It’s fair to say that CS2’s cosmetics system is by far one of the best out of all competitive games. The entire culture around skin trading is one of the best features of the game. However, this also makes it extremely difficult for a new player to get their heads around the extensive skin system in CS2, especially if your goal is to bring a bit of flair to your CS2 Loadout.

There are so many factors that can change the value of a skin. Skin conditions and patterns are just to name a few. You could have two identically named skins, and they could be vastly different in terms of monetary value.

Of course, the main driving factor of skin’s value is how rare it is found. The rarer the skin is, the more it costs. This is the reason why some CS2 skins cost thousands of dollars. In this article, we will go over all the different skin rarities in CS2, and other factors that could increase a skin’s value.

All CS2 Skin Rarities

You can think of skin rarities as tiers. The higher the tier, the harder it is to obtain that skin. It’s like grading skins as Common, Epic, or Legendary. Now, there are a lot of ways to get skins in CS2. Cases, Trade-up Contracts, Trading, and Operations, to name a few. CS2 Skin rarity basically defines how hard it is to get a skin, or how “rare” it is. These are the Skin Rarities in CS2.

• Consumer Grade - Grey/White
• Industrial Grade - Light Blue
• Mil-Spec - Blue
• Restricted - Purple
• Classified - Pink
• Covert - Red
• Contraband - Yellow

The rarities start from Consumer Grade, which is the most common, and go to Contraband, which is the rarest and has only skin (we will get to that later). As the rarity increases, so does the price. Consumer Grade skins can cost from a few cents to a couple of dollars, whereas Covert skins can start from a few hundred dollars up to thousands.

The type of weapon also affects the rarities. In general, knife skins are rarer than weapon skins.

Consumer and Industrial Grade

These are the bottom-of-the-barrel skins, usually quite cheap. Most of the time you get these skins for free just by playing the game. If you have been playing CS2 for a while, there is a good chance you already have a lot of these skins in your inventory. They are good skins to use as fodder to trade up for a better skin. Consumer and Industrial Grade skins are not included in cases.

AUG | Snake Pit and SSG | 08 Sand Dune are examples of Consumer Grade skins, while the AWP | Safari Mesh and M4A1-S | Boreal Forest lie in the Industrial Grade.

Mil-Spec and Restricted

This is where you can start to get some pretty decent-looking skins. Sure, these are still far in terms of looks from the higher-rarities skins but, for the average player, these skins are a good starting point. Mil-Spec and Restricted have the highest odds from cases, 79.92% and 15.98% respectively. The pricing of these skins starts from a few dollars but can go into hundreds or even thousands, depending on the condition, pattern, and weapon.

Glock-18 | Candy Apple and AWP | Snake Camo are Mil-Spec skins. Some popular Restricted skins include Desert Eagle | Blaze and M4A1-S | Icarus Fell.

Classified

This is where skins start to look pristine, and the prices start to climb higher. Classified skins are near the peak of CS2 skin rarities, often considered as status symbols. Owning Classified skins shows that the player is interested in building a good collection. Classified Skins can start from $50-60 and can easily go above $2000-3000 in terms of pricing. You can get Classified skins in cases, but the odds are very low about 3.2%. Popular classified skins include the AK-47 | Case Hardened and AWP | Graphite.

Covert

These are the rarest skins in the game. Owning a Covert skin is nothing short of a flex, especially if you have one in good condition with the right pattern. Pricing can start from a few hundred dollars to up tens or hundred thousand dollars for the most premium and pristine looking skins. While you could try to unlock Covert skins in cases, the odds will not be in your favor, about 0.64%.

All knives and gloves lie in the Covert Rarity. But all knives are not equal, even if they share the same rarity. They are in their own tiers within Covert. Also, the odds of getting a knife or glove are lower than a Covert weapon skin, about 0.26%.

Popular Covert weapon skins include the Asiimov collection and AK-47 | Bloodsport.

Contraband

The Contraband rarity has only one skin: the M4A4 Howl. There was a huge copyright scandal behind this weapon skin, which is why it was rated Contraband. This rarity means that the only way to get this weapon is to buy it from another player, making it extremely rare. This also means the price for the M4A4 Howl skyrocketed. The pricing for this weapon starts close to $4000 and can go up exponentially, depending on condition and other factors.

Factors that Affect a Skin’s Value in CS2

Apart from rarity, there are a lot of other factors that can bump up the price of a skin. This is why you can find Mil-spec or Restricted skins listed for thousands of dollars. These factors also make the skin rare.

Skin Condition

As the name suggests, this indicates how worn down the skin is. It is often represented in float values (ranging from 0 to 1 ). Float values decide what the condition of the skin will be: the closer the float value is to 0, the more pristine the skin is and vice versa. Each rarity has its own range of float values, listed below.

• Factory New (0.00 – 0.07 float values)
• Minimal Wear (0.07 – 0.15 float values)
• Field-Tested (0.15 – 0.38 float values)
• Well-Worn (0.38 – 0.45 float values)
• Battle-Scarred (0.45 – 1.00 float values)

For instance, a Factory New AK-47 Asiimov will cost substantially more than a Battle-Scarred one.

Pattern

Whenever a skin is unlocked, it gets assigned a pattern from 1-999 randomly and does not change. This pattern number can significantly increase the price of the skin. Pattern ID basically defines the visuals of the skin and where the wear will show. Some Pattern IDs are better than others, hence they are valued more.

StatTrak

When a skin is unlocked, there is a 10% chance to get a StatTrak variant. Essentially, a StatTrak weapon has the ability to count kills you make with that weapon. Since this is a really neat feature, it’s demanded more, hence StatTrak weapons cost a lot. On StatTrak guns, the kill counter is a little digital counter. On knives, the kills are etched into the blades.

StatTrak weapons are demanded more, but StatTrak knives are usually ignored as nobody wants scratches on their knives.

Stickers

Stickers can also increase the value of a skin. Stickers themselves have their own rarity system. Stickers are usually unlocked from sticker capsules, and have a heavy impact on the skin rarity. For instance, a rare skin with a rare sticker becomes even more rare.

Apart from these factors, the rarity of a skin also depends on which collection it’s from and whether it is a Souvenir Skin (skin dropped during Major tournaments, often with team stickers on it) or not. If there is weapon skin from a collection that was released years ago and the chances of Valve releasing it again are low, the skin becomes a lot rarer.

Conclusion

The CS2 skin rarity is hard to grasp for a beginner, but hopefully this article gives you a detailed in-depth look into why some skins are rarer than others. Although the different rarity tiers are easy to understand, things can start to get complicated when there are other factors taken into account like pattern and skin condition. But, once you read about them, things start to make sense. Even though CS2’s skin system is complicated, it is also the best part about the game. The entire culture is just amazing to be a part of, and now that you understand it, you can be too.