Decentraland’s 2024 Recap

By Decentraland, , in Announcements

Pop the champagne bottle Emote in honor of 2024! Defined by ambitious goals set in the ‘24 Manifesto, Decentraland’s 2024 was truly transformative, marking a bold leap forward in the virtual world's evolution. From the launch of Decentraland 2.0—DCL’s completely rebuilt desktop client with advancements in performance, immersion, and social interaction—to the first-ever in-person Community and DAO Summits, 2024 focused on building a strong foundation for the platform’s future growth.

Ahead of the release of Decentraland’s 2025 Manifesto (coming soon!), let’s take a moment to celebrate everything that made 2024 unforgettable—from major updates and new features to memorable events and milestones—starting with some fun recap stats! Decentraland’s 2024 in Numbers 💃 14M Emotes Played 🗨️ 1.3M Chat Messages Sent 🏃 627k+ Hours Spent In-World 📅 720+ Unique Community Events 🎮 200+ DCL 2.0 Alpha Testers (Thank you!💜) 

Decentraland 2.0

The development and launch of DCL 2.0 was Decentraland’s primary goal of 2024, crucial to the platform’s future growth. Transitioning Decentraland’s reference client to become solely desktop-based, the new Unity client delivered major advancements in performance, at the same time setting the stage for future expansion to mobile and VR. Highlighted by Decrypt for its improved mechanics and focus on social interaction, the new client introduced smoother gameplay, beautiful graphics, and new engaging features such as Badges and Daily Quests, revamping the Decentraland experience and paving the way for more improvements. Work on the client will continue in 2025 to bring it to feature parity with the old client and beyond—follow what the Dev Team is working on via the Product Development Database.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxl22bib4L0

Released alongside Decentraland’s new desktop client as part of DCL 2.0, the Creator Hub also made its debut in 2024. An all-in-one tool for scene building and deploying, DCL’s Creator Hub is a desktop app that serves creators of all skill levels, offering both drag-and-drop tools and advanced coding options. With development continuing into 2025, the Creator Hub ultimately aims to streamline all content-creation processes in Decentraland.

In addition to the technical components of DCL 2.0, a new edition of Decentraland’s white paper, White Paper 2.0, was published just ahead of the new client to officially signal the beginning of a new era for Decentraland. The document provides a much-needed update to the original 2017 white paper, covering everything from Decentraland’s technical innovations and ecosystem to its history and real-world impact on the community, ending with an exciting roadmap for the platform’s future development. Read the key takeaways here or dive into White Paper 2.0 to get the full scoop.

What began as a foundation for digital autonomy has bloomed into a vibrant virtual world defined by connection, creativity, and collaboration. Since its launch in 2020, Decentraland’s community has cultivated the founders’ vision of a decentralized world, transforming it into a social platform where friendship, inclusivity, and shared experiences thrive. This unique digital culture has been instrumental in shaping Decentraland 2.0 and will continue to guide the platform’s evolution, positioning Decentraland at the forefront of the decentralization movement as a truly community-driven social virtual world.

Update Roundup

While most development in 2024 focused on Decentraland 2.0, there were still many notable updates released throughout the year that contributed to improving the Decentraland experience. Listed below are some of the year's updates you want to be sure not to miss! If you’d like to see everything the Foundation was working on in 2024, check out Decentraland’s Product Development Notion Database.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFdPjV4lfos

Social Sign-In

Essential to making Decentraland more Web2 and user-friendly, social sign-in allows new users to make their DCL account using a social profile, such as Google or Discord, keeping all digital wallet processes behind the scenes. See the video above to learn more.

In-App & Email Notifications

Users can now easily keep track of their DCL matters whether they’re online or afk. In-app notifications show up in-world as well as on decentraland.org, while email notifications keep you updated even if you’re on your phone. Fully customizable, you can choose what kind of notifications you’d like to be emailed about from Account Settings. Email notifications are off by default, so make sure to opt in if you’d like to receive them!

More Payment Options in Marketplace

Over 2024, the payment options in Decentraland’s Marketplace were continually expanded to include more options. In addition to paying with MANA or by card, you can now also pay with almost any cryptocurrency, removing the blockers between you and that shiny new Wearable. Start shopping now, remember, when you purchase items from creators in the Marketplace, you’re directly supporting their work—Decentraland creators retain 97.5% of their sales (the highest revenue share in the industry!).

Improvements to Decentraland's SDK 7

Since its release in 2023, Decentraland's SDK 7 has continually evolved to empower builders with greater creative capabilities and streamline the scene-creation process. In 2024, the Creator Hub desktop app made the SDK more accessible, combining user-friendly drag-and-drop tools with advanced coding options. New features were also introduced, including access to scene-specific player information and the ability to freeze player movement, enabling richer multiplayer experiences and expanded game modes. Additionally, tools like Free Camera Control for cinematic effects and enhanced audio controls were added, giving creators more ways to craft immersive and dynamic scenes. Learn more about scene creation in the Docs or jump into a tutorial to start building!

Streamlining Linked Wearables

Did you know it's possible to import your community’s NFTs into Decentraland as Linked Wearables? Satoshiverse, Woodies, and A Kid Called Beast are just a few examples of communities that are able to meet in DCL and explore, wearing their NFTs as Wearables. While this option has been live since 2022, the process of importing external NFTs was recently greatly improved to be more user-friendly. If you are interested in creating Linked Wearables for your community to wear in DCL, please reach out to the Foundation at partnerships@decentraland.org. Learn more about Linked Wearables.

World Permissions

When you get a Decentraland NAME, you also get access to a World, your private virtual space within the Decentraland ecosystem, separate from the Genesis City map. Now you can manage who can visit your World as well as grant streaming and deployment privileges to friends or collaborators. Manage your Worlds.

New Marketplace Rarity: Exotic

In response to a community request through Canny.io, the Exotic rarity was introduced with an item limit of 50. Browse Exotic items.

Decentraland IRL

2024 was such an eventful year for Decentraland, it couldn’t be contained to the virtual realm! Breaking out into the physical world, Decentraland history was made when community and Foundation members came together in Decentraland’s birthplace, Argentina, for the first-ever Community Summit. Celebrating how far the platform had come since its 2020 launch, the Summit premiered the first sneak peek of DCL 2.0, hosted community playtests, as well as workshops and feedback sessions. Read a recap here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gh22bJDdMiI&t=2s

Following the success of the Community Summit in May, the DAO organized a smaller DAO Regenesis Summit in Portugal at the beginning of September. The Summit focused on workshopping ideas to revitalize the DAO and improve its processes going forward. Read a recap here. 

Focusing on expanding outreach and brand awareness, 2024 also saw the kickoff of Decentraland’s Ambassador Program. In 2024, the program saw community members organize 17 IRL meetings and workshops around the world in 8 countries. All together these events had almost 1k attendees. The Ambassador Program will continue in 2025, so be on the lookout for ways to get involved and for events near you!

Notable Events

Despite the ongoing development of DCL 2.0 throughout the year, 2024 saw many exciting events take place in Decentraland, from old faithfuls like DCL’s longest-running annual event, Decentraland Art Week, to new, experimental events such as Decentraland Game Expo. 

In addition to providing entertainment and bringing in new users, these events are also special moments for creators to shine and show off their skills. Many of the attractions and artwork on display at events are created by community members and new creators introduced to Decentraland through open calls. Take a look at some of the most exciting event stats from 2024:

  • 50k USD Awarded to 3D creators via open calls and contests

  • 170+ Entries from creators via Open Calls/Game Jams

  • 160+ Brands, studios, and creators participated in events

  • 70k+ Views of live-streamed panels (Watch them here)

Check out the recaps of 2024’s biggest events below and if you’re feeling adventurous, jump in and explore the festival grounds! Many of the interactive experiences and immersive installations are still waiting to be discovered. 

  • Decentraland Music Festival '24 | Learn More | Jump In

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LE_q8D8Upuk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rNgHtLmb8w

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJjDc97jJic&t=2s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKfjxUomiAw&t=14s

Excited for upcoming events? Find out how to get involved when the 2025 Manifesto drops later this month!

Thank you to everyone who contributed to the success of Decentraland’s 2024! This past year of amazing evolution for Decentraland wouldn’t have been possible without your continued passion and dedication.❤️

Looking ahead, Decentraland’s 2025 Manifesto is on the horizon, setting the stage for an exciting new chapter. Be sure to subscribe to the newsletter or follow Decentraland on X, Instagram, and Discord to stay updated as the vision for 2025 unfolds.

For those who haven’t explored Decentraland since the transformative 2.0 launch in October, now is the perfect time to jump in! Download Decentraland and start exploring.