Mercari NFT Marketplace: Japan Users Can Now Buy & Sell Crypto Art On OpenSea

Liz Morton
Liz Morton


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Mercari Japan announces launch of a new NFT marketplace, allowing users to buy and sell crypto art seamlessly through OpenSea with future plans to issue and sell NFTs in partnership with businesses and IP holders in Japan and around the world.

According to a company press release:

The new service allows users to use Mercari to buy and sell popular NFTs available on OpenSea, a major NFT marketplace based in the US. This change kicks off the expansion of Mercari’s business from a marketplace for buying and selling physical items into a digital marketplace for buying and selling NFTs...

...Users will now be able to seamlessly purchase NFTs using their Mercari sales balance without having to apply to create a cryptoasset wallet or open a new account. In addition, users will also be able to easily list the NFTs they purchase on Mercari NFT.

From day one of the service launch, Mercari users will be able to buy and sell NFTs from popular projects on OpenSea, a major NFT marketplace. Going forward, Mercari plans to issue and sell NFT contents together with businesses and IP holders in Japan and overseas in a variety of categories including art, trading cards, and entertainment to further expand Mercari NFT as a digital marketplace.

Available payment methods include Merpay balance, Merpay Smart Pay, and Mercard, while Bitcoin processed by the subsidiary Mercoin is not supported as a payment method.

There is no fee for purchasing or listing NFTs but the seller will pay a 10% fee upon sale. More details can be found on Mercari Japan's help page for Mercari NFT.

The move comes at a time when global interest in crypto art has cooled significantly from 2020-2022 highs - notably rival eBay has recently wound down their KnownOrigin NFT marketplace, a 2022 acquisition which did not pan out well for the company.

eBay’s KnownOrigin Winds Down On-Chain Marketplace & Minters For NFT Cryptoart
eBay’s KnownOrigin is winding down on-chain marketplace & minters 2 years after acquisition as NFT cryptoart bubble fizzles out.

NFT growth in Japan has continued largely due to the country's strong entertainment and gaming sectors, but adoption has still been slower than many predicted just a few years ago with recent research from Statista showing 17% of Japanese respondents interested in financial products were familiar with NFTs, marking a decrease from previous years.

According to a survey conducted in September 2024, around 17 percent of respondents in Japan who had interest in financial products were to some extent interested in non-fungible tokens (NFTs). Close to 24 percent did not know NFTs or had never heard of the term.

What do you think of Mercari's foray into non-fungible tokens? Let us know in the comments below!

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Liz Morton is a 17 year ecommerce pro turned indie investigative journalist providing ad-free deep dives on eBay, Amazon, Etsy & more, championing sellers & advocating for corporate accountability.


Recent Comments
Avatar Placeholderlessthanthreerecords8 hours ago
Happening to me too. On my active listings page (with the full list) it looks fine, but when I click on them, many have the random characters. I reported it, and that's when one glitch led to another! As I was typing the message after clicking the "?", letters were repeatedly not coming up (usually one or two at the end of a word). I was finally able to get the message entered, but how tedious!
Avatar Placeholderbritishsoeedw-021 hours ago
I'm having the same problem, Vat has ben added to my listings and sales have literally stopped.
Avatar PlaceholderblazeagloryYesterday
I've been selling on ebay since 2003 but i had to get a new account because after having a perfect feedback with ZERO negative feedback, i had one sale go south where the item i had i simply couldn't find in my inventory! So i ended up Ebay roughly 250$. You'd think they'd call me or message me and work out a plan but no, immediately PAY NOW PAY NOW OR YOUR ACCOUNT GETS CLOSED! I sell hand to mouth and usually each sale gets spent on bills QUICK, so i told Ebay i could pay monthly or weekly and pay the balance off in a month or sooner. Anyways, they closed my perfect TRS account. I mean no sympathy or anything after roughly 20 something odd years...SO now my new account after not selling for several months has only a couple sales. I dunno if things have changed but traffic seems waaaaay down but with this last sale, a nice vintage DAVID YURMAN silver bracelet, i had to ship to an authenticator, which I've never had to do. Hey I'm all for it because on ebay the last 20 years, the silver jewelery market has been HIGH RISK fakes labeled .925 yet NOT! LOL So I'm ok with an authenticator program that actually WORKS! So now the bracelet has been in Carlsbad since Monday May 19th 2025. I'm hoping it gets verified by tomorrow. I'll keep you all posted