Following the Ordinals on Bitcoin, Solana enters a new era because of Metaplex’s new standard for fully on-chain and immutable digital assets. Wu Blockchain, a crypto news reporter, reported on Metaplex’s launch of Metaplex Inscriptions and Engravings.
On December 19, Metaplex, an open protocol with nearly 15 million collectors, introduced Metaplex Inscriptions and Engravings, a new standard for Solana’s NFT. The new standard will allow the storage of metadata and media content entirely on the Solana network.
Metaplex is a protocol on Solana where one can create, mint, auction, and visualize NFTs on the Solana blockchain. It is a library of tools and smart contracts that allows creators to create NFTs more easily. Metaplex has made it possible to mint 116.1 million NFTs on the Solana blockchain.
Before the new standard, most NFTs on Solana stored their data and content on external services like IPFS and Arweave. Meaning NFTs weren’t stored on Solana and were dependent on external systems.
Metaplex Inscriptions allows the storage of assets’ metadata, and media content on Solana. Now, removing the need to trust external systems, Solana unlocks greater flexibility for on-chain attributes and smart contacts.
Metaplex Engravings allows for the first truly immutable NFT on Solana. It adds an extra layer of security to the engraved NFT, preventing any change from being made, regardless of whether the program is immutable or not.
Both programs are now available at devnet(developer network). Once the testing phase is over, based on the new standard, miners will be able to mint new NFTs and convert the existing digital collectible to new NFTs.
