TONRadar Research Report: Innovative Solution by TONTech for Large NFT Collections on TON

This report highlights an innovative solution developed to address challenges faced in deploying and managing large collections of Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) on the TON blockchain. TON’s asynchronous architecture encourages sharded smart contracts, which creates obstacles when dealing with large NFT collections. However, the research team has come up with an excellent compromise that combines on-chain and off-chain data storage to enable the deployment of extremely large NFT collections at an affordable cost.

NFT, or non-fungible tokens, are unique assets that have been tokenized on a blockchain, giving them distinct identification codes and metadata. Unlike cryptocurrencies, which are interchangeable, NFTs cannot be freely exchanged on a one-to-one basis.

One of the clearest advantages of NFTs is their ability to enhance market efficiency. When a physical asset is tokenized, the sales process becomes streamlined, eliminating the need for intermediaries. By representing digital or physical artwork on a blockchain, NFTs enable sellers to directly connect with their intended audience, bypassing the requirement for agents (provided that artists possess the knowledge to securely host their NFTs).

To learn more about NFT, read this article.

Challenges with Traditional NFT Deployment

The current NFT standard in TON involves representing each NFT as a separate smart contract. This means that deploying a collection with a large number of items results in the creation of an excessive number of contracts (1 million + 1 contracts for a 1 million-item collection). Additionally, handling operations involving multiple NFTs becomes a complex task.

The Innovative Solution: Virtual NFTs

The proposed solution introduces “virtual NFTs,” a new state for NFTs that stores their data, including ownership and metadata, off-chain. On-chain, a Merkle tree root contains all the NFTs in the collection. The first transfer of a virtual NFT results in its minting on-chain, making it indistinguishable from regular NFTs going forward.

Key Benefits of Virtual NFTs:

Scalable Collection Creation: The solution allows for the creation of massive NFT collections, even up to 1 billion items, overcoming previous limitations.
Fixed Price Deployment: Collection deployment comes at a fixed price, regardless of its size, making it cost-effective for creators.
Low Deployment Costs: The cost of deploying virtual NFT collections is incredibly low, similar to deploying an empty collection, reducing financial barriers.
Affordable Claiming: The claiming of virtual NFTs is highly affordable, comparable to a standard NFT transfer, ensuring accessibility for users.
Full Compatibility: Virtual NFTs maintain full compatibility with the existing NFT standard and mechanics, ensuring a seamless transition for developers and users.
Ease of Implementation: Implementing virtual NFTs on marketplace platforms is relatively straightforward, simplifying the adoption process.