Sorare, the blockchain-based fantasy sports activities recreation the place followers can accumulate NFT participant playing cards, is altering dwelling as soon as once more, this time transferring from StarkEx to layer 1 chain Solana.
In an Oct. 8 announcement, Solare described the transfer from Ethereum Layer 2 scaling answer StarkEx as “greater than a technical improve,” calling it “an development in our imaginative and prescient to be essentially the most open and versatile platform for digital sporting items.”
In its FAQ part concerning the transition, Solare defined that it’s transferring Solare playing cards to Solana to attach it to a “broader ecosystem,” together with the flexibility to handle NFTs in fashionable Solana wallets like Phantom. The crew additionally hinted at the opportunity of future Solare ecosystem tokens as a part of their long-term imaginative and prescient.
“Long term, we’re exploring each alternative in entrance of us: forging partnerships with different communities, unlocking new types of gameplay and utility, and maybe increasing our personal ecosystem leveraging Sorare tokens.”
The announcement didn’t present any particulars as to why Sorare selected to maneuver to Solana, however X commentators have urged that Sorare might have been paid an eight-figure sum for the transfer. The Defiant reached out to Solare and Solana for remark, however didn’t obtain a response by press time.
Based in 2019 by Nicolas Julia and Adrien Montfort, Sorare began on Ethereum and moved to L2 StarkEx, an application-specific scaling engine from Starknet developer StarkWare, by mid-2021 to cut back gasoline prices. That very same 12 months, the corporate raised $680 million in Sequence B, giving it a valuation of roughly $4.3 billion.
Migration particulars
As a part of the transition beginning this month, customers’ ETH balances presently on StarkEx will probably be migrated to Coinbase’s Ethereum Layer 2, Base, bettering “transaction effectivity whereas sustaining a well-known expertise,” Solare stated.
In keeping with the weblog publish, by the top of October, Sorare playing cards will probably be bridged as Solana NFTs whereas preserving all card attributes reminiscent of rarity, serial quantity, season, XP, and metadata. The crew additionally acknowledged that Solare will cowl all gasoline charges related to the transition, and specified that customers “won’t signal any transactions or use any cryptocurrencies in the course of the transition.”
Sorare additionally added that when the transition is full, playing cards withdrawn to Ethereum wallets “will proceed to work for gameplay, however won’t be transactable on Sorare till redeposited or bridged to Solana,” and NFTs left on StarkEx will probably be bridged to Solana.
Are NFTs again?

NFT buying and selling quantity and variety of gross sales. Supply: DappRadar
Sorare’s transfer comes as whole NFT gross sales have reached their highest stage since 2022, in line with knowledge from blockchain analytics platform DappRadar.
In a analysis publish on Thursday, DappRadar wrote that the market recorded greater than 18.1 million NFT gross sales within the third quarter, producing $1.6 billion in transaction quantity, including that “one of many main DAPPs” within the sports activities house is Sorare, which is answerable for “offered tons of of hundreds of digital playing cards to gamers and collectors all over the world, and multi-million greenback transaction quantity.”
Earlier at present, Larva Labs, creator of CryptoPunks, Autoglyphs, and Meebits, wrapped up its curated collection of Artwork Blocks with its new assortment Quine, with the sale ending at 7.56 ETH, or $31,000 per Quine NFT.
