NFTs fundamentally changed how we perceive digital art, collectibles and ownership.
By enabling verifiable digital ownership for unique digital assets, NFTs have become a multi-billion-dollar industry that has led to digital art sales with price tags that match those of high-profile sales in the traditional art market.
In this article, you’ll discover the top ten most expensive NFTs ever sold (as of time of writing).
In the list of most expensive NFT sales ever, you’ll find a mix of unique digital art and PFPs, which highlights how diverse crypto art culture has become.
The Merge is an NFT by pseudonymous digital artist Pak, which sold for $91.8 million on the NFT marketplace on Nifty Gateway in December 2021.
It was a dynamic digital artwork that collectors bought in units called “masses.” The more masses they had, the larger their own, unique The Merge NFT would grow. For this reason, this NFT remains controversial, as people disagree on whether it was actually a single NFT or a collection.
Either way, The Merge remains the biggest NFT sale in history.
Everydays: the First 5000 Days is an NFT artwork created by digital artist and animator Mike Winkelmann, known professionally as Beeple. It sold for $69.3 million at auction house Christie's in March 2021, making it the most expensive NFT sale of its time.
On May 1, 2007, Beeple decided to create daily works of art and post them online. As the name implies, Everydays: The First 5000 Days is made up of 5000 of these digital images, spanning over 13 years and arranged in loose chronological order.
Clock is another one of Pak’s NFTs; it sold for $52.7 million in February 2022, with the proceeds used to support funding for Julian Assange's legal defense.
The artwork logged the number of days that Assange had spent imprisoned and is part of a collection called Censored, created by Pak and Assange. After Assange was freed in June 2024, the collection became a case study of how NFT art can help redefine activism.
Another widely acclaimed piece of art by Beeple, HUMAN ONE is actually both a digital video and a 3D sculpture, and its linked NFT sold for almost $29 million in November 2021.
The dynamic video sculpture changes over time and allows Beeple to alter it remotely. It shows an explorer walking through different landscapes that can look like our world, imagined fantasy worlds, or whatever strikes Beeple’s fancy. It’s in motion 24/7, and clues hidden within the artwork can help you unlock new NFTs.
CryptoPunks are a popular collection of 10,000 NFTs on the Ethereum blockchain, and #5822 sold for $23.7 million in February 2022.
This is one of the rarest CryptoPunks available: it’s an alien with a blue bandana - both very rare features in the collection. There are only nine alien CryptoPunks, and its blue bandana is the only distinguishable feature.
CryptoPunks are one of the most influential NFT collections for a reason: #7523 sold for $11.75 million at a Sotheby’s auction in June 2021.
Like #5822, it’s another blue alien, but aside from its hat, it has an earring and wears a very rare medical mask. The mask was especially interesting in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic at the time of the sale, and #7523 is the only alien CryptoPunk wearing one.
TPunks are often known as the “Tron version” of the CryptoPunks collection since they were inspired by the Ethereum-native NFT collection. The #3442 sold for $10.5 million in August 2021, and was especially notable for the fact that it was purchased by Justin Sun, the founder of Tron.
This TPunk looks a lot like the Joker, so the pop-culture reference is another factor in its popularity. Later, Sun donated the NFT to APENFT, a Tron project promoting NFTs. It’s still the most expensive NFT ever sold on the Tron blockchain.
Back to the CryptoPunk collection, another prominent example is #4156, which sold for $10.26 million in December 2021.
Represented by an ape with a blue bandana, it’s another extremely rare CryptoPunk, since the collection has only 24 apes. It was actually first owned by an investor known as 4156 – the same number as the NFT – but he stated that he sold it for this amount (record-breaking at the time) due to the restrictive NFT license.
CryptoPunk aliens go for huge prices, and #3100 is no exception: it sold for $7.67 million in March 2021.
Aside from being an alien – as rare as that is – #3100 only wears a white headband and has no other notable attributes. The headband is shared among only 406 Punks total, so the high rarity is one of its most desirable features.
Finally, CryptoPunk #7804 sold for $7.6 million in March 2021.
This CryptoPunk is another alien, wearing a cap, sunglasses, and a pipe. You’d think a cap and sunglasses don’t necessarily go together, but hey, the market wants what it wants. All of its characteristics are pretty rare, making it a great catch.
If you’re interested in discovering more NFTs from different collections, Magic Eden is the best place to start. Here, you can filter by collection, floor price, rarity, trading volume and more. Check out purpose built marketplaces for Solana, Ethereum, Bitcoin Ordinals and more.
Visit the Magic Eden marketplace now to start trading NFTs.
Without taking account their personal wealth unreleated to NFTs, Pak has made the money selling NFTs of his artwork. The Merge and The Clock combined, which make up numbers 1 and 3 on our list, made up $144.5 million.
The most successful NFT in terms of value at sale is The Merge by Pak, which fetched $91.8 million at the time. But if you’re measuring success by popularity, then collections like CryptoPunks, Pudgy Penguins, and Bored Apes would be at the forefront, since they’ve become household names.
NFTs are expensive because they are unique. Nobody can have the exact same NFT as you. Additionally, attributes setting them apart from others in their collection can increase their rarity, making people willing to pay even more for them.
Over the last month, the top 10 collections by trading volume are Courtyard, CryptoPunks, Pudgy Penguins, Doodles, Bored Ape Yacht Club, Lil Pudgy's, Mutant Ape Yacht Club, SMB Gen2, Frogana, and Taproot Wizards.
You can see a live list of the top NFTs here.
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