For people not well-versed in non-fungible tokens (NFTs), it may sound like another fad. Cryptocurrency enthusiasts have a lot of enthusiasm for NFTs, but how do they work in the real world? You’d be forgiven if you admitted that you don’t know what an NFT is.

Frankly, many people don’t, but as with anything in life, many people would rather besmirch something than try to understand it. They perceive it as a threat instead of something they can use to invest in or broaden their horizons.

At the turn of the 21st century, there were only a handful of websites where you could gamble online. Nowadays, it is one of the biggest and fastest-growing sectors in the digital hemisphere. You can play a wide range of casino games and use a variety of payment methods. This includes NFTs, which we will be taking a closer look at today, and casino operators that accept Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies as payment methods.

What are NFTs?

You may have come across NFTs in a number of different ways. For instance, several celebrities minted and sold their NFTs through social media during the bull run of 2021. Admittedly, this isn’t as popular as a couple of years ago due to the sharp decline in cryptocurrency prices. However, they’re still a reliable and innovative way to register unique ownership, typically for digital art pieces.

If you zoom out on the broader spectrum, you can also use NFTs to identify wallets that have registered for a service, and they can be used for gambling too.

As they certify authentic proof of ownership, NFTs cannot be amended. If somebody buys or sells their NFT, the ownership is transferred on the blockchain and verified via the ledger, which records the transaction publicly. It has proven to be a very effective way to prove unique ownership of an asset as there is a proven track record of reliability and security.

You can buy and sell NFTs on several different blockchains. By far, the most popular blockchain for trading NFTs is Ethereum. While Solana and other projects have attempted to muscle in on this multibillion-dollar market, Ethereum remains the number one choice despite its high gas fees.

How do you use an NFT in an online casino?

In the same way, you can use cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin to place a bet, NFTs work similarly. Ultimately, you must connect your wallet where the NFT is stored and confirm that you want to use it as a gambling payment method.

Since NFT is often digital art, it will often be measured by the floor price of the overall collection of the NFT pieces — usually in Ethereum. However, some cryptocurrency casinos will calculate the value via Bitcoin, which is transferable and instantaneous, so there’s no cause for concern.

With cryptocurrency gambling, you can connect your wallet without providing personal or identifiable financial information. If you use a more traditional digital casino, despite their immense levels of security, your personal information and financial details are stored on a server. In the event of a hack or somebody maliciously accessing those details, your information and identity could be compromised.

This isn’t the case with cryptocurrency or NFT gambling. Once you have connected your wallet, you can gamble straight away, and you don’t need to worry about a bank in the middle overseeing the transaction and having you jump through all sorts of hoops just to access your funds.

With NFTs or crypto, you connect your wallet peer-to-peer and start playing your chosen casino game. If you aren’t privy to how NFTs work, just think of it as gambling using a physical piece of art that has value.

Are certain NFTs more popular to use in gambling than others?

We can expand this question a little as there aren’t enough statistics or data showing the most popular NFTs used for gambling. The Bored Ape and Mutant Ape Yacht Club collections are sitting at the top of the tree when it comes to NFTs. The highest-selling Bored Ape was sold for over $3,000,000, and owners of Bored Ape NFTs include celebrities such as Steve Aoki and Snoop Dogg.

However, just because they’re still the most popular NFTs doesn’t mean they were shielded from the cataclysmic crypto downturn in 2022. The floor price for Bored Ape and Mutant Ape NFTs regularly exceeds $50,000, indicating how revered they are in cryptocurrency.

While people do not use Ape Yacht Club NFTs to gamble, given they hold so much intrinsic trading and investment value, it is a good idea to look at some of the lower-priced collections with many NFTs.

NFTs such as Nakamigos, relatively new on the NFT scene, have a floor price of around 0.7 Ethereum, which is roughly $700 to $800. This could be an excellent price for those looking to gamble. Instead of converting the NFT back to Ethereum, they can use it immediately to play their chosen online casino game.

It’s always best to check whether your digital casino accepts a wide range of NFTs or a specific brand. You can purchase NFTs solely for gambling, as some digital asset casinos will offer promo codes and bonuses for the ownership and sale of particular NFTs.

Gamble responsibly

It’s best to research what NFTs are used for gambling and to keep an eye on their price. If they appreciate, you may get more for your buck. Likewise, if the price heads the other way, you could be in for a rude awakening when you finally decide to use it to play your online casino game.

Ensuring you keep an eye on how much money or time you spend gambling is a crucial starting point before you play poker, roulette, blackjack or slot machine games. By keeping the experience as entertaining as possible and not focusing on casino gaming as a source of income, you can fully relax and maximize your NFT casino experience.

Conclusion

Given that it is such an exciting new area of gambling, it’s difficult to say whether NFT gaming will explode in popularity similarly to online casino gaming at the turn of the century. However, cryptocurrency casino gaming is slowly beginning to gather momentum, traction and respect within the gambling sector.

With so much money available for traditional, online casinos, you’d think there will be some pushback if NFT and cryptocurrency casinos begin to surge in popularity. For now, it appears they’re happy for this alternate gambling method to exist on the industry’s fringes, but who knows how it will start to take shape as time progresses?

With so many variables that make NFTs such an attractive proposition as an investment, they won’t be going away anytime soon. On the contrary, if their utility continues growing and other businesses use them alongside the gambling sector, their value could steadily rise.

We may not see the enormous explosion in the price we saw in the 2021 bull run, which led to several NFT sales surpassing $10m, but there could be decent scope for profit for people who hold onto their digital art pieces for long enough.

Cryptocurrency and NFT casino gaming have plenty of positives for consumers and providers. If more people begin to wake up to the possibilities, there could be collections of NFTs designed solely for gambling. As long as the convenience remains, there is plenty of hope and excitement for operators in the cryptocurrency online gaming sector.