Here’s Why DeGods and Y00ts Will Leave Solana Blockchain in 2023

The Solana blockchain’s performance has continued to decline throughout the second half of 2022, prompting some of its most influential players to seek opportunities elsewhere. At first, only platforms like Magic Eden announced intentions to go cross-chain to expand their horizons. Now, two of the most prominent PFP projects on Solana, DeGods and y00ts, have announced their imminent departure from the blockchain.

The news came from DeGods and y00ts Twitter pages on December 25th, with each releasing a simple statement of intent to bridge from Solana in 2023. Although both projects exist under the same umbrella, they will (technically) separate, as DeGods bridges to Ethereum and y00ts to Polygon .

The rationale behind the move

While this latest news may surprise some, in the overall DeGods and y00ts community, it solidifies months of excitement and speculation. Although details surrounding the timing and method of the upcoming transitions have yet to be revealed, the NFT space has turned its attention to the project’s creator Rohun Vora, known in Web3 as Frank III.

In a video posted on his Twitter account, Vora addressed the Solana NFT community, thanking devoted SOL collectors for their support and stating that he and his team realized that in order to grow, they needed to explore new opportunities. “We think it’s time to take a calculated risk and embark on a new journey,” Vora said. He ended the video by noting that while the bridging of DeGods and y00ts is set to happen in late Q1, more details and roadmaps will be available in early January.

After his video, Vora also participated a Twitter space where he answered questions and provided more context to the announcement. In space, he drew parallels between streaming services (like Netflix and HBO Max) fighting for intellectual property and blockchains racing to create the most robust NFT platforms. He also noted that an argument could be made that DeGods had limited itself to Solana, saying, “It’s hard to accept, but it’s been hard to grow at the rate we want to grow. If Ethereum is where we need to go to continue to grow, that’s what we need to do.”

Where do DeGods and y00ts go from here?

While the DeGods and y00ts migrations may sound simple in practice, such a high-profile and high-volume data transfer from one blockchain to another will undoubtedly come with roadblocks. Likewise, each will have its own unique difficulties. While y00ts’ move to Polygon will be handled via the Polygon partnership fund — as reported by CoinDesk via a DeGods representative — The Ethereum bridge is something unique.

When projects choose to bridge outward from their origin blockchain (often Ethereum), similar to what Doodles plans with Doodles 2, they often do so using a layer two blockchain (ie Polygon for Doodles 2) while still maintaining original pool on the origin blockchain. But the DeGods movement will seek not to bridge to a layer two, but to cross chains completely from Solana to Ethereum, surely bringing with it a number of obstacles.

Still, with DeGods considered by many to be one of the most inspiring comeback stories in the NFT space, community support for this latest move is likely to persist. Having remained at the top of the Solana NFT price charts, while some are understandably disappointed by the news, the growing PFP empire with Vora has only continued to grow in its wake.