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Overview

Moralis provides optimized NFT image previews for both EVM and Solana NFTs, generated on demand and delivered via a global CDN. Instead of loading large, slow, and inconsistent original NFT images directly from IPFS or third-party hosts, you can rely on Moralis to serve low, medium, and high-resolution thumbnails that are fast, cacheable, and reliable - ideal for wallets, marketplaces, dashboards, and feeds. This removes the need to build and operate your own NFT media pipeline while significantly improving frontend performance and UX. Related pages:

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What are NFT image previews?

NFT image previews are pre-generated thumbnails of the original NFT media, optimized for common UI use cases such as:
  • Wallet views
  • Galleries
  • Marketplaces
  • Search results
  • Collection pages
Moralis generates and caches these previews once, then serves them via CDN for subsequent requests.

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Supported image formats

Moralis currently supports common static image formats, including:
  • JPG / JPEG
  • PNG
  • GIF
  • TIFF
  • WEBP
  • SVG

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Not yet supported

  • Video (planned)

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How to enable image previews

Image previews are returned when the media_items query parameter is set to true. Once enabled, preview URLs are included directly in the API response.

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Does this cost extra?

No. Enabling media_items=true is free and does not consume additional compute units (CUs).

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Preview generation lifecycle

Image previews are generated on demand.

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What happens on first request?

  • If previews don’t yet exist:
    • Generation starts automatically
    • The original media URL is still returned
  • Once generated:
    • Previews are cached
    • Subsequent requests return previews instantly

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Preview generation statuses

Each NFT media item includes a generation status:
StatusDescription
successPreview generated and returned
processingPreview is being generated
unsupported_mediaMedia type not supported
invalid_urlMetadata image URL is invalid
retryGeneration failed and will retry
host_unavailableMedia host is unavailable
temporarily_unavailableTemporary failure (e.g. rate limits)
Regardless of status, the API always returns the original media URL as a fallback.

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Retry behavior

If preview generation fails, Moralis automatically retries with exponential backoff.
  • Up to 8 retry attempts
  • Increasing delay between attempts

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Retry schedule

AttemptDelay
11 minute
25 minutes
310 minutes
415 minutes
530 minutes
640 minutes
750 minutes
860 minutes
This ensures resilience against:
  • Temporary host issues
  • Rate-limited IPFS gateways
  • Intermittent CDN failures

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Why this matters

Without image previews:
  • Large images slow down UIs
  • IPFS gateways can be unreliable
  • Frontends must handle resizing and caching manually
With Moralis image previews:
  • Faster load times
  • Predictable image sizes
  • CDN-backed delivery
  • No custom infrastructure required

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Common use cases

  • Wallet dashboards
    Fast-loading NFT grids
  • Marketplaces
    Consistent thumbnails for listings
  • Search & discovery
    Lightweight previews for large result sets
  • Mobile apps
    Reduced bandwidth and faster rendering

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Supported chains

NFT image previews are supported across both major NFT ecosystems:
  • EVM chains
    Ethereum, Polygon, Base, Arbitrum, Optimism, BNB Chain, and more
  • Solana
    Including SPL NFTs and Metaplex-based collections
Image previews behave consistently across supported chains, with the same:
  • Generation logic
  • Retry behavior
  • CDN delivery
  • API response structure

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Summary

Moralis NFT Image Previews provide:
  • On-demand thumbnail generation
  • CDN-backed delivery
  • Multi-resolution previews
  • Zero additional CU cost
  • Automatic retries and fallbacks
This allows you to ship fast, reliable NFT experiences without worrying about media hosting or processing.