CS2 has fewer free cases than most players expect. There is one weekly reward for Prime accounts, a paid pass that turns playtime into items, and the Steam Community Market. Everything else, including every case opening, costs money. Here is how each route works as of October 2026.
The weekly care package
When CS2 launched in September 2023, Valve replaced the old random weekly drops with a Weekly Care Package. It works like this:
- You need Prime Status. Since June 2021, accounts without Prime do not earn XP, ranks or item drops. Prime costs $14.99 on the US Steam store.
- It unlocks on your first level-up of the week. A profile level takes 5,000 XP, and the weekly XP bonus makes the first level of the week the fastest one.
- You see four rewards and keep two. The options can include a weapon case, a terminal, a weapon skin from the current drop collections, or graffiti.
- One package per week. The weekly period resets on Tuesday evening US time (02:00 GMT on Wednesday), so leveling up twice in a week does not give a second package.
If a case is one of your four options, it is usually worth taking, because a case can be sold on the Market while most drop skins are worth very little. Check the current Market price of each option before you choose.
Active and rare drop pool
Valve does not publish which cases can appear in the care package. Trackers that log thousands of drops split them into an active pool, which shows up regularly, and a rare pool of older cases that still appear now and then.
As of mid-2026, trackers such as Tradeit list the Dead Hand Terminal, the Genesis Terminal, the Kilowatt Case, the Revolution Case and the Dreams & Nightmares Case in the regular rotation. Treat any list like this as a snapshot, because Valve changes the pool without announcing every change.
The skin collections are documented. In March 2025 Valve added the Ascent, Boreal and Radiant collections to the care package list. In January 2026 it added Harlequin and Achroma and removed Safehouse, Dust 2 and the 2018 Nuke and Inferno collections.
The Armory Pass
The Armory arrived in October 2024 and replaced the old Operation passes. CS2 has not run a classic Operation, so the Armory is now the paid way to turn playtime into items.
- An Armory Pass is Prime-only and is bought in the game, priced in your local currency. Guides list it at $15.99 in the US.
- Each pass holds 40 Armory Credits. Since a November 2024 update, all 40 are earned by gaining XP while the pass is active.
- You spend credits on whatever the Armory currently offers: weapon collections, charms, stickers, limited edition items and, at times, cases.
The Armory has carried two cases so far. The Gallery Case launched with it in October 2024 and was removed on October 1, 2025. The Fever Case was added in March 2025. The July 2026 update added the Arabesque and Spy Tech weapon collections. Check the Armory tab in the game to see what is available right now.
Terminals
Since September 2025, Valve has also released collections through terminals instead of cases. The Genesis Terminal (September 2025) and the Dead Hand Terminal (March 2026) both come as weekly drops. Instead of a random unbox with a key, a terminal lets you buy items from its collection at the price it offers. In March 2026 Valve added a setting that caps the offers you are shown at a maximum you choose.
The Dead Hand collection added 22 new gloves as its rare special items, the first new gloves in CS2.
Recent cases and terminals
| Container | Released | How you get it |
|---|---|---|
| Revolution Case | Feb 2023 | Weekly drop |
| Kilowatt Case | Feb 2024 | Weekly drop |
| Gallery Case | Oct 2024 | Armory (removed Oct 2025) |
| Fever Case | Mar 2025 | Armory |
| Genesis Terminal | Sep 2025 | Weekly drop |
| Dead Hand Terminal | Mar 2026 | Weekly drop |
Every one of them can also be bought from other players on the Steam Community Market, as long as someone is selling.
Buying on the Steam Market
The Market is the only option without Prime, and the fastest one with it. You pay with Steam Wallet funds, and the listed price already includes Valve's fees, which the seller pays. Our Steam Market fees guide shows how much a seller actually keeps.
- Market purchases have a cooldown. An item bought on the Market cannot be traded, resold or relisted for about seven days.
- Old cases are not always expensive. Prices follow supply and demand, not age. Look at the price history on the item page before you buy.
- Market balance stays on Steam. Money from Market sales goes to your Steam Wallet. It cannot be withdrawn as cash.
Keys, prices and odds
A case does nothing without a key. In the US a key costs $2.49 in the game store, and Valve sets local prices elsewhere. Keys bought from Valve since October 2019 cannot be traded or sold, so there is no cheaper secondhand supply.
Opening a case is a paid random draw. These are the rarity odds that Valve disclosed for its weapon cases:
| Rarity | Chance per opening |
|---|---|
| Mil-Spec (blue) | 79.92% |
| Restricted (purple) | 15.98% |
| Classified (pink) | 3.20% |
| Covert (red) | 0.64% |
| Knife or gloves (gold) | 0.26% |
A knife or gloves comes out of roughly 1 opening in 385, and four in five openings give the lowest tier. If you want a specific skin, buying that skin directly almost always costs less than opening cases until it appears. Some countries handle cases differently: Valve's notes for the Genesis Terminal mention separate rules for Belgium, the Netherlands and France.
Since October 2025, five Covert skins can also be traded up for a knife or gloves from one of their collections, which made top-tier items reachable without opening a case.
Trade protection
On July 16, 2025, Valve added Trade Protected Items. If you lose control of your account or get scammed, you can reverse all Counter-Strike item trades from the last seven days from the Trade History page.
- Items you receive in a trade are marked as protected and cannot be traded or sold until the seven days pass.
- The person who reverses trades gets a 30-day restriction on trading and Market activity.
- Market purchases cannot be reversed, because there is no sender to reverse them.
If you buy cases from another player, the case is not fully yours until the protection window closes. Do not pass it on, or pay for anything else with it, before then.
Which route makes sense
- You already have Prime: level up once a week and take the case or terminal when it is offered. That is the only free route.
- You want a specific case: buy it on the Market and check the price history first.
- You play a lot anyway: an Armory Pass can make sense if you like what the Armory currently offers.
- You want a specific skin: skip cases and buy the skin. Our guide to the most expensive CS2 skins covers what makes rare items worth what they are.
If you do not have Prime yet, our Premier unlock guide covers Prime, profile levels and the weekly XP bonus.