Understanding Arbitrum NFTs

Truthfully, I first bought NFTs on Arbitrum on a whim. I thought I had an interview for a marketing position there and I wanted to get familiar with their ecosystem before I chatted with them.

Spoiler: I didn’t get the job or even interview for the correct position

However, the experience of buying NFTs on a L2 was good experience for me, especially with the emergence of Base recently.

Arbitrum is a popular L2 that uses “roll-ups” to reduce gas costs and congestion on mainnet ETH…and for that reason, your eyes may have already glazed over.

But hear me out. the effectiveness of roll-ups *could* be the future of NFTs. That’s because no one wants to spend ten dollars…let alone hundreds or thousands…on gas fees. That’s what has made Solana NFTs so popular despite the network intermittently just going down…it’s quick and cheap.

As NFTs scale, this has become an important topic, and Arbitrum NFTs, much like other L2s have the advantage of having quick transactions and cheap ones too.

However, does that make them work in the long-term? I’ll dive in.

Getting Started: Buying Arbitrum NFTs

To begin, you will need an Ethereum wallet. If you do not have one, I would suggest MetaMask or Rainbow wallet.

In order to purchase an Arbitrum NFT, you'll first need to undergo a swapping process. That’s because you’ll need the Arbitrum token in order to purchase in the native currency. To do this, you’ll need to use the Arbitrum Bridge. Previously, you often had to convert to a coin like $MAGIC on Uniswap or Sushiswap if you wanted to buy a SmolBrains, for example. However, Arbitrum NFTs are now available on OpenSea and other marketplaces. This means you can keep everything in ETH after it's converted on the bridge.

Next, you'll simply need to add Arbitrum to your Metamask wallet. To do so, just click on 'add network' and input the following criteria (or OpenSea can even handle this for you):

• Network Name: Arbitrum
• New RPC URL: https://arb1.arbitrum.io/rpc
• Chain ID: 42161
• Currency Symbol: ETH
• Block Explorer URL: https://arbiscan.io/

Once that's done, return to your Ethereum Mainnet wallet and open up the bridge. Convert the total ETH you desire into Arbitrum. The bridge transaction requires 2 signatures and took me about 10 minutes in total.

It's not exactly lightning fast (it took me about 10 minutes to bridge my Ethereum), but once it's done, you just need to switch back to the Arbitrum network in Metamask... and you're all set to explore the world of Arbitrum NFTs.

I went on OpenSea and bought some ‘Government Toucans’ (see above) mostly because they were cheap and your boy loves toucans.

The most popular and historic project on Arbitrum is SmolBrains which is on a token called $MAGIC. You can swap $ARB for  $MAGIC on Uniswap or you can buy them with your bridged $ARB on OpenSea.

Smol Brains are one of the first dynamic NFTs and you’ll find that it’s revolutionary irregardless of the chain that it’s on. That means it’s certainly worth a look!

It’s up to you though now. What you buy on Arbitrum is your choice, but you’ll see that there is a thriving and cool ecosystem of NFTs already on there.

Give it a try and let me know what you think!