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Understanding Protocol Rewards on Zora
Understanding Protocol Rewards on Zora
Updated yesterday

Zora’s mission has always been to bring creativity onchain, and we are dedicated to creating the best tools, products, and features to make it as easy as possible for creators to earn sustainably from their work. This includes when Creators are releasing NFT projects with 0 ETH mint prices.

Our Protocol Rewards are the next step in this mission and allow us to spread the wealth to those contributing to our growing ecosystem. Creators and developers on Zora have the opportunity to now automatically earn a portion of the mint fees paid by their collectors.

For clarity, the total collector mint fee will remain the same at 0.000777 ETH (~$1.40); we will just be splitting the proceeds to reward ecosystem participants as outlined below!

A few factors determine how these rewards are split, with the primary factor being whether the collection is a 0 ETH mint or a paid mint.

Before viewing the fee breakdown, there are a few terms to understand:

Create Referral Reward: This reward is an incentive for developers who build alternative platforms allowing Creators to deploy their collections using Zora’s Creator Toolkit. These platforms shall receive a reward for every NFT minted for such collections.

Mint Referral Reward: This rewards interfaces that surface collections created using Zora’s Creator Toolkit for minting, whether directly on Zora or on an alternative platform. The interface shall receive a reward for each individual mint on a Zora Creator contract it enables.

First Minter Reward (Coming Soon!):* This rewards the first party to mint an NFT in a collection created using Zora's Creator Toolkit.

*This reward is not yet live and is currently allocated to the Creator by default.

Breakdown of our Protocol Rewards

Protocol Rewards split on 0 ETH mints:

Creator Reward: 0.000333

Create Referral Reward: 0.000111

Mint Referral Reward: 0.000111

Zora Fee: 0.000111

First Minter Reward:* 0.000111

Protocol Rewards split on paid mints:

The creator keeps 100% of earnings from sales

Create Referral Reward: 0.000222

Mint Referral Reward: 0.000222

Zora Fee: 0.000222

First Minter Reward:* 0.000111

Protocol Reward Examples

To help you understand the different ways that these fees can be distributed, here are some example scenarios:

Example 1

Let’s start with the baseline: If a collection is created directly on Zora and the mint happens on the Zora mint page, the fee allocation is as follows:

0 ETH Mint:

  1. Creator Reward = 0.000333 ETH

  2. First Minter Reward = 0.000111 ETH (currently allocated to Creator)

  3. Zora split = 0.000333 ETH (Zora mint fee + Create referral + Mint Referral)

Paid Mint:

  1. Creator receives 100% of the mint price

  2. First Minter Reward = 0.000111 ETH (currently allocated to Creator)

  3. Zora split = 0.000666 ETH (Zora mint fee + Create Referral + Mint Referral)

Example 2

Create Referral - If a creator deploys their collection on another platform using Zora contracts, but the mint happens on the Zora mint page:

0 ETH Mint:

  1. Creator Rewards = 0.000333 ETH

  2. First Minter Reward = 0.000111 ETH (currently allocated to Creator)

  3. Zora split = 0.000222 ETH (Zora mint fee + Mint Referral)

  4. The developer that built the alternative platform = 0.000111 ETH (Create Referral)

Paid Mint:

  1. Creator receives 100% of the mint price

  2. First Minter Reward = 0.000111 ETH (currently allocated to Creator)

  3. Zora split = 0.000444 ETH (Zora mint fee + Mint Referral)

  4. The developer that built the alternative platform = 0.000222 ETH (Create Referral)

Example 3

Mint Referral - If the collection is created on Zora, but the mint happens elsewhere (e.g. Mint.fun)

0 ETH Mint:

  1. Creator Reward = 0.000333 ETH

  2. First Minter Reward = 0.000111 ETH (currently allocated to Creator)

  3. Zora Split = 0.000222ETH (Zora mint fee + Create Referral)

  4. The developer that built the alternative platform reward = 0.000111 ETH (Mint Referral)

Paid Mint:

  1. Creator receives 100% of the mint price

  2. First Minter Reward = 0.000111 ETH (currently allocated to Creator)

  3. Zora split = 0.000444 ETH (Mint fee + Create Referral)

  4. The developer that built the alternative platform split = 0.000222 ETH (Mint Referral)

Example 4

Create + Mint Referral - If a creator deploys their collection on another platform using Zora contracts AND the mint happens on another platform.

0 ETH Mint:

  1. Creator Reward = 0.000333 ETH

  2. First Minter Reward = 0.000111 ETH (currently allocated to Creator)

  3. Zora split = 0.000111 ETH

  4. The developer that built the alternative platform split = 0.000111 ETH (Mint Referral)

  5. The developer that built the alternative platform split = 0.000111 ETH (Create Referral)

Paid Mint:

  1. Creator receives 100% of the mint price

  2. First Minter Reward = 0.000111 ETH (currently allocated to Creator)

  3. Zora split = 0.000222 ETH (Mint fee)

  4. The developer that built the alternative Create platform split = 0.000222 ETH (Mint Referral)

  5. The developer that built the alternative Mint platform split = 0.000222 ETH (Create Referral)

* This change goes into effect on August 3, 2023. If you are a Creator that would like to update your existing collection’s contract to adopt the new fee structure, please find instructions on how to do so here.

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