NFT sales hit $246 million over the past week. These were the 5 best-selling digital collections.

• NFT sales have had a breakthrough year in 2021, with total sales volume surging to $12 billion.
• The NFT market is dominated by a handful of standout leaders due to their popularity and rarity.
• These are the five best-selling digital collectibles that helped drive $246 million in NFT sales over the past week.

The cryptocurrency boom over the past two years has helped propel a newer market to record heights: digital collectibles, also known as NFTs.

2021 has been a breakthrough year for NFTs, with total sales volume hitting more than $12 billion as both investors and entrepreneurs descend upon the nascent Web3 space.

NFTs, or non-fungible tokens, are unique, irreplaceable, mostly digital items that users buy and sell online.

NFTs use blockchain technology to keep a digital record of ownership, similar to cryptocurrencies. They were first launched on ethereum, the same blockchain that supports the cryptocurrency ether, and to this day most NFTs can still only be purchased using ether.

In the past week alone, sales of NFTs hit $246 million, according to data from NonFungible.com.

With NFT sales soaring, these are the five best-selling NFT collections over the past week, according to NonFungible.

5. Doodles

7-Day Sales Volume: $9.8 million
Number of 7-Day Sales: 701
Highest 7-Day Sale: $78,776

Explainer: "Doodles come in a joyful range of colors, traits, and sizes with a collection size of 10,000. Doodles are a funky bunch that like to role play or transmogrify themselves into delicious treats. Holding a Doodle allows you to participate in coordinating the Doodles Community Treasury."

4. Art Blocks

7-Day Sales Volume: $14.6 million
Number of 7-Day Sales: 6,302
Highest 7-Day Sale: $270,731

Explainer: "A storefront for genuinely programmable and on-demand generative artwork that is stored directly on the Ethereum blockchain."

3. The Sandbox

7-Day Sales Volume: $18.0 million
Number of 7-Day Sales: 1,291
Highest 7-Day Sale: $100,849

Explainer: "The Sandbox is a community-driven UGC-voxel platform where users own their LAND and host their creative magic."

2. CryptoPunks

7-Day Sales Volume: $24.7 million
Number of 7-Day Sales: 79
Highest 7-Day Sale: $1.6 million

Explainer: "10,000 unique collectible characters with proof of ownership stored on the Ethereum blockchain. The project that inspired the modern CryptoArt movement."

1. Bored Ape Yacht Club

7-Day Sales Volume: $34.1 million
Number of 7-Day Sales: 528
Highest 7-Day Sale: $795,896

Explainer: "BAYC is a collection of 10,000 Bored Ape NFTs—unique digital collectibles living on the Ethereum blockchain. Your Bored Ape doubles as your Yacht Club membership card, and grants access to members-only benefits."