Before going step by step, it helps to understand the key distinction between truly gasless minting and lazy minting — because they're different things that both result in the creator paying nothing upfront.
Lazy Minting
Your NFT is listed on a marketplace but not yet written to the blockchain. The gas fee is paid by the buyer at the time of the first sale. If it never sells, you never pay anything. Available on OpenSea and Rarible.
Buyer pays on saleGasless Minting
Your NFT is minted on-chain immediately at no cost to you. The gas fee is covered by the platform. Polygon's official NFT Minter uses gasless minting powered by Biconomy's meta-transaction infrastructure.
Platform covers gasStandard Polygon Minting
You pay gas yourself in POL — but at Polygon's average of $0.0047 per transaction, even standard paid minting is near-free. This option gives you maximum control over contract and metadata.
~$0.005 per mint
Method 1: Lazy Minting on OpenSea (Recommended for Beginners)
- Install MetaMask. Download the MetaMask browser extension or mobile app. Create a new wallet and store your seed phrase somewhere safe and offline. You do not need any cryptocurrency to start.
- Add the Polygon network to MetaMask. In MetaMask, go to Settings → Networks → Add Network. Enter Polygon Mainnet (Chain ID: 137, RPC: https://polygon-rpc.com, currency: POL). OpenSea also prompts you to add this automatically on first connection.
- Connect MetaMask to OpenSea. Go to opensea.io and click "Create." Connect your MetaMask wallet when prompted. Select Polygon as your blockchain.
- Create your collection. Add a name, description, logo image, and category. Set your royalty percentage (typically 2.5–10%). Choose Polygon as the blockchain.
- Add your first NFT. Upload your image, audio, or video file. Fill in the name, description, and properties. Do not click "List for sale" yet — just create the item.
- List for sale. When you list the item, OpenSea uses lazy minting by default on Polygon. Your NFT appears on the marketplace immediately. No gas is charged until a buyer completes a purchase.
Method 2: Polygon's Official NFT Minter (Truly Gasless)
The Polygon team's own NFT Minter at polygon.technology/nft-minter offers fully gasless minting using Biconomy's meta-transaction system. Your NFT is written to the blockchain immediately — no lazy minting — and the gas is covered by Polygon. The Minter supports ERC-721 and ERC-1155 standards, soulbound NFTs, unlockable content, and physical item redemption links. It's the best option if you want true on-chain minting with zero upfront cost and don't need marketplace reach beyond what you can share directly.
SCR collections were minted on Polygon using the same low-fee infrastructure described here. If you want to see examples of live Polygon NFT collections, browse the SCR NFT collection index or see the Polygon NFT page for the full collection. Polygon's affordability is why a small project like SCR — based in the Comox Valley on Vancouver Island — can operate a real NFT ecosystem without needing institutional infrastructure or large gas budgets.