Can You Gift An NFT? - nftska.com (2024)

Yes, you can absolutely gift an NFT. Not only that, but gifting an NFT is a great way to introduce someone to the world of NFTs.

NFT Gift Ideas

Before you go about gifting an NFT, you need to choose an NFT for the lucky receiver.

Picking out a present for someone in real life can be difficult, but picking out a gift in the NFT world may be more so, because you have to also consider the receiver's experience with NFTs.

But let’s start with a few NFT gift ideas.

Art NFTs as a Gift

While art is very subjective, if we are talking about NFTs on the Ethereum blockchain, then certain art projects could work very well as gifts.

For this category I would go with the highly reputable, "classics" (or at least as classic as it gets for NFTs).

Gifting an ArtBlocks NFT

Art Blocks was one of the first generative art projects that has achieved critical success in the world outside of NFTs. Anyone who knows anything about NFT art will know Art Blocks.

Art Blocks has what is called a "Curated" collection. These curated pieces tend to have very high prices (some selling for millions of dollars).

While you can find some bargains in the Curated collection, you'll more likely find something suitable for a gift budget from what is called the "Presents" collection (which was formally called "Factory").

OpenSea (the most popular NFT marketplace for secondary sales) has recently made it more difficult to sort between the different Art Blocks collections, so you have a couple of options here to pick out your perfect gift.

Exploring the Art Blocks Website

One option is to go to the "Explore Collections" page on the Art Blocks website.

You'll see a tab called "Presents". Click on that tab to explore NFTs in the Presents collections and then take note of the collection name of ones that catch your eye (which you can then search for later on OpenSea).

Screenshot from the Art Blocks website showing the "Presents" tab

If you are feeling a bit more adventurous, you can even mint an NFT directly from the Art Blocks website.

In the drop down from the top of the page, just select the Status as "Open" and see what is still available to mint.

Select Status > Open to see which NFTs are still available to mint directly from Art Blocks

The advantage of taking this approach is that you can say to the receiver of the gift that there have been no other owners of this particular NFT except you. The disadvantage is that you mint what you mint - the design of the NFT will be randomly generated based on the artist's algorithm for that particular collection.

Exploring Art Blocks on OpenSea

I find it a bit difficult to navigate Art Blocks on OpenSea since they don't clearly mark which pieces are from the "Curated" collection and which are from the "Presents" collection (formally called "Factory").

But if you are looking for something budget friendly for a gift, here is what you can do.

Click on "see all items" from the Explore Art Blocks on OpenSea.

Click on "See All Items" from the Art Blocks page on OpenSea

Once you are viewing all the items, you can then just sort "Price low to high". Most of the lower priced pieces will be from the Presents/Factory collection.

Sort Prices low to high on OpenSea

You might get a bit overwhelmed by all the choices, but just take you time and look for things that strike you as interesting and might make a nice gift.

I own several pieces from the Presents/Factory collection, including a few from a collection called "Flowers by RVig", which I think make great gifts as they are both aesthetically pleasing as well as not particularly expensive (at the time of this writing, November 2022, the lowest cost Flower was listed for approximately .075 ETH - about $85 USD).

Flowers by RVig from my personal collection

NFTs Gifts that are Kid Friendly

So high-end art probably won’t go over very well with the kids, but there are some kid friendly type projects out there that might be better suited for the little ones.

CryptoKitties

Everyone thinks cats are cute, right?

So what better than a classic NFT - CryptoKitties.

Most CryptoKitties NFTs are actually quite cheap since there are so many of them (there are literally millions of them). Only certain rares (such as older generations with rare traits) are actually expensive.

You can browse CryptoKitties on OpenSea and pick one up for a few dollars.

Please note, this guidance is just for a gift, not as investment advice. There is a reason why most CryptoKitties have a low price - most are not rare. That is not to say they don't have value - but an investor should be much more judicious in choosing such an NFT. So my advice here is just to have some fun, choose something low cost, and don't worry about trying to find something that will gain in value.

AlphaBetty Doodles

AlphaBetty NFTs might also make a nice gift for a small child.

AlphaBetty Doodles describe themselves as follows:

"AlphaBetty Doodles is a vibrant character who helps children go through the alphabet in colorful style. She was created to bring fun into learning the alphabet, and brought into the NFT world to provide that same experience to young people learning about blockchain technology."

AlphaBetty Doodles gained some traction during the bull market of 2021. Things have cooled down significantly since then. As a result, you can pick up an NFT from this collection for a low price. That said, it is worth noting that the project has remained active during this bear market - which is a good thing.

You can browse AlphaBetty NFTs on OpenSea.

Screenshot taken from the AlphaBetty Doodles website, November 26, 2021

Enter the ETH address to transfer the NFT to the person you are giving the gift

Note: "Quantity" will only appear if you are transferring a certain type of NFT (usually ERC-1155) where there could be multiple of the same NFT as is the case in the screenshot above.

When making the transfer you will be redirected to your wallet to submit the transaction. At this stage you will see the estimated gas fee for the transaction (yes, you do need to pay for gas even for a gift transfer).

After the transfer goes through, you will see a success page on OpenSea.

Success Page on OpenSea. Includes a link to Etherscan.

How to Present Your NFT to the Receiver

While the mechanics of gifting an NFT is pretty simple, the act of actually presenting your NFT to someone might take a bit of thought, especially if the receiver is new to NFTs.

Print the NFT and give it to them in person

If someone is brand new to the world of crypto/NFTs and you are going to meet this person in the real world, then you might want to consider printing out the NFT. That way, you can give them the NFT in person and, at the same time, walk them through the process of setting up a wallet like Metamask.

There are even services out there that will print and physically frame NFTs. I did some googling and found a few of these services, but I haven’t tried any of them, so I hesitate to mention them here (but I will update this article if/when I do try one of these services).

Email/text a link to the NFT and provide them with instructions

If you are not going to see the receiver in person, then you could just email or text them a link to the NFT you bought for them. It doesn’t have the same "surprise" factor that a gift might provide, but it works.

In your follow up (email, Zoom, Skype, etc.), you can walk through the set up of MetaMask, etc. and then make the transfer of the NFT to their wallet.

But I think it is a bad idea to set up a wallet for them.

The reason is that, if you set up the wallet for them, then you would have their seed phrase. If they trust you (well, maybe they do :)), then that might work, but even still, if they are new to NFTs, they might not understand how important it is to keep your seed phrase private.

And keeping your seed phrase private is an important concept to understand in the world of NFTs.

If the receiver has experience with crypto and/or NFTs and you know they have a crypto wallet like Metamask or Trust Wallet, then you still have the issue of getting their wallet address.

Unless you already know it or they have made it public, you’ll just have to ask.

Yes, all of this sounds a bit on the cumbersome side, but remember that we are very early in the development of NFTs, so this is the price we pay for "getting in on the ground floor".

In the future, having a crypto wallet address will become much more commonplace, much like an email address that your friends and family already know. Until that time, we have to jump through some hoops.

Final Thoughts

Gifting an NFT is not only possible, but also a great idea to get new people into the NFT world.

And if you do decide to gift someone that is new to NFTs, just know that you may likely become that person’s "NFT coach" - which is a good thing!

So gift-on my NFT friends (or should I say "frens") and be Belichick-like with your coaching.