Coinbase NFT Pauses Creator Drops, Insists Marketplace Is Not Shutting Down

In case you forgot, Coinbase still has an NFT marketplace—and it’s still not doing very well.

Coinbase NFT announced on Wednesday that it is “pausing” future NFT drops, but specified that it is not shuttering its marketplace completely.

“We are pausing creator Drops on the NFT marketplace to focus on other features and tools that creators have asked for,” Coinbase NFT said on Twitter.

We recently shared that we are pausing creator Drops on the NFT marketplace to focus on other features and tools that creators have asked for.

To be clear: We are not shutting down the Coinbase NFT marketplace.
— Coinbase NFT (@Coinbase_NFT) February 1, 2023

“We believe that ultimately these changes will bring increased focus and efficiency to the Coinbase NFT team’s ability to build an enduring product that best serves the community in the long-term,” a Coinbase spokesperson told Decrypt via email. “Our mission for Coinbase NFT remains unchanged and we remain optimistic about our future as we continue building.”

It’s unclear exactly why Coinbase NFT has to stop launches with creators in order to launch other features. It could be possibly due to a shortage of staff, as Coinbase—like many other crypto firms—has continued to lay off employees over the past year. Just last month, Coinbase said it was laying off another 950 members of its staff.

When asked why it was unable to do creator drops and build new features simultaneously, Coinbase told Decrypt that “The Coinbase NFT team realigned its resources to focus on the highest impact areas for our users.”

Its Chief Product Officer Surojit Chatterjee also stepped away from the company just six months after Coinbase NFT’s lackluster launch.

Since that launch in the spring of 2022, Coinbase NFT continued to release new features for its marketplace in an effort to attract new users, such as a bulk manage tool, rarity filters, and time-delayed listings.

But according to a Dune Analytics dashboard, its efforts have not been very fruitful, as the marketplace has seen just $106 in total volume traded in the past 24 hours.

Since its launch last year, Coinbase NFT has seen roughly $7.34 million in all-time total volume traded. To put that in perspective, rival marketplace OpenSea saw over $11.3 million in total volume traded in Ethereum NFTs just yesterday alone.

The most single-day volume Coinbase NFT has seen so far was back in early September, when it saw just 447 ETH of total volume traded, which is approximately $735,315.

Coinbase’s NFT marketplace has continued to draw criticism from Twitter users, who cracked jokes about the marketplace’s small user base in response to its announcement that it would be pausing creator drops.

“The seven people who use your platform were worried,” borovik.eth joked.