Blur NFT Marketplace to Shut Down Website Next Month, Sparking Mixed Reactions From Collectors

Nonfungible token marketplace Blur, which once shocked the digital asset industry by overtaking OpenSea as the largest NFT marketplace by trading volume, has announced that it is shutting down its website next month. The decision has drawn sharp reactions from digital art collectors, with many expressing relief rather than sorrow over the end of the once-dominant platform’s frontend operations.

Blur made the surprising announcement on X on Monday, marking its first post on the social media platform in more than a year. According to the announcement, the platform’s frontend website will officially shut down on November 12. However, the team clarified that its underlying onchain marketplace will remain operational, allowing users to continue interacting with smart contracts directly.

Alongside the closure of the main website, Blend, the peer-to-peer perpetual NFT lending protocol built by Blur, will also cease matching new loans. Blur stated that active borrowers have until the November 12 deadline to either fully repay their outstanding loans or allow them to default. Additionally, the platform promised to provide a dedicated withdrawal interface after the website shutdown is completed to ensure users can recover remaining assets.

The news immediately triggered a wave of reactions across social media, drawing fierce criticism from prominent figures in the digital art and collector community who blamed the platform for reshaping the NFT landscape in ways they viewed as detrimental.

"Good riddance. You destroyed NFTs. Please shut down and never come back," wrote prominent NFT collector Cryptobscure in a direct reply to Blur’s announcement on X.

Another collector, known as starfruit, echoed similar sentiments in a separate post on the platform, writing, "You may not have been able to complete your mission to destroy NFTs. But you acted with extreme determination and tried everything. Congratulations to us for surviving you."

The abrupt announcement and subsequent backlash have renewed intense industry criticism surrounding the aggressive market strategy that originally helped Blur surge to the top of the NFT trading charts in 2023. Blur’s rapid ascent was fueled by a combination of optional creator royalties and lucrative token rewards designed to incentivize high-volume traders to aggressively bid on and flip digital collectibles.

This disruptive strategy accelerated a broader industry shift toward lower creator royalties across the ecosystem. Rival marketplace OpenSea later responded to competitive pressure by moving to optional creator fees for newly listed collections, fundamentally altering how artists and creators collected ongoing secondary sales revenue.

Blur originally launched on October 19, 2022, introducing a model that allowed sellers to customize their royalty payments while offering larger prospective token rewards to traders who chose to pay higher creator royalties. However, Blur entered the market at a time when royalty protections were already beginning to erode. Competing marketplace Magic Eden had already moved to optional royalties just the previous week, setting off a race to the bottom among platforms fighting for market share.

By July of the following year, blockchain analytics platform Nansen reported that effective creator royalty fees had plummeted to an average of 0.6% in July 2023, down sharply from an average of 2.5% in 2022. Nansen attributed a significant portion of that drastic drop to Blur’s rapid growth, its minimum royalty policy, and the subsequent defensive move by OpenSea to lower its own royalty requirements to stay competitive in an increasingly cutthroat market.

NFT Sales Slump From Boom-Era Highs

Blur did not disclose the underlying reasons behind its decision to shutter its frontend website and wind down new lending activity on the Blend protocol. The move comes, however, at a time when overall NFT trading activity remains severely depressed, trading far below the dizzying heights seen during the historic boom era of the digital asset market.

Data compiled by CryptoSlam illustrates the stark decline in market activity, showing that total NFT sales in September amounted to $167 million spread across approximately 2.9 million total transactions. For comparison, the market reached its all-time peak in January 2022, a period that recorded an astonishing $6 billion in total sales volume across 13.7 million transactions.

The broader NFT infrastructure sector has faced immense pressure amid the prolonged market slump. Gemini-owned platform Nifty Gateway and social collecting platform Rodeo both announced plans to wind down their operations in January. Meanwhile, digital art platform Foundation announced its own closure in April after a planned acquisition and sale intended to keep the marketplace operating ultimately fell through. Major cryptocurrency exchange Binance also ended standalone NFT support on its core exchange platform, shifting asset management responsibilities directly to the Binance Wallet.

Cointelegraph reached out to Blur founder Tieshun "Pacman" Roquerre for comment regarding the upcoming website shutdown and the future of the protocol’s onchain infrastructure.