5 Things to Know Ahead of the ‘Notcoin’ Token Launch

The Notcoin token is finally here—well, almost. After a couple of missed deadlines in April, the NOT token on The Open Network (TON) is set to launch in a matter of hours, with exchanges like Binance and OKX set to list the token on May 16.

Tens of millions of players will also be able to claim their NOT allocations at the same time, which means Notcoin is poised to be not only one of the biggest gaming token launches of 2024, but possibly one of the biggest overall crypto drops in 2024.

If you haven’t been following the latest updates, then there are a few key things that you need to know, whether you’re planning to claim your NOT tokens, purchase them, or perhaps try to earn some through staking campaigns. Here’s a quick, final primer before the Notcoin rollout.

1) Staking campaigns

While there was already a substantial player base, Notcoin also worked with notable crypto exchanges Binance and OKX to seed billions of NOT tokens to their respective customer bases, perhaps opening up a broader audience of NOT holders and traders.

But that window is closing fast. Between the two campaigns, more than 4 billion NOT tokens were offered to users who staked other cryptocurrencies. And Binance users jumped hard at the opportunity, staking some $14 billion to grab a share of the rewards.

As of this writing, there are only a couple of hours left to secure rewards via Binance, but several hours left to do so through OKX—so act fast if you still can.

2) When listing?

According to official Notcoin posts on Wednesday, the token will be listed on major exchanges at 12:00 UTC on Thursday—that’s 9am Eastern.

Binance, OKX, Bybit, KuCoin, and Bitfinex are among those who have already announced plans to list the token right away. The total supply of NOT is just over 102.7 billion tokens, with about 80.2 billion offered to players via the airdrop claim.

3) Claim your coins

If you mined in-game coins between January and April 1, the end of the mining phase, then you can claim your on-chain NOT tokens. Some 35 million total players hopped into the Telegram-based clicker game, and NOT tokens are being awarded at a 1,000-to-1 conversation rate. So if you mined 100,000 in-game coins, you’ll have 100 NOT to claim.

Notcoin opened up the in-game claim process to all players on Tuesday, beginning with the ability to either transfer the tokens to a centralized exchange account or stake them for future rewards and access—more on that in a moment. On Thursday, once the token has been listed, Notcoin will add the ability to withdraw any earned NOT to a self-custody wallet, as well.

4) Should you stake?

For some players, the NOT token launch might end their planned journey with Notcoin. Crypto traders “farm” airdrops all the time, and this one was simple and widely known. But Open Builders, the team behind Notcoin, aims to keep some of those millions of users onboard.

When you go to claim your NOT tokens, Notcoin will ask whether you want to stake (or lock) your tokens within the game for a period of 30 days—which means you won’t be able to withdraw or sell them during that span.

But in doing so, Notcoin says that you’ll be able to “Explore & earn extra rewards” and gain “Exclusive access” to staking pools based on your player level. Keeping your tokens locked up for a month is a risk, as with any crypto decision, but it’s one that could yield future benefits if you’re in no rush to cash out and move on.

5) What’s next?

Notcoin will bring back its coin-tapping game and launch a new kind of rewards model, but there are grander ambitions ahead, as Open Builders co-founder Sasha Plotvinov has shared with Decrypt’s GG.

In the short term, Notcoin will bring back the familiar game with the added ability to earn real NOT tokens instead of more in-game coins. But with all the tokens minted and deployed, there will be a new model. Projects and companies will be able to buy NOT on the market and pay it into the game to fuel play-to-earn rewards, sharing tokens with players who engage with their content.

Beyond that, Plotvinov shared that Notcoin aims to become the “Netflix of social, viral games,” serving as a platform for third-party developers to deploy their simple, addictive games that can potentially reach a sizable audience—with token rewards, of course.

Edited by Ryan Ozawa.