Counter Strike: Ultimate CS2 Skin Quality Guide

Cosmetic skins are the main driver of the Counter Strike 2 economy. Every day, thousands of people trade, sell and buy items in hopes of making a profit or simply upgrading their loadout. But how do you know which weapon finishes are the most valuable? After all, there are so many variables that come into play when it comes to judging the quality of a skin. Fortunately, today we’ll tell you about all of them.

Skins in Counter Strike 2

Cosmetic items, aka weapon skins or finishes, are items that CS2 players can buy, sell, and trade. Their name comes from the fact that they have a purely aesthetic function, that is, they change the external appearance of an item. They do not change their other properties. While they might not improve any of your stats in-game, some weapon skins are worth a lot of money among CS2 traders. Some players who sell CS2 skins make a fortune on some of the most expensive CS2 skins in the game. Because of this, CS2 skins are a serious business, and it’s important to learn everything you can about the rarity system.

What Kind of Skins Are Available in Counter-Strike 2?

While there is no way to pinpoint exactly how many skins are available in Counter-Strike 2, it is estimated that there are around 2,800. These include some of the most expensive glove skins, weapon skins, and expensive knife skins. Over the years, Valve has released countless updates, and with them countless collections. The possibilities are pretty much endless, therefore, today every gamer can be sure to find the perfect option for themselves.

In terms of types of skins, this is indicated by the border around their preview symbol. Most are white, however, there are a few exceptions. Namely:

  • Purple – Rare Special (★) items (Knife skins, gloves)
  • Yellow – Souvenir skins
  • Orange – StatTrakâ„¢ skins
  • Dark Green – Genuine skins
  • Light Green – Prototype skins

What Is Skin Quality?

If you want to trade CS2 skins on the Steam market, it is essential to be familiar with the concept of skin quality. This is what determines whether an item is valuable or not.

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But what exactly is skin quality?

In Counter Strike, skin quality is quite a complex concept, which consists of many factors. These are:

  • Float Value (Skin Wear)
  • Belonging to a Collection
  • Presence of StatTrak
  • Rarity
  • Special Circumstances

It is thanks to them that players can price their items, or judge whether they are making a good investment. In order to understand exactly what they are, we will now go through each one in turn.

Float Value

When dealing with CS2 skins, you should, first of all, realize that two seemingly identical skins can differ significantly from each other. Consequently, they can be worth completely different amounts. And why is this the case? Well, as with everyday items, everything deteriorates over time and with use. In fact, the same applies to weapon finishes in CS2.

Skin Wear is one of the most important properties of skins, which determines their level of wear and has been divided into 5 categories. Factory New refers to new skins that look like they were pulled straight from the store shelf. Battle-Scarred, on the other hand, refers to skins that are full of scratches and dents, and their patterns are barely noticeable anymore. Which grade an item falls into depends on its Float Value, a number from one to zero that is assigned to every skin in Counter Strike.

Here is what Float Value corresponds to each level of Skin Wear:

  • Factory New (0.00-0.07)
  • Minimal Wear (0.07-0.15)
  • Field Tested (0.15-0.37)
  • Well Worn (0.37-0.44)
  • Battle-Scarred (0.44-1.00)

The problem is that there is no accurate way to determine what Float Value your skin has since no such data is provided at the time of purchase. Meanwhile, the ranges given above are actually very broad, and one Well-Worn skin may look completely different from another falling into the same category. Fortunately, there are tools such as Float Checker, which allows players to estimate exactly what Skin Wear their item has.

Collection

Each of the skins in the game belongs to one of the many different CS2 collections. Valve releases them every few months, most often in connection with some upcoming important event in the Counter Strike world. These could be, for example, the upcoming CS2 Majors or a new CS2 Operation. This is when players are most excited and eager to revamp their inventories for the big event.

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Usually, the items belonging to one collection, have some kind of common features like names referring to a particular item, or patterns following a specific theme, e.g. as in the case of the CS2 Anubis collection, where all weapon finishes in some way referred to ancient Egypt.

Over time, some collections generally become more valuable than others, so which set an item belongs to affects its quality and market price.

Presence of StatTrak

StatTrak skins include a special feature, that’s a real treat to serious CS2 players. Its task is to accurately count the number of kills a player has scored with a given weapon and display this result so that you can brag to other players. It is shown in the form of an LED display, which consists of 6 digits. This means that if the number exceeds 999,999, the counter will reset to zero.

It may not seem like much at first, but in reality, StatTrak significantly increases the quality and the price of an item. Players are in love with this feature, as they enjoy nothing more than bragging about their skills on maps.

Rarity

Rarity is one of the most important factors affecting the quality of a given skin, as it determines what the chances are that an item will appear organically in the game. After all, it’s important to remember that Steam’s economy is governed by the law of supply and demand, so whether a weapon finish is valuable or not also depends on how many of them are available on the market. Therefore, the rarer the item, the higher its price will be.

These are all rarity grades in Counter-Strike:

  • Common – Consumer Grade, Base Grade
  • Uncommon – Industrial grade
  • Rare – Mil-Spec, High Grade
  • Mythical – Restricted, Remarkable
  • Legendary – Classified, Exotic
  • Ancient – Covert, Extraordinary
  • Exceedingly Rare – Rare Special, Gloves, Knives
  • Immortal – Contraband

Special Circumstances

This category does not necessarily account for the quality of a particular skin, but it can certainly have a huge impact on its market value, so we think it is worth mentioning.

Well, it is difficult to predict what exactly will happen on the Steam market, and there have already been several cases in history when the price of a given skin skyrocketed overnight. This most often happens when, for some reason, a weapon finish has to be withdrawn, and then the only way to add it to your inventory is through resale.

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That’s exactly what happened with the M4A4 Howl, an item that at this point is already something of a legend in the Counter Strike community. Its price is now up to several thousand dollars, which is really a lot, considering that this is a CS2 weapon skin that exists only virtually, in-game. If you want to know why exactly this is the case, be sure to read the article we dedicated to it on the blog.

Conclusions

As you can see, weapon quality is a really complex concept that consists of many factors. To fully understand it, it is necessary to also comprehend each of them. Only then can you build your in-game inventory with full confidence. Remember, however, that on SkinsMonkey you are trading with a bot that makes all the estimates for you. They are based on millions of transactions from the Internet, which means that with us, you can be sure that you are getting the best possible deal. Also, make sure to check out our free CS2 skins giveaways!