A patch of virtual real estate in the online world Decentraland sold for a record US$2.4-million (R38-million) worth of cryptocurrency, the buyer crypto investor Tokens.com and Decentraland said on Tuesday.

Decentraland is an online environment — also called a “metaverse” — where users can buy land, visit buildings, walk around and meet people as avatars.

Such environments have grown in popularity this year, as the pandemic caused people to spend more time online.

Interest surged last month when Facebook changed its name to Meta Platforms to reflect its focus on developing virtual reality products for the metaverse.

Decentraland is a specific type of metaverse that uses a blockchain. Land and other items in Decentraland are sold in the form of non-fungible tokens (NFTs), a kind of crypto asset.

Crypto enthusiasts buy land there as a speculative investment, using Decentraland’s cryptocurrency, Mana.

A subsidiary of Tokens.com, called the Metaverse Group, bought a patch of real estate for 618 000 Mana on Monday, which was $2.4-million at the time, a Decentraland spokesman and a statement by Tokens.com said.

The land’s purchase was recorded on the NFT marketplace OpenSea.

Most expensive

Decentraland said it was the most expensive purchase of a plot of virtual real estate on the platform.

The land is in the “Fashion Street” area of Decentraland’s map and Tokens.com said it would be used to host digital fashion events and sell virtual clothing for avatars.

It is made of 116 smaller parcels, measuring 4.9sq m each, making the land 566 virtual square metres in size.