Do you want to own unique NBA basketball NFTs for some of the biggest highlights and superstars? In this guide, we’ll show you how to buy NBA Top Shot basketball NFTs.
Specifically, we’ll go over:
- What are Top Shot basketball NFTs?
- Benefits of Top Shot over other digital card NFTs
- Requirements to buy basketball NFTs
- How to buy NBA Top Shot NFTs (step by step)
If we’ve missed anything, or you have more questions, comment down at the bottom of this guide.
RELATED: How to Buy Topps MLB baseball cards.
What is NBA Top Shot?
NBA Top Shot is the next generation of trading card collection for professional basketball fans. Much like the Topps NFT Baseball Cards, NBA Top Shot is a basketball NFT (non-fungible token) marketplace where users can buy, sell, and trade digital NBA moments.
Instead of just a digital image of a card, NBA Top Shot allows you to purchase NBA moments, which are packaged highlight clips that operate similarly to trading cards. Each moment has a specific rarity, which defines how many copies of each NFT are released into the public.
How Does NBA Top Shot Work?
NBA Top Shot is based on a blockchain company called Dapper Labs. NBA Top Shot allows you to buy the rights to an NBA moment online. You own that moment in an online secured wallet where you can show them off, but also trade them with others or sell them on the NBA Top Shot Marketplace.
Each NBA moment will have a different type of rarity and you keep these secured in hopes that the price of them appreciates over time. There are multiple different types of moments that you can purchase. You can also purchase packs on the Marketplace which will be a randomized pack containing multiple tiers of moments. These packs will range in price depending on what rarity tier is included.
Rarity Tiers
Right now there are three main rarity tiers when getting cards (moments) from packs, however a fourth tier called Fandom was recently introduced.
Common Tier
This includes cards that have or will have 10,000+ copies in total
Rare Tier
This includes cards that have or will have 150-4,999 copes total
Legendary Tier
This includes cards that have or will have 25-499 copies total
Fandom Tier
A brand new tier which is fan-driven and the supply is driven by dynamic demand, rather than preset mint numbers.
The value of each moment you open is dependent on multiple different things. The rarer the card, the better resale value they are. It also depends on which player is on the card as popular NBA players will be worth more money than the backup players.
Each card will also have a number on it, so the lower the number out of the total number of those available will be more valuable.
Who Owns NBA Top Shot?
Dapper Labs is the maker of NBA Top Shot. The NBA Players Union approached the Vancouver-based blockchain company and they came up with NBA Top Shot. It is licensed directly by the NBA. That means that it is the official spot for NBA basketball NFTs.
Topps NFT Baseball Cards vs NBA Top Shot
Topps NFT Baseball cards and NBA Top Shot are very similar NFT Marketplaces. Both allow you to securely purchase, hold, trade and sell your NFTs online digitally. They are both based on a blockchain. There is however one major difference.
With Topps NFT Baseball cards it is very similar to just collecting trading cards in real-life. They are digital images of player cards based on different rarity tiers.
With NBA Top Shot, you are getting an NBA highlight moment. It works the same, but it is not a still digital image. You could be getting Carmelo Anthony sinking a game winning three pointer, or LeBron James throwing down a massive slam dunk.
When you click into each moment, it will automatically start playing the highlight for you to watch. This adds a more dynamic aspect to these basketball nfts.
Requirements to Buy NBA Top Shot Basketball NFTs.
You will require a few things in order to buy basketball NFTs:
- An NBA Top Shot account
- A Dapper Wallet
Below, we’ll show you how to get setup with both and how to buy a Top Shot NFT.
How to Officially Buy NBA Top Shots
In this guide, we’ll show you how to buy basketball NFTs. We’ll go over:
- Creating an NBA Top Shot account
- Opening a Dapper Wallet for storing your NFTs
- Buying Top Shots on the marketplace
How to Create an NBA Top Shot Account.
- Visit nbatopshop.com and click Sign Up in the top right hand corner of the screen. You can sign up via email or else by connecting your Google account.
- Next it will provide you a one-time sign up code that would be used if you ever needed to recover your account. Make sure you keep this code somewhere safe in case you ever need to use it.
How to Open Up a Dapper Wallet
If you are planning on holding your NBA Top Shot moments, you will need to transfer them into a secure wallet. We recommend the Dapper Wallet as they are the creators of Top Shot so transferring between the two is seamless.
Also, NFT moments are on the Flow blockchain because they are highlights instead of still images, so you won’t be able to store them on an Ethereum wallet like other NFTs.
- Visit meetdapper.com and download the Dapper Wallet
- Once you have your Dapper Wallet set up, you can visit the NBA Top Shot Marketplace and start buying.
How to Buy NBA Top Shots on the Markletplace
Visiting nbatopshot.com/marketplace where you will be able to start purchasing your basketball NFTs. Currently, all of the packs are sold out as they often do right after release. We would recommend following NBA Top Shot on Twitter so that you can get notifications on when next packs will be released.
As packs are sold out, you will only be able to purchase single moments from the Marketplace. This also allows you to just purchase the moments that you want instead of getting random ones from the packs.
On the marketplace, search for the moment that you are interested in and click on it. It will open a screen and show you the highlight that you are purchasing. It will also outline the asking price, owner, number of collectors for said moment, average price history and more.
Once you find your moment you would like, click Select and Buy and it will take you into all of the available moments for sale and the asking prices. Choose one, click Buy and it will now be in your Inventory.
NBA Top Shot Marketplace
The NBA Top Shot Marketplace interface is very smooth and user friendly. It allows you to search for moments by players, teams and sets. You can also filter by Moment Collectibles, Most Valuable Listings as well as specific Team Moments.
Scrolling down in the marketplace, you can also search by the different Rarity Tiers (Common, Fandom, Rare and Legendary). Lastly, you can search by Sets and see which moments fit into which specific sets.
NBA Top Shot Sets
A set is a curated collection of all of your Top Shot moments. Once you own a specific moment, you can add it to its specific set. Sets describe a certain theme according to the moments inside.
A few sets include:
- Rookie Debuts
- Throwdowns (massive in-game slam dunks)
- So Fresh (elite plays from certain parts of the Season)
Sets also have different Series, which is basically split between the different years these in-game moments happened.
NBA Top Shot Challenges
NBA Top Shot also has certain challenges that you can complete. Here, you get to show off specific moments in your inventory and it gives you an opportunity to earn exclusive prizes, packs or NFTs.
To access these challenges you simply visit nbatopshot.com/challenges-and-quests/challenges.
There are a multitude of challenges that you can complete. Each Legacy Challenge makes you collect a certain number of moments. If you happen to own these specific moments, you can complete the challenge to win the specified reward.
It will show you what the reward is for the challenge before you start collecting. This adds a nice touch to collecting and also is great in helping you obtain rarer moments and packs that might not otherwise be available.
There are also Active Challenges which have a time limit. These are tailored to more recent moments in time and if you can create the showcase of moments before the time expires you will win exclusive prizes such as Rare packs or rare NFTs that will get added to your Inventory.
NBA Top Shot Strategy
When starting out Top Shot, it’s not a bad idea to come in with a strategy for buying these basketball NFTs. However, it depends on what your end game is and how much time you want to put in.
Here are a few strategies that we’ve found successful.
- At this point in time, it would be a good idea to just buy and hold everything you can. Top Shot has been releasing new packs fairly quickly so if you own cards from the very start, they should theoretically increase in price.
- Look at this year’s Rookie class and try to purchase the lower serial number cards. These cards should increase in price due to the likelihood of these Rookies turning into star players in the future. Darius Garland, Christian Wood, Scottie Barnes and Evan Mobley are some that come to mind.
- Buy the Superstar’s as cheap as you can find them. LeBron, Kevin Durant and James Harden all have many career milestones so it is not a bad idea to stockpile as many of those as you can.
- Look for the cheapest moments you can find on the Marketplace ($1). These are very low risk break-even moments, so if they flop you aren’t at a massive loss. But in the future if they increase in value, it is straight profit to you.
- Lastly, do whatever you want. If you have a favorite team and you want to collect as many players from that team then go for it. If a moment increases in price from when you bought it and you don’t have interest in keeping it, sell it for some profit. Purchase packs when they are released, collect sets, complete challenges and have some fun showing off your collection!
Let us know down below if you have any questions about NBA Top Shot!