Global NFT sales fell 15.28% to 37.54 million USD over the latest seven-day period, even as the number of buyer and seller addresses more than doubled, according to CryptoSlam data captured on September 19.
The decline marks another weak week for the NFT market, which has now seen volumes contract from roughly 44.31 million USD the prior week. Yet the headline number hides a striking divergence beneath the surface: participation is surging while value continues to bleed out.
Buyer addresses up 174% as sales slide
Buyer addresses increased 174.04% to 114,977 over the week, while seller addresses rose 151.72% to 108,037. The figures represent blockchain addresses rather than confirmed individual users, so the true number of unique participants may be lower.
Transaction counts moved in the opposite direction, falling 9.08% to 808,432. The combination of more active addresses and fewer transactions shows activity spreading across a larger pool of wallets, each transacting less on average. CryptoSlam’s data alone does not establish whether those wallets belong to new market entrants or existing users cycling across addresses.
The NFT decline occurred alongside a rebound in the wider crypto market. Bitcoin traded near 81,311 USD and Ethereum near 2,647 USD when the data was checked, with total cryptocurrency market capitalization around 2.79 trillion USD according to CoinGecko. The concurrent moves do not establish a direct causal link between the crypto rebound and NFT weakness.
Ethereum leads with 15.3 million USD despite decline
Ethereum remained the leading blockchain for organic NFT sales, generating 15.32 million USD during the week, down 2.66%. Buyer addresses on the network climbed 63.82% to 13,546, and Ethereum recorded 443,802 USD in wash-trading volume, down 52.41%. Including wash activity, total volume reached 15.76 million USD, a 5.44% decline.
Polygon ranked second with 7.09 million USD in organic sales, down 4.88%, with buyer addresses up 91.47% to 26,588. Wash trading played an outsized role on Polygon, where CryptoSlam identified 18.07 million USD in wash volume, lifting the combined total to 25.15 million USD. Organic sales and wash trading are separate measures and should not be added when assessing genuine NFT purchases.
Bitcoin placed third with 4.33 million USD in sales, a steep 53.99% weekly drop, even as buyer addresses climbed 141.29% to 5,441. BNB Chain followed with 2.58 million USD, down 36.26%, though its buyer count surged 384.73% to 10,732, the largest percentage gain among the six leading blockchains.
Base was the only top-five network to post growth, with organic volume up 4.06% to 2.16 million USD and buyer addresses up 253.04% to 2,323. Solana ranked sixth at 1.89 million USD, down 11.08%, on 25,301 buyer addresses, up 164.90%. Together the six networks accounted for roughly 33.36 million USD, nearly 89% of the global total.
Courtyard tops collections for another week
Courtyard on Polygon remained the leading NFT collection with 6.3 million USD in sales, down just 0.93%. The tokenized collectibles marketplace recorded 123,504 transactions, up 21.52%, involving 18,459 buyer addresses and 14,921 seller addresses. Courtyard’s stability amid the broader decline continues a pattern in which physically-backed tokenized collectibles show steadier demand than purely digital art.
Ethereum-based Argonauts ranked second with 2.74 million USD after a 36.91% decline, with transactions down 48.15% to 1,204. Alchemix V3 Transmuter placed third after sales jumped 622.03% to 1.83 million USD, though almost all of that volume came from eight transactions involving four buyers and three sellers. The concentration matters because those tokens appear linked to positions in a decentralized finance protocol rather than conventional artwork, even though CryptoSlam classifies the transfers as NFT sales.
Guild of Guardians Heroes on Immutable zkEVM generated 986,168 USD, up 3.5%, across 689 transactions. Panini America ranked fifth with 893,356 USD, up 19.27%, recording 13,469 transactions while buyer addresses fell 24.18% to 762, providing a direct link to the US sports card segment. Bitcoin-based ATMC BRC-20 NFTs followed with 716,730 USD.
More wallets, less money: what the data suggests
The week’s defining feature is the gap between participation and value. Buyer addresses more than doubling while sales fall 15% suggests the market’s remaining activity is shifting toward low-ticket items, airdrop farming, points programs and gaming assets, rather than the high-value collectible sales that defined previous cycles.
Collections like Courtyard and Panini, both tied to real-world or sports collectibles, holding up better than pure digital-art projects reinforces that shift. Meanwhile, the heavy wash-trading share on Polygon and Base, where non-organic volume rivals or exceeds organic sales, complicates any read of chain-level rankings.
For the NFT sector, the week paints a picture of a market searching for product-market fit: infrastructure and address activity remain healthy, but monetization per participant keeps compressing. Until a new category of high-value use emerges, volume rallies like those of past cycles look increasingly distant, and weekly reports like this one track a slow grind rather than a recovery.
The cryptocurrency market remains highly volatile. This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial or investment advice.
buyer addresses up 174% while sales fall 15% is just airdrop farming with extra steps. 114k wallets, 808k transactions, avg tx under 50 bucks
37.5M for the whole NFT market in a week is bleak compared to 2021, but the doubling of seller addresses suggests people are still trying to exit, not accumulate.
seller count rising while volume falls reads like listings with no bids tbh. people want out at any price and the tape says nobody is catching
the addresses are wallets not people tho, could be the same farmers churning fresh wallets. cryptoSlam counting them as buyers is generous
genuinely curious how many of those 114k wallets only bought in to qualify for some marketplace points program. feels like every collection is running an airdrop farm now
the 808k transactions at sub-50 dollar averages basically confirm it. no real collector needs a thousand tiny buys across fresh wallets
^ this. And the article itself admits activity is spreading across more wallets transacting less each. That is fragmentation, not demand.
volumes down 15% but buyer addresses up 174%? thats airdrop farmers cycling wallets, not a revival
agreed, more participants means nothing when they are addresses not people. CryptoSlam even admits that in the fine print
37.5 million for the ENTIRE nft market in a week. we did that in an hour back in 2021. ETH leading anyway lol
hard agree, a single bored ape collection was doing 100M+ weeks in 2021. 37.5M for the entire market and eth gets called the leader for it lol
eth leading at 37.5m weekly feels like being the tallest player in a middling division. the 2021 peak did these numbers before lunch