The non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace OpenSea will be upgraded in December with a new and improved platform amid prolonged NFT market doldrums. 

“To really innovate, sometimes you have to take a step back and reimagine everything. So we built a new OpenSea from the ground up,” said OpenSea co-founder and CEO Devin Finzer in a Nov. 4 X post.

He added that the new platform will be launched in December, without providing further details. A link shared by OpenSea on X redirected to a waiting list page with a prompt to connect a crypto wallet.

DappRadar communications manager and head of content “nederob” said on X there was “some serious hype” about the new platform since users may be expecting an airdrop. 

Still, considering that the platform is based in the United States, he added that a token airdrop was “unlikely but not unthinkable.” 

He speculated that new features may include account abstraction or “smart accounts,” NFT shared ownership, memecoin trading and minting, more chain integration and SocialFi. 

Meanwhile, trading volume on OpenSea surged almost 60% over the week, topping $50 million as NFT sales jumped, according to DappRadar. While volumes hit $15 million on Nov. 2, they have remained relatively flat since early 2022. 

OpenSea was launched in 2017 but did not gain widespread popularity until the NFT boom in 2021. The platform saw peak trading volume hit $5 billion in January 2022, but since then, the NFT bubble has burst, sending volumes and revenue plummeting.

Monthly volume was just $46 million in October, down 99% from its all-time high, according to Dune Analytics.  

Related: NFTs can be securities but SEC Wells notice to OpenSea ‘not productive’

The announcement comes after the US Securities and Exchange Commission hit the NFT marketplace in September with a Wells notice, a warning that it could launch an enforcement action alleging trading of unregistered securities. 

Finzer said at the time that “by targeting NFTs, the SEC would stifle innovation on an even broader scale,” impacting hundreds of thousands of digital artists and creators.

The firm has had a tumultuous couple of years, laying off staff in November 2023 when Finzer announced that it was re-orienting the team around “OpenSea 2.0.”

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