Ranked & Reviewed
Best NFT Marketplaces
NFT venues ranked on total trading cost, royalty handling, real liquidity and protection against approval-based scams.
No money changes hands. This is a non-commercial project: no advertising, no sponsored placements, and no affiliate or referral links. Links to the services below earn us nothing. Every overall score is the plain average of the criteria shown on the page, so you can check the arithmetic yourself — see our rating methodology and how the site is funded.
OpenSea publishes a 1% selling fee included in the displayed price, 10% on primary drop mints and 0% on swaps, handles royalties as enforced or optional per collection, and licenses its Seaport protocol under MIT with a Trail of Bits audit.
Pros
- Selling fee published at 1%, included in the price shown to buyers
- 0% fee on swaps and, currently, on private listings
- Seaport protocol is MIT-licensed
- Audited by Trail of Bits, April to May 2022, stated in the repository
- Verified account badge documented, with a clear caveat that it is not a guarantee
Cons
- Royalty enforcement depends on the collection — enforced for some, optional for others
- The supported-chain list is not stated on the fees page
- The 10% primary-mint fee is high relative to the 1% secondary fee
Rarible charges a mandatory protocol fee paid by both buyer and seller, illustrated at 1%, supports creator royalties, and licenses its protocol contracts under MIT with a ChainSecurity audit of its Exchange v2.
Pros
- Protocol fee documented as mandatory and paid by both sides, with a 1% illustration
- Optional origin fees documented separately, so the fee stack is transparent
- Protocol contracts are MIT-licensed
- Exchange v2 audited by ChainSecurity, stated in the repository
- Royalties documented as payments to the original creator on each sale
Cons
- The exact protocol-fee percentage is shown as an example rather than fixed on the page read
- The supported-blockchain list is referenced but not enumerated on the fees page
- No maximum royalty is stated on the page read
LooksRare charges a 2% total fee — 1.5% to LOOKS stakers and 0.5% to collections that register an address — and states plainly that since its V2 release it no longer enforces creator royalties, sharing protocol fees with creators instead. Its exchange contracts are MIT.
Pros
- 2% total fee published, split 1.5% to stakers and 0.5% to registered collections
- States candidly that V2 no longer enforces royalties
- Shares 25% of protocol fees with creators as the replacement, published
- Exchange v2 contracts are MIT-licensed
Cons
- Creator royalties are removed; buyers can only opt in to pay them
- No named audit firm is stated on the fetched repository page
- The supported chain is not stated on the pages read
Zora publishes a 1% trading fee on creator and pair coins, itemised across six recipients, with a much smaller 0.01% fee on trend coins, and licenses its protocol under MIT. Its model is trading-fee rewards rather than traditional creator royalties.
Pros
- 1% trading fee on creator and pair coins, itemised to the recipient
- Creator receives 0.5% of that 1% — the largest single share, published
- Trend coins carry a far smaller 0.01% total trading fee
- Protocol is MIT-licensed
Cons
- The model is trading-fee rewards, not traditional enforced creator royalties
- No named audit firm is stated; the repository references only a bug bounty
- The supported chain is not stated on the fees page
Tensor publishes a 2% taker fee and 0% maker fee, and enforces full royalties on collections that set them — always paid by the taker, never the maker. It does not publish a contract licence or a named audit on the pages read.
Pros
- Taker fee published at 2%, maker fee at 0%
- Full royalties enforced on collections that require them, and always paid by the taker
- For optional-royalty collections, takers choose none, half or all — stated explicitly
- A clear, seller-friendly fee and royalty structure
Cons
- No contract licence is published on the pages read
- No named audit is stated
- The supported chain is not stated on the fees page
SuperRare publishes a 3% marketplace fee paid by the buyer, an 85/15 primary split between artist and its DAO treasury, and a 10% secondary royalty to the original artist. It does not publish a contract licence or named audit on the pages read.
Pros
- Marketplace fee published at 3%, paid by the buyer
- Primary sale split published: 85% to the artist, 15% to the SuperRare DAO treasury
- Secondary royalty published at 10% to the original artist
- A clear, curation-focused fee model
Cons
- No contract licence is published on the pages read
- No named audit is stated
- The supported chain is not stated on the pages read
- The terms of service are served as a PDF that could not be parsed
Magic Eden charges 0% to list and 2% on all transactions, gives buyers the option to honour creator royalties unless enforced in metadata, and is narrowing to Solana — its support for EVM chains and Bitcoin is ending.
Pros
- Listing fees at 0%, with a flat 2% on all transactions
- Royalties paid immediately after a sale when honoured or enforced in metadata
- A simple, single-figure transaction fee
Cons
- Buyers can opt out of royalties unless they are enforced in the metadata
- Coverage is narrowing: marketplace support for EVM chains and Bitcoin is ending
- No contract licence or named audit is published on the pages read
Blur advertises 0% marketplace fees on its homepage. Beyond that headline, its royalty policy, chain coverage, contract licence and audit record could not be confirmed from a fetched official page.
Pros
- States 0% marketplace fees on the homepage
- A trader-focused marketplace built around zero trading fees
Cons
- The royalty policy could not be confirmed from a fetched official page
- No contract licence or named audit could be verified
- No chain list is stated on the fetched homepage
- Most detail exists only on third-party or blog sources we did not treat as primary
Element states full support for creator royalties, distributing a percentage of each sale back to the creator. Its marketplace fee, chain coverage, contract licence and audit record are not stated on the pages read.
Pros
- States full support for royalties, with a percentage of each sale distributed to the creator
- Documents the royalty mechanism in plain language
Cons
- The marketplace fee is not stated on the fetched features page
- No maximum royalty is stated
- The ElementEx repository showed no LICENSE file
- No named audit and no chain list are stated on the pages read
OKX's NFT marketplace states zero listing fees and contrasts itself with platforms charging upwards of 1%. Its transaction fee, royalty policy, chain coverage, contract licence and audits are not stated on the pages read.
Pros
- States zero listing fees plainly
- Positions itself against platforms charging upwards of 1%
Cons
- No transaction fee percentage is stated on the fetched fees page
- The royalty policy is not stated on the fetched page
- No contract licence, named audit or chain list is published
- It is an exchange-operated marketplace rather than an open-source protocol
At a glance
| Service | Score | Best for |
|---|---|---|
| OpenSea | 7.6 | MIT-licensed and Trail of Bits audited |
| Rarible | 7.2 | MIT-licensed and ChainSecurity audited |
| LooksRare | 5.4 | MIT-licensed, candid about zero royalties |
| Zora | 5.4 | MIT-licensed, itemised trading fee |
| Tensor | 5.2 | Full royalty enforcement, clearly stated |
| SuperRare | 4.6 | Fees and splits published in full |
| Magic Eden | 4.4 | Clear fee, but coverage is narrowing |
| Blur | 2.8 | Zero marketplace fees, thin public documentation |
| Element | 2.6 | Royalty support stated, little else published |
| OKX NFT | 2.2 | Zero listing fees, few published numbers |
How do NFT marketplace fees work?
A marketplace takes a commission on each sale, typically a small percentage, sometimes charged to the buyer and sometimes the seller. Beyond that headline lie the details that shape the real cost: whether creator royalties are enforced or optional, the gas cost of listing and cancelling, and any fee on offers. A marketplace advertising low fees while quietly making royalties optional is shifting economics away from creators, which is a fact worth surfacing rather than a mere technicality.
Enforced, optional or zero royalties?
Creator royalties — a percentage paid to the original creator on each resale — have become a battleground. Some marketplaces enforce them; some make them optional so buyers can opt out; some removed them entirely and share protocol fees with creators instead. None of these is inherently right, but the difference is material to a creator deciding where to mint, and honesty about the policy matters more than the policy itself.
Why buyer safety is a scoring criterion
Most NFT losses come not from broken contracts but from a user signing a malicious approval — a permission that lets a contract move their assets. A marketplace that clearly shows what a signature grants, verifies collections, and offers tooling to review and revoke approvals protects buyers in a way that a bare trading venue does not. Security here is a feature of the interface, not just the contract.
What to check
- Fee transparency: the commission as a figure, including who pays it.
- Royalty policy: whether royalties are enforced, optional or removed, in the marketplace's own words.
- Licence and audits: whether the exchange contracts are published, and audited by a named firm.
- Chain coverage: the networks supported, and whether coverage is expanding or narrowing.
How we score this category
A marketplace is scored on what it costs to trade, how it treats creator royalties, and how well it protects buyers from the approval-based scams common to NFTs. This rubric follows the published fee, the royalty policy in the marketplace's own words, the chains supported and the licence of any published contract — because the difference between an enforced royalty and an optional one is a real one for a creator, and worth stating plainly.
Every service in this ranking is scored 0–10 against the same 5 criteria, each carrying equal weight (20% apiece). The overall score is their plain average, rounded to one decimal place, and each review prints the individual numbers and the arithmetic so you can reproduce the result yourself.
What each criterion covers
- Fee transparency20% of the score
- Whether the marketplace commission is published as a figure, including who pays it and how any split works. A stated percentage beats a claim of low fees with no number.
- Royalty policy20% of the score
- Whether creator royalties are enforced, optional or removed — stated in the marketplace's own words. Honesty about an optional or zero-royalty model scores above vagueness, even where the policy itself is unfavourable to creators.
- Licence & code openness20% of the score
- The licence on the marketplace's published exchange contracts, read from the file. A recognised open-source licence scores highest; no published repository, or a repository with no licence, scores low.
- Chain coverage20% of the score
- The networks the marketplace states it operates on. Where a marketplace is narrowing its coverage, that is scored as the fact it is.
- Verification & audits20% of the score
- Whether the marketplace documents a collection-verification system or scam protection, and whether its contracts are audited by a named firm.
What does not affect a score
Nothing commercial, because there is nothing commercial to affect it. This is a non-commercial project: no advertising, no sponsored placements, and no affiliate or referral links anywhere on the site. Links to the services above earn us nothing, so no provider can buy a score, a rank, or an entry in this list. Where two services finish level, they are listed alphabetically rather than ordered silently.
The process across all categories, including how often we re-check, is set out in our ratings methodology.
Rankings are editorial. Nothing here is financial advice. Editorial policy · How we score · How we're funded.