Best Of Both Worlds? Coinbase Adds Support For Solana

A cryptocurrency platform is adding additional support for one of the fast growing cryptocurrencies.

What Happened: Coinbase Wallet, a unit of Coinbase Global Inc COIN announced support for the Solana SOL/USD ecosystem, which includes bringing the cryptocurrency into its Coinbase Wallet browser extension.

Coinbase Wallet users can now send, receive and store Solana and SPL tokens through the browser extension. This marks the first non-Ethereum ETH/USD blockchain to be supported by the Coinbase Wallet browser extension.

Prior to the extension addition, Coinbase users had to create a new crypto wallet and manage it separately for Solana.

Coinbase also highlighted scaling issues and high gas fees across several blockchains. Solana offers low-cost transactions and also has speedy transaction times.

Coinbase said the browser extension is just the beginning with plans to “further integrate with the Solana ecosystem.”

Related Link: How To Buy NFTs 

Why It’s Important: Solana has seen increased usage and “built a vibrant community of both developers and users along the way,” according to Coinbase.

Coinbase said Solana has $7.4 billion in total locked value and over 1,400 projects launched across NFTs and web3. The extended support for Solana comes as Coinbase is planning to launch its NFT marketplace soon.

Along with Ethereum, Solana is one of the fastest growing blockchains used for non-fungible tokens.

Coinbase said it will allow the ability to “view and manage their Solana NFTs directly within their Coinbase Wallet extension.”

Price Action: Coinbase shares are down 1% to $174.89 on Friday. Solana is down 4% to $85.34.