixel heads. While most punks are male and female humans, it also features several other rarer species like apes, aliens and zombies within the collection. These punks come with seven distinguishable features that include a bucktooth, a mole, big beard, cigarette, shades, top hat and earrings. These vary in design.

Larva Labs, the company that introduced CryptoPunks initially gave out 9000 of the NFTs to anyone with a claimable Ethereum wallet and held 1000 as “Dev punks”. However, it wasn’t long before the punks rose to fame and were being traded for massive amounts. An article by Mashable became so popular that it ended up with the available collection being sold out within just 24 hours.

The project has gained much popularity and momentum and has been trading at high prices. CryptoPunk NFTs are also appealing as a means of status or seniority within the NFT or crypto world, seen as one of the coolest NFT projects.

Several famous names have been associating with the project and have been showcasing the NFTs owned by them through their social media, creating an idea of an elite crypto community. The costliest CryptoPunk traded to date is currently CryptoPunk 7523, for a large amount of ethereum worth $11.75 million.

Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC)

An NFT article is incomplete without a mention of these dressed up apes with cool accessories. Created and launched by Yuga Labs in April 2021, the Bored Apes Yacht Club or BAYC had a minting cost of merely 0.08 ETH. One of the co-founders of the project stated that the reason for them choosing apes was referring to slang within the crypto community.

The phrase “to ape in” which means frantically investing money into several projects gave them the idea of basing the project around apes. The team also took inspiration from the then only top NFT project, CryptoPunks.

BAYC consists of 10,000 apes which vary by properties such as facial expressions, fur type, clothing, accessories and more. These properties can be used to understand the rarity of the axis on the Opensea marketplace, the main marketplace for the BAYC. They are costly too, with the costliest being worth $3.4 million- The Bored Ape #8817.

The value of the BAYC has gone up exponentially, and for the right reasons. The high cost of the NFTs brought about a sense of high status amongst the holders. This helped bring in the famous icons which in turn helped BAYC grow in popularity. In January 2022 BAYC hit a 100 ETH floor price.

Big names in the entertainment and sports world like Eminem, Steph Curry, Jimmy Fallon, Post Malone don their Apes on their social media. If this wasn’t enough, Adidas included BAYC as one of the top names in its NFT program, Into the Metaverse. The company also bought an ape of its own.

It gained even more reach as they launched the mutant serum which would allow an owner to mutate their ape. The project has been striving to be more than just an NFT and become an ‘off-chain” brand too. The club announced a P2E game scheduled in 2022 in partnership with Animoca Brands.

Yuga Labs (the creators of BAYC) acquired CryptoPunks and Meebits on March 12th 2022 from Larva Labs, bullish news which saw the floor price of all three NFT collections pump.

Axie Infinity

Created in 2018 by Sky Mavis and co-founded by Trung Nguyen and Aleksander Larsen, Axie Infinity is a blockchain-based battle game that boasts of NFTs called Axies. The game made headlines in 2021 as its game’s native token AXS shot to enormous price levels. But along with them, the value of the characters i.e. Axies also skyrocketed.

The most expensive Axie monster was traded for around 115 ETH at a point. However, the same axie is estimated to be worth over $1.5 million now.

The NFTs in this case isn’t just a piece of art or a collectable, but also a utility within the Axie Infinity Game. Built on the Ethereum chain, the Axies are traded on the Axie Marketplace. One can also trade items or land within the game in the form of NFTs on the marketplace.

Doodles NFTs

Launched on 17th October 2021, Doodles is headed by two very affluent names within the NFT industry. Evan Keast, one of the co-founders has worked for Dapper Labs since 2018. This is the same organization that delivered projects like Cryptokitties and NBA Topshot.

The artist, Scott Martin, a Canadian who created the collection is a fan favourite due to the style he hones and has been receiving much applause from the audience for his simplistic but attractive way of art. The creator has previously worked with Google and Snapchat.

The other co-founder of the platform Jordan Castro has worked at Dapper labs and has been known to lead the Cryptokitties team in development. With an array of professionals like this, Doodles gained immense popularity post-launch. Since then, the number of sales has kept going up with the costliest doodle being sold for 296.69 ETH.

Doodles has managed to go up in the NFT charts despite being launched later than other blue chip NFTs. Along with a multilayer feature and many more to come, these vibrant and clear-line drawings should definitely be on your watchlist.

Art Blocks Curated

Imagine a piece of art being created not by an artist, but by an autonomous system using parameters given by a person. That is exactly what Artblocks is all about. This method of creating beautiful masterpieces is called generative art.

To capture the true essence of digital art is exactly what drove Erick Calderon to continue his hobby more seriously and thus paving way for one of the most sensational NFT projects in the space. As the founder of Artblocks, Erick Calderon sold a lot of his CryptoPunks at meagre rates to fund his project.

The idea of the same concept of profile pic pixel heads being generated didn’t appeal to Erick. He also noticed that since the amount of money earned by creators was massive, there was a huge supply of art that couldn’t even be appreciated.

Thus, Art Blocks Curated was put into effect. This offering among some others that Artblock provides, is the most strictly curated among the collections. An individual is expected to turn in their work where a set of curators will determine whether or not to put up the NFT on Artblock.

Artblock has been embraced by several famous artists which only helps in more visibility. Moreover, as the NFT verse ages, it will look for artworks that can be marvelled at. For an art connoisseur who doesn’t enjoy pixel head jpeg files, Artblock might be the place to be.

Best new NFT projects

These are some projects that have recently garnered much traction and have been performing well. They are currently being minted or are in the news due to their popularity. These NFTs are some of the top picks of the investors with maximum engagement as a community in recent times:

Ghozali Every day

This might be a lot to take in, but it’s true. This 22-year-old boy from Indonesia clicked selfies of himself for around 4 years as a part of a school video. However, Ghozali decided to put them up on the Opensea marketplace with a simple description that read “it’s really a picture of me standing in front of the computer day by day”.

Launched on 9 January 2022, Ghozali initially priced every image of his at $3. Well, the current volume traded as of now stands around 405 ETH with a floor price of 0.11 ETH. While this doesn’t necessarily mean that it might be a project worth investing in as a community or one with much potential, it is one to look out for.

This shows how NFTs might potentially play a role in featuring our entire personality in a virtual world. And for the collectors, the buying opportunity doesn’t have to be wasted since this is, and always will be, the first NFT collection of a real person. That could contribute to eventually rising bids for the collection.

Phanta Bear

Since its launch on 1st January 2022, Phanta Bears have been going viral with partnerships, sales, celebrity backing and much more. Founded by Ezek Club, a digital club based in Asia, the project gained a record number of members in their discord community within just five days.

One of the founders includes a popular Taiwanese performer nicknamed the King of Mandipop Jay Chou. His fashion brand PHANTACi is backing the project.

A Phanta Bear NFT allows the owners access to the exclusive Ezek Club as well as the Matrix World. Matrix world is a metaverse project by Matrix Labs. The roadmap of the Phanta Bear collection boasts an ambitious approach.

With virtual concerts and interactions between the bears as the owners’ personalities within the virtual world, Phanta bears have much planned. The 10,000 NFT collection even had higher sales than BAYC in the past week. This shows the massive growth the project has been seeing.

Azuki NFTs

This anime-feel art collection has been the talk of the town. The traditional look of an NFT collection includes simple lines or animals that have pixel heads. This project, however, is a whole different deal.

The art is nothing short of phenomenal and boasts of a project that is optimized for the metaverse and is built by the community itself. The project offers the owners access to The Garden, a corner of the virtual world where creators meet and collaborate to build a decentralized future.

The project was founded by several partially doxxed(identity revealed) developers. But they include engineers with experience from companies like Facebook. Minting began on 13th January 2022, and the project sold out within minutes.

You will have to get into a third-party marketplace to acquire the NFTs. With a goal of not just being an NFT project, but also a  Metaverse brand in the future, this project built on the Ethereum smart chain will be one to watch out for.

Best Upcoming NFT projects

These projects are some of the most hyped projects in the space right now with extreme community engagement and interest. The projects are yet to be launched and people know that a whitelist spot itself could mean an easy profit. These projects are to be launched in the coming weeks or months.

Dogami

With the dog meme hype quite alive since the early Dogecoin days, NFT creators have tried to incorporate it into their artworks to make a quick buck. However, the lack of anything more than a simple jpeg of a Dog didn’t appeal to the masses.

This is not the case with Dogami. With more than 50,000 members on discord and an impressive 30,000 following on Twitter, Dogami is being embraced by the NFT collectors and other community members already.

Set to launch in January, Dogami is a crypto game that is mobile phone-optimized that features Dog avatars as NFTs. In their metaverse called the “petaverse”, users can collect or trade NFTs, play, earn and socialize. It is built on the Tezos network and boasts of being one of the top AAA crypto games to be introduced. The developers of the project are famous for their work in Marvel, DC comics etc.

With a funding round which ended with Dogami securing around $6 million from top gaming and tech companies like Ubisoft and Animoca Brands, Dogami is being considered as a sure winner as it launched.

Check out our list of the best NFT giveaways for this year.

How to Buy NFTs

Buying NFTs can be a hassle, but there are simpler ways to get it done using exchanges like eToro. Here’s a step by step method to buy Ethereum on eToro and purchase NFTs via platforms like Opensea using it.

• Sign up on the eToro homepage. No referral codes is required. Fill in the details and you are good to go.
• Provide documents needed for profile verification. eToro is a secure platform that prioritizes the safety of the users and makes it mandatory to comply with regulations set by the government. The verification process will begin as soon as you submit the required documents
• Depositing money on eToro is as simple as it gets. You can choose to pay with Credit/Debit Cards, Bank transfers, Online transfers, Rapid transfers, Paypal, Neteller and Skrill. You can deposit a minimum amount of $50

• Ethereum can be bought from a funded wallet easily. Simply search and select ETH from the market results and click on trade.

• The eToro platform gives all the information necessary on the interface itself. Latest research material, order book, candlesticks, indicators and crypto info.

• Once you select the amount of ETH you wish to buy, click on buy and just like that, you are one of the 3.9% people who own cryptocurrency, you are indeed early enough!
• You can also stake any leftover ETH to earn passive income on eToro. To learn about buying NFTs from various marketplaces, read our how to buy NFTs page.

Conclusion

The overall growth of the NFT markets has shown us one thing, it is here to stay. With Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta rebranding, it is obvious that massive chunks of the investing citizenry will adhere to getting into the trending thing if it is trending enough.

But with the way we are seeing technological advancements, it might only be a matter of time till we come around to appreciate digital art as much as we do, the physical form of it. The value of an NFT can only be speculated; but just like any other asset, it too thrives on the number of people ready to invest or indulge.

A portion of people buy and sell NFTs and see value in it, while some laugh it off as a momentary fad. However, it simply has to be taken seriously as we see big names enter the industry. Tech giants like Facebook and Samsung, brands like Adidas, Venture Capital Organizations etc. are showing interest and contributing. With the way they are getting involved and investing, we can be assured that NFTs are here to stay, and for long.

With crypto platforms like eToro.com, buying and selling cryptocurrency is made easier. Getting a reliable wallet to store your coins securely is of importance. eToro is one of the few brokers that have been authorized and regulated by FCA, CySEC & ASIC.

Read more:

• Best upcoming NFT Drops
• Best wallets for NFTs
• How to buy Axie Infinity shards

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