Storing Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) on the Solana blockchain is now more affordable thanks to a novel technology known as state compression. Developed by both Solana Labs and Metaplex, this new technology takes advantage of Merkle trees to drastically reduce transaction costs associated with hosting NFTs on the blockchain. Initially, it cost an estimated 1,200 SOL (about $24,000) to store 100,000 million NFTs on Solana. But, with state compression, that cost is lowered down to just four SOL (about $103).

This opens up an array of possibilities regarding its applications. Airdrop facilitators, Web3 gaming developers too, will be able to benefit from this breakthrough as they can now build digital goods on the blockchain without having to worry about unreasonably high transaction costs. The technology works by summarizing large sets of data into a fingerprint, often referred to as a Merkle tree. Then, instead of having numerous individual NFTs on the blockchain, only the condensed version of each data is stored on-chain. All the additional data can be accessed through Solana's Remote Procedure Calls (RPC).

This new technology also allows for the updating of values stored in the blockchain if any modifications are made to the individual values stored off-chain. Consumers are also not negatively impacted as the NFTs still show up in their wallets and can be transferred, operated in smart contracts or sold in marketplace, without a hitch. Recently, there have been some RPC providers which can facilitate state compression related queries, making it possible to experience all the tangible benefits of this groundbreaking technology.



Other News from Today