Music NFT sales in 2021: What we learned - Water & Music

For Water & Music's inaugural collaborative research report, over 40 of our community members across industries, geographies, career stages and skill sets came together to try to make sense of the immense challenges and opportunities that lay ahead for music/Web3's future.

Musicians have sold $70M+ worth of NFTs to date. 63% of sales revenue came from independent/unsigned artists.

About 72% of that music NFT revenue can be attributed to the electronic music genre. Hip hop/R&B/Soul came in second, with Rock/Alternative third.

The primary financial metric for success in music NFTs should not be how much an artist can charge their fans at mint. Rather, it should be how much the fans can generate for and with the artist post mint.

music producer 3LAU just sold the first tokenized music album, an NFT version of his album, Ultraviolet, for $3.6 million. The NFT is also redeemable for additional perks such as a customized song. Again, it’s possible for creators to tie directly economic flows to these items, enabling holders of assets to receive revenue from the project as it la... See more