A year after acquiring NFT aggregator Gem, OpenSea launched a new PRO platform for advanced NFT traders.
"Over the past several months, the Gem team has been working tirelessly to build and refine the platform to its new form: Gem v2. And today, we're officially joining forces to unveil OpenSea Pro (previously Gem v2) — the fastest and most powerful NFT marketplace aggregator available," the platform's team said in the official announcement of OpenSea PRO.
OpenSea, apparently motivated by its fierce rivalry with Blur, another NFT marketplace designed for advanced trading, has spent several months upgrading and optimizing Gem. According to OpenSea, the updated aggregator will collect, process, and visualize real-time data from 170 NFT marketplaces.
One of the benefits of OpenSea PRO is advanced orders that will allow traders to sweep across the deepest liquidity of any NFT marketplace aggregator and have more control over listings, rarity scores of NFT collections, and purchases. The platform will also allow to place orders based on various parameters, including an item quantity, maximum item price, and traits.
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OpenSea promises users improved inventory management for a seamless trading experience with support for instant sales and numerous other useful features such as live mints overview, watch lists, and batch transfers.
In addition, OpenSea claims to offer "the most gas-optimized smart contracts of any NFT aggregator."
To keep up with Blur, which is best known for its generous airdrops of the BLUR token, OpenSea also wants to offer incentives for using its platform. The company has introduced a limited promotional period with a 0% fee listing and has also announced an airdrop of Gemesis, a special NFT collection to celebrate the launch of the new version of Gem.
"In celebration of the launch of OpenSea Pro, the Gem team wishes to express their heartfelt gratitude to the community members who have supported them since the platform's very beginning. To commemorate this journey, we're proud to announce the 'Gemesis' NFT drop, a special 'thank you' for Gem's early adopters," OpenSea said in its blog, adding that only the users who purchased NFTs on Gem before March 31, 2023, would be eligible for the airdrop.
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The reaction of the NFT community to the news was mixed. Some NFT traders who had already had the opportunity to test the features of OpenSea PRO reported that the platform is much more convenient and user-friendly than Blur.
Still, there was some disappointment among artists who have recently suffered from the lack of support from the leading marketplaces, which have shifted their focus from creators to fast-paced traders. Some loyal OpenSea users feel treated unfairly, since the airdrop is earmarked only for the traders who used Gem.
