Blur: nft marketplaces rating breakdown
Ethereum · pro trading
The venue that won the fee war and rewrote the category’s economics: 0% marketplace fee since launch, and a bidding system that put real, standing capital behind collections rather than waiting for listings — $18.04m sits in its bid pools today. For a trader moving size in blue-chip collections, it is still the most capital-efficient place to work.
The venue that won the fee war and rewrote the category’s economics: 0% marketplace fee since launch, and a bidding system that put real, standing capital behind collections rather than waiting for listings — $18.04m sits in its bid pools today. For a trader moving size in blue-chip collections, it is still the most capital-efficient place to work.
How the score is built
Each criterion is scored 0–10 and weighted. The median column is the middle score across every entry in this ranking, so a row reads as a position rather than a number.
| Criterion | What we measured | Weight | Score | Category median | Rank | Weighted gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| What the venue takes | 0% marketplace fee · published · 2026-08-27 · source | 28% | 10 | 6.5 | 1 of 8 | +0.98 |
| What the creator actually gets | optional, capped at 0.5% creator royalties · published · 2026-08-27 · source | 25% | 3 | 6 | 7 of 8 | -0.75 |
| Is anyone actually trading here? | $18.04m capital in bid pools · sourced · 2026-08-27 · source | 22% | 8 | 5.5 | 2 of 8 | +0.55 |
| Custody and approvals | — | 15% | 6 | 7 | 7 of 8 | -0.15 |
| Chains and collections | — | 10% | 3 | 3.5 | 5 of 8 | -0.05 |
Measured 27 August 2026 · weights and method · decided by what the venue takes, worth +0.98 points against the median
What the venue takes: 10/10
The published marketplace fee, quoted from the venue’s own documentation, alongside thirty days of fees actually collected from public data — because a headline of “0%” and a business that still needs revenue is a combination worth examining. Where a venue charges differently for its own drops or its own chain, that is recorded separately.
Scored 10 of 10 against a category median of 6.5, which places it 1st of 8 among nft marketplaces on this criterion. At a 28% weight that is 0.98 points above the median contribution of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 10, the worst 4.
What the creator actually gets: 3/10
Whether creator royalties are enforced, optional, or capped, per the venue’s own documentation. This is the category’s defining change: royalties used to be enforced by marketplaces as a courtesy, and the fee war ended that almost everywhere. A buyer should know whether the artist is being paid, and a creator should know before they mint.
Scored 3 of 10 against a category median of 6, which places it 7th of 8 among nft marketplaces on this criterion. At a 25% weight that is 0.75 points below the median contribution of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 8, the worst 2.
Is anyone actually trading here?: 8/10
Thirty days of fees collected and value held in on-platform bidding pools, from public data at a stated timestamp. In a collapsed market this is the criterion that separates a venue from a website: a marketplace collecting four figures a month has an interface, not a market.
Scored 8 of 10 against a category median of 5.5, which places it 2nd of 8 among nft marketplaces on this criterion. At a 22% weight that is 0.55 points above the median contribution of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 10, the worst 1.
Custody and approvals: 6/10
Whether listing requires granting a contract approval over your collection, what that approval can do, and the venue’s incident history — including phishing and front-end attacks, which have cost NFT holders far more than contract exploits ever have.
Scored 6 of 10 against a category median of 7, which places it 7th of 8 among nft marketplaces on this criterion. At a 15% weight that is 0.15 points below the median contribution of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 8, the worst 6.
Chains and collections: 3/10
Chains supported with real activity, and whether the venue is the primary market for the collections on them.
Scored 3 of 10 against a category median of 3.5, which places it 5th of 8 among nft marketplaces on this criterion. At a 10% weight that is 0.05 points below the median contribution of the weighted total. The best score in the category is 10, the worst 2.
Its nearest neighbours in this ranking
| # | Entry | What the venue takes | How it differs |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | OpenSea | 8 | Behind by 2 on what the venue takes. |
| 2 | Immutable Orderbook | 6 | Behind by 4 on what the venue takes. |
| 4 | Magic Eden | 5 | Behind by 5 on what the venue takes. |
| 5 | Tensor | 7 | Behind by 3 on what the venue takes. |
Questions about this score
How does Blur make money with a 0% fee?
+
Not from trading fees. Its economics have run on token incentives and the ecosystem built around its bidding and lending products rather than a per-trade charge, and a governance proposal for a 0.5% protocol fee had not passed as of mid-2026. A venue that charges nothing to trade still needs revenue eventually, which is worth remembering when assessing how durable the arrangement is.
Did Blur really end NFT royalties?
+
It started the sequence that did. Blur made royalties optional and capped them at 0.5% to win market share against OpenSea, and the rest of the market matched within months rather than lose volume. Buyers got a better deal, venues got worse businesses, and the people making the work stopped being paid on resale.