Register External Collection

Crossmint has a pre-audited library of smart contracts that serve most use cases. However, if you have custom needs, you can also bring your own.

The Checkout has been battle-tested at scale with Crossmint’s collections, and may result in a more reliable experience than using an untested, imported contract, or at least require less trouble-shooting.

When does it make sense to bring my own contract?

What about secondary sale contracts/marketplaces?

All collection imports start with the same initial steps, then diverge based on your blockchain:

Common Steps (All Chains) - Steps 1-4 for all blockchains
EVM-Specific Steps - Steps for Ethereum, Polygon, etc.
Solana-Specific Steps - Additional steps for Solana candy machines

Common Steps (All Chains)

These initial steps are the same whether you’re importing an EVM contract or a Solana candy machine:

Navigate to Token collections and click `New collection`

Enter Collection Information

This information is displayed in the Hosted Checkout, Storefront, and Claim pages. You can edit it later.

Select `Import an existing contract` option

Select the Blockchain your contract is deployed on

Remember, Crossmint has staging and production environments. When working in the staging environment, choose the mainnet name. For example, if your contract is on the Polygon Amoy testnet, select Polygon.

After completing these common steps, continue with the blockchain-specific instructions below.

EVM-Specific Steps

Complete the Common Steps above first, then continue with these EVM-specific steps:

Pre-requisites

Your contract must be ERC-721, ERC-721A, or ERC-1155 compliant.
The minting function must allow minting directly to an address that is different from the one that invoked the contract. And it must contain at least one parameter that specifies that recipient address.
A single address must be able to call the mint function unlimited times but does not need to be able to hold unlimited NFTs.

Contract Registration

You may register contracts manually from the console or via .

My ABI wasn't automatically imported

When you compile your smart contract there will be a corresponding abi file with an .abi or .json extension.

Inside this file, you’ll see JSON property named abi, which describes the functions in your smart contract. Here’s an example of a very simple abi file. Yours will likely have more function descriptions.

// Example generated abi file for smart contract
{
    "abi": [
        {
            "inputs": [],
            "stateMutability": "nonpayable",
            "type": "constructor"
        },
        {
            "inputs": [
                {
                    "internalType": "address",
                    "name": "_to",
                    "type": "address"
                }
            ],
            "name": "mintTo",
            "outputs": [],
            "stateMutability": "payable",
            "type": "function"
        }
    ]
}

Copy the JSON array object that comes after the string abi and paste it into the Contract ABI text box in the developer console. The content you paste in should begin with [ and end with ].

Specifying the remaining parameters

Using proxy contracts

EVM Contract Import Steps

Step 5: Select `Import my own contract` option

Step 6: Contract Address

Enter the address of your contract and the console will determine the contract type automatically.

Step 7: Proxy or Sales Contract (optional)

Notice in the screenshot that the example has the same contract address that was entered in previous step. This indicates a basic setup where the purchase function is within the registered NFT contract. The only reason to change this is if purchases should be sent to a different contract address that is not the same as the NFT contract.

Most developers do not need to change this. If you are unsure, leave it as is. Transparent upgradeable contracts also do not need to use this setting and should use the beacon address in the previous step.

Step 8: Contract ABI

As long as your contract is verified on the block explorer we can query the ABI automatically. If you have not verified your contract, you must enter the ABI manually.

Step 9: Mint Function Currency

Unless you specifically deployed a contract that supports USDC you must leave the native currency selected. If you are unsure, leave it as is.

Step 10: Select Mint Function

If you selected the native currency in the previous step, this will be a very short list. If you have multiple mint functions in your contract that you want to accept payments for, you must register each one separately.

USDC mint functions typically are NOT payable. Change the currency selector to USDC to populate the mint function list with valid options.

The mint function must accept an address parameter and mint to that address. If your mint function lacks this you’ll need to deploy a new contract or modify your existing contract.

Step 11: Parameter for recipient address

After the mint function has been selected, this will be a short list built from the function parameters of type address. If you have multiple options here, ensure that you select the correct one. Doing this incorrectly will result in the purchased NFTs being sent to the wrong address and they likely will not be recoverable.

Step 12: Parameter for quantity

This will be a short list built from the function parameters of type uint256. If you have multiple options here, ensure that you select the correct one. Doing this incorrectly will result in the NFT checkout tools not being able to properly mint the correct quantity of NFTs.

Step 13: Review details and click `Register collection` to complete

Solana-Specific Steps

Complete the Common Steps above first, then continue with these Solana-specific steps:

Instant support for:

Primaries: Candy Machine v3, Metaplex Instant Sales, Magic Eden’s Launchpad
Secondaries: Auction House, Tensor, Magic Eden API, Hyperspace

Only the integrations listed above are available at the moment. For custom integrations, please contact sales.

Solana Candy Machine Import

Crossmint supports Candy Machine v3. After completing the common steps above, continue with these Solana-specific steps:

Step 5: Select Solana for the blockchain

This step replaces step 4 from the common steps above - select Solana from the blockchain dropdown.

Step 6: Choose candy machine version and enter candy machine ID

Find the ID in the cache.json file in the folder where you deployed your Candy Machine.

Step 7: Review details and click `Register collection` to complete

Congratulations! 🎉 You’ve successfully registered your external collection in Crossmint.

Next steps

Integrate the Crossmint SDK to start selling from your website. You can do this in three ways:

EASY: Use the Storefront to start accepting payments without writing any code.
MID: Add a Hosted Checkout into your existing site or app, which opens a Crossmint branded checkout flow in a pop-up or new tab.
ADVANCED: Craft an Embedded Checkout with custom UI into your website or app.

FAQs

What about Xion blockchain contracts?

What about other blockchains? (Aptos, Sui, etc.)

Can I register my collection via API?

Yes! You can programmatically register collections using the Collections Registration API.

API Endpoint: POST https://staging.crossmint.com/api/v1-alpha1/collections

Required Headers:

Content-Type: application/json
x-api-key: <your-api-key> (requires collections.create scope)

curl --request POST \
     --url https://staging.crossmint.com/api/v1-alpha1/collections \
     --header 'content-type: application/json' \
     --header 'x-api-key: <X_API_KEY>' \
     --data '{
       "chain": "ethereum",
       "contractType": "erc-721",
       "args": {
         "contractAddress": "0x1234567890123456789012345678901234567890",
         "abi": "[{\"inputs\":[{\"internalType\":\"address\",\"name\":\"_to\",\"type\":\"address\"}],\"name\":\"mintTo\",\"outputs\":[],\"stateMutability\":\"payable\",\"type\":\"function\"}]",
         "mintFunctionName": "mintTo(address)",
         "toParamName": "_to",
         "quantityParamName": "_quantity",
         "contractType": "erc-721"
       },
       "metadata": {
         "title": "My NFT Collection",
         "description": "A custom NFT collection",
         "imageUrl": "https://example.com/collection-image.png",
         "social": {
           "twitter": "https://twitter.com/mycollection",
           "discord": "https://discord.gg/mycollection"
         }
       },
       "ownership": "external",
       "category": "art",
       "scopes": ["payments:credit-card", "payments:cross-chain"]
     }'

Key Parameters:

chain: "solana", "ethereum", "polygon", "bsc"
contractType: "candy-machine", "erc-721", "erc-1155", "thirdweb-drop"
args: Contract-specific arguments (see examples above)
- For EVM: contractAddress, abi, mintFunctionName, toParamName, contractType (required); quantityParamName (optional)
- For Solana: candyMachineId (required)
metadata: Object with title, description, imageUrl (all required), and optional social object with twitter/discord links
ownership: Set to "external" for imported contracts
category: "art", "gaming", "music", "loyalty", "ticketing", "charity", "other"
scopes: ["payments:credit-card", "payments:cross-chain"]

Response (201 Created): The API returns a collection object with identifiers you can use with Crossmint’s checkout and payment systems.

{
    "collectionId": "abc123-def456-ghi789...",
    "clientId": "abc123-def456-ghi789..."
}

This API is currently in alpha (v1-alpha1) and subject to change. The returned collectionId and clientId are typically the same value and can be used interchangeably for checkout integration.

Introduction

Wallets

Authentication

Tokenization (Minting)

Checkout

Register External Collection

Quick Navigation

Common Steps (All Chains)

EVM-Specific Steps

Pre-requisites

Contract Registration

EVM Contract Import Steps

Solana-Specific Steps

Solana Candy Machine Import

Next steps

FAQs

Introduction

Wallets

Authentication

Tokenization (Minting)

Checkout

​Quick Navigation

​Common Steps (All Chains)

​EVM-Specific Steps

​Pre-requisites

​Contract Registration

​EVM Contract Import Steps

​Solana-Specific Steps

​Solana Candy Machine Import

​Next steps

​FAQs

Quick Navigation

Common Steps (All Chains)

EVM-Specific Steps

Pre-requisites

Contract Registration

EVM Contract Import Steps

Solana-Specific Steps

Solana Candy Machine Import

Next steps

FAQs