Skins in Counter-Strike play a huge role in the game’s popularity, as in-game pixels can be transferred to other players in exchange for other skins or straight cash. With the skins market becoming a billion-dollar industry already, trading has allowed players to make real money by flipping their skins.
If you’re looking to start your CS2 trading journey, there are a handful of things you should know to make educated decisions. In this article, we’ll go over the ultimate CSGO skin trading guide so you don’t make any silly mistakes.
Understanding The Types Of CS2 Skins
When you’re trading in CS2, you will be dealing with all sorts of Counter-Strike skins. It is important to note that there are various types of CS2 skins, so it is crucial that you are familiar with what they are. Let’s briefly go over them now.
Weapon Skins
Weapon skins make up the majority of CS2 skins. Weapon skins have various rarities in the game, going from Consumer Grade all the way to Covert. They populate more than 95% of all skins in the economy. They can be obtained through in-game drops as well as cases or souvenir packages.
Knife Skins
Knife skins are extremely rare items, meaning they are valued very highly in the marketplace. Most knife skins do not go lower than $100, and can easily reach the $1,000 mark. They can only be obtained through weapon cases, and the odds of unboxing them are close to 1 in 385.
Glove Skins
Glove skins enhance the looks of the gloves your player agent is wearing. They fall under the same category as knife skins, making them also highly sought-after. These skins can only be obtained through specific weapon cases, as they are a substitute for knives.
Stickers
Stickers in CS2 work just like they do in real life. They can be pasted onto weapon skins to enhance the looks and give the skin some flair. Most stickers are generally cheap, but discontinued and scarce ones such as the Katowice 2014 stickers are extremely expensive. Applied stickers do not add its full value to weapon skins!
Cases, Packages And Capsules
Finally, we have other small items which aren’t necessarily skins, but are still an important part of the economy. Cases, packages and capsules are responsible for dropping weapon skins and stickers, so they still have market value.
How Are CS2 Skins Priced?
Next, it is very important to understand that skins are priced differently. There are several factors that influence the market price for skins, so it is vital to understand the main ones.
Popularity
It is evident that some skins look much better than others, meaning they are more sought after. The popularity of skins drives the demand for them to go up. Through basic laws of supply and demand, the prices for the most popular skins will increase since everyone wants them.
Float Values (Wear Conditions)
The float values on a skin play a crucial role in the final market value of the skin. Everytime a skin is unboxed or obtained, they are immediately assigned to a specific float value, which is a decimal number between 0.00 to 1.00. The lower the float value, the less tears the skin has.
The float values on skins directly correlate with the wear condition, such as Factory New and Minimal Wear.
Here is how float values are related to its wear conditions:
- Factory New: 0 – 0.07
- Minimal Wear: 0.07 – 0.15
- Field-Tested: 0.15 – 0.38
- Well-Worn: 0.38 – 0.45
- Battle-Scarred: 0.45 – 1
Obviously, skins with better float value and wear condition will be worth more than others, which is why Factory New skins are more expensive than lower conditions.
StatTrak Or Souvenir Skins
StatTrak and Souvenir skins are regular skins that have special features.
StatTrak adds a kill counter on the skin, tracking the total number of kills the owner has gotten while using the skin. The chances of getting a skin in StatTrak from a weapon case is around 10%, giving it a huge boost in market price.
Souvenir skins feature four golden stickers on the skin, which are stickers of professional players, teams, and tournaments. These stickers are different from regular stickers, increasing the value of the skin.
Rare Patterns
Rare patterns only apply for certain skins, such as the Case Hardened. Pattern-based skins have 1,000 different pattern indexes, so hitting that one in a thousand pattern can straight up make you a millionaire.
For example, the number 1 Karambit | Case Hardened has a pattern index of #387. This incredibly rare pattern has allowed the price for this specific knife to exceed the million-dollar mark.
Based On Collections
Finally, the collection where the skin comes from is also important. Every skin in Counter-Strike is a part of a certain collection, which means it was released on the same update. Collections can be based on weapon cases or maps.
The collection is incredibly important due to the trade up contract mechanic, which allows players to upgrade their skins to a skin from a higher tier, but also in the same collection.
For example, the M4A1-S | Knight is a bland and boring skin, but it is worth thousands of dollars since it can be traded up for an AWP | Dragon Lore.
Setting Up Your Profile For Trading
Now that we have understood how skins work and how they are priced, we can start approaching our first trade. However, there are two things you need to do before you start talking to people.
Finding Your Trade Link
The first thing to do is to find your trade link. Your Steam trade link is your own custom link, that when pressed, will direct another user to send you a trade offer immediately. This is a very common thing to ask for in the trading community, so don’t embarrass yourself if you don’t know where to get it.
Here is a step-by-step guide to finding your trade link:
- Open your Steam desktop client and hover over your profile name.
- When the drop-down menu appears, click on the “Inventory” section.
- Next, click on the “Trade Offers” menu on the top-right corner.
- Look for “Who can send me Trade Offers?”
- Finally, you can scroll down and see your custom trade link, which is a pretty long link.
- All you have to do now is to copy and paste the link and send it to your trading partner.
Make sure to save your trade link somewhere so you can pull it out immediately. Or, you can always memorize the steps and navigate to your trade link efficiently.
Change Your Inventory Visibility To Public
After getting your trade link, there is one last thing you have to do, which is to change your profile visibility to public. If this is not done, users who click your trade link will not be able to see your inventory, defeating the entire purpose of trading.
Don’t worry, changing your visibility is pretty easy. Follow the steps below:
- Open your Steam desktop client and head to your Steam Profile page.
- Next, click on “Edit Profile” on the right side of your screen.
- Go to your “Privacy Settings” where you should see a list of different options.
- Finally, change “My Profile” to “Public” and “Inventory” to “Public” too.
Now, all traders can see your profile and inventory, allowing them to check out the skins you have for trade.
Understanding Skin Trading vs. Cash Trading
In Counter-Strike, there are two main types of trading: skin trading and cash trading. These two are the only ways you can barter with each other for skins, so let’s understand the key differences between the two methods.
Skin Trading
Skin trading is pretty self-explanatory. You are exchanging your CS2 skin(s) for someone else’s skins. Since you are only dealing with Steam items, every skin trade can be performed using a Steam trade offer.
The Steam trade offer is the safest trading system, since you are directly using the Steam platform. This means Valve is essentially middle-manning the transaction, so no side can be scammed.
Using the Steam trade offer, you can put as many skins as you’d like and shoot an offer to another person. The receiver will have the option to accept or decline the trade, but they can also send a counter-offer back to you.
Cash Trading
Cash trading is the act of buying skins with real money. This method is mostly used in the upper echelons of trading, when skins are worth tens of thousands of dollars. When such expensive skins are put up for trade, it is difficult to find a 1:1 fair trade, which is why buying it with straight cash makes the process much easier.
However, the disadvantage is that the Steam platform cannot act as the middle-man for cash transactions. One side must go first, whether it is the person sending the money, or the person sending the skin.
Make sure you are cash trading with reputable traders, or you must spend a little bit of extra money to hire a middle-man that will secure the transaction. This method is not recommended for new players as inexperienced traders can easily get scammed.
Bonus: Mixed Trading
Sometimes, you traders might exchange their Counter-Strike skins for other skins, but there might be a lack of value from one side. If such cases exist, the trader might have to put more skins into the trade. However, if the other trader is not interested in any other skins, then the gap might be covered by straight cash.
If this is the case, we could consider it a “mixed trade” since there are skins and money offered by one side.
Finding Trading Partners
Now that you’re informed of all the basic things you need to know, the last thing we’ll discuss is where you can find potential trading partners to strike deals.
Trading Sites
The first and easiest method is using trading sites. These trading sites are automated platforms with millions of dollars worth of skins. You can directly trade with the website instead of finding a real person. Once you have decided on a trade, one of the website’s bots will send you a trade offer.
The good thing about trading sites is that it is very convenient, since you will have an abundance of skins to select from. If your skin is worth more than the site’s, the missing balance can immediately be transferred to your website balance. Additionally, the skins will be delivered instantly so you don’t have to wait additional time.
However, you do not have the ability to negotiate. Also, sites will mark up their prices, as that is the only way they can make a profit and keep the website running.
Trading Communities
If you want to find real people to trade with, you can look for trading communities on social media platforms such as Steam, Discord, and Facebook. Most of these communities are available to the public and free to join.
In these communities, you can post your trade listings and offers that other members can see. Alternatively, you can also see the listings of other traders to see if there’s anything you’re interested in.
However, remember to be respectful and try not to lowball. If you are difficult to work with, word can spread and your reputation in the community will decline.