Magic Eden Launches Marketplace For Bitcoin Ordinals, Enabling On-Chain Storage Of Media Without Smart Contracts

Crypto Metaverse
4 min readMar 22, 2023

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Magic Eden, one of the largest cross-chain NFT platforms, has launched a new marketplace for Bitcoin Ordinals, a breakthrough project on Bitcoin’s blockchain that enables on-chain storage of media without the use of smart contracts. This development suggests that Ordinals tooling and infrastructure are spinning up quickly, and multi-chain moves are becoming increasingly popular among NFT marketplaces.

Key Highlights

  • The marketplace will integrate with two noncustodial crypto wallets, Hiro and Xverse, to allow users to process transactions.
  • The Ordinals marketplace launched with over 70 collections, and for its initial beta launch, Magic Eden selected 13 collections to partner with, including Taproot Wizards, Inscribed Pepes, and Bitcoin Bandits.
  • Magic Eden plans to focus on security and transparency while leveraging its brand, so people can feel safe when trading their Ordinals.
  • The marketplace uses partially signed Bitcoin transactions to enable permissionless swaps, rather than smart contracts, and there is currently no royalty support for the marketplace. However, Magic Eden is actively looking into the development of an on-chain, permissionless royalty standard.
  • Interest from creators will dictate the future direction for Magic Eden’s Bitcoin marketplace, and the limitations of the protocol suggest that it’s a better fit for some types of on-chain assets, like limited edition artwork, than others, such as large-scale video game NFT collections.

Bitcoin Ordinals are a relatively new breakthrough for Bitcoin, and their growth has been significant since the first one was inscribed in December. The total number of inscriptions surged from 679 to 240,000 between February 1 and March 1, according to data from Dune Analytics. Inscribing digital artifacts on Bitcoin provides a different value proposition than some other NFT chains, as it stays on every node forever, even if the apocalypse hits. The subsector is still discovering its product-market fit, but the growth of Bitcoin NFTs indicates that there is a market for people who want to own true digital artifacts or collectibles.

Magic Eden’s move to support Bitcoin Ordinals is a significant development in the NFT space. As a non-custodial marketplace, Magic Eden never takes control of assets being traded, and its Ordinals marketplace experience will be similar to what users experience on its platform. The marketplace launched with over 70 collections, and for its initial beta launch of the Bitcoin Marketplace, Magic Eden selected 13 collections to partner with, including Taproot Wizards, Inscribed Pepes, and Bitcoin Bandits, to name a few. While the Ordinals marketplace is currently focused on secondary market sales, Magic Eden already has plans to expand its offerings.

Magic Eden plans to offer future tools for minting (or inscribing) digital assets onto the Bitcoin blockchain. It is still unclear whether that will take the form of a minting launchpad or auctions. Nonetheless, Magic Eden’s focus on security and transparency, while leveraging its brand, will make the space more accessible and safer for nonprofessional users. The possibilities are endless, and we can’t wait to see what other developments the world of NFTs will bring in the future.

Magic Eden’s move to support Bitcoin Ordinals is a significant development in the NFT space. The Bitcoin marketplace for digital artifacts is still discovering its product-market fit, but the growth of Bitcoin NFTs indicates that there is a market for people who want to own true digital artifacts or collectibles. With Magic Eden’s focus on security and transparency, while leveraging its brand, the space will be more accessible and safer for nonprofessional users. As the possibilities are endless, we recommend keeping an eye on the developments in the world of NFTs, and how they can fit into your investment portfolio.

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FAQs

What is magic eden?

Magic Eden facilitates decentralized peer-to-peer trading of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and is a top-tier platform for users to create, list, and trade these unique digital assets. Although initially designed for the Solana blockchain, Magic Eden has expanded its services to include Ethereum, Bitcoin and Polygon support.

What happened with Magic Eden?

On January 5th, Magic Eden disclosed that an exploit resulted in the sale of 13 fraudulent NFTs across five collections, transacted 27 times and totaling approximately 1,100 Solana (SOL), worth almost $15,000. The two affected collections were the popular and high-priced Solana-based projects ABC and y00ts.

Who is the CEO of Magic Eden?

Jack Lu

Who pays fees on Magic Eden?

Creator royalties refer to the fees charged by NFT project creators, usually by the seller, during NFT trades. Typically, these fees range from 5% to 10% of the sale price, and the funds are deposited into a digital wallet controlled by the NFT project’s creators.

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