The skins in CS:GO can range from a few cents up to several thousands of dollars. Here, we will be taking a look at the most expensive CS:GO skins in 2022.
CS:GO has been around for a long 8 years and during this time, as the game got established, so did its marketplace. The CS:GO skin market is now worth millions of dollars and the prices of these skins are only ever increasing. With skins ranging from a few cents to several hundreds of thousands of dollars, you might be wondering just how expensive can skins get in CS:GO?
Read More: The Rarest CS:GO Skins
What makes a CS:GO skin expensive?
In the simplest definition, the skins that look the nicest and wanted by everyone are the most expensive. But that definition gets real complicated real fast. Along with how nice a skin looks, skin rarity is also a term closely associated with skin price. The harder to obtain an item, the more expensive it gets. Then skin wear, quality, stattrack availability, patterns, and stickers all factor in and, cumulate to the final price of the item.
Skin Wear or Float Number
Skins in the game are assigned float numbers that determine their wear or condition. From 0.0 to 1.0, the higher the number, the worse the condition, and the lower the number the better the condition. Most skins get more scratched up with higher wear values. However, there are some “brightness skins” where only the brightness of the skin texture gets affected with wear making them playable even at higher floats.
Floats 0.000-0.07 are Factory New (FN) skins. These look the best, brightest, have no scratches, and cost the most. From 0.07-0.15 are the Minimal Wear (MW) skins. These look almost the same as FN skins but are more affordable. Field-Tested (FT) skins come in floats 0.15-0.37. These are usually the best value for money and still, look very playable.
Well-Worn (WW) skins range from floats 0.37 to 0.44 and are the range where most skins start to look quite bad. Apart from brightness skins, it is not advised to purchase these tiers of skins. Battle-Scarred (BS) skins range from .44-1.0 and they are the worst quality skin can be. The name’s abbreviation does it justice and it is not advised to go after this tier of skins. An exception to these is the BS >0.96 float AWP | Asiimov known as the Blackiimov(Full black scope) which surprisingly costs more than an FN version.
Skin Quality
Skin quality comes in Industrial Grade (White) Mil-Spec (Blue), Restricted (Purple), Classified (Pink), Covert (Red), and Special Item/Knife (Gold). The prices of items do follow the quality hierarchy for the most part, but at the extreme ends, other factors like patterns and stickers overtake quality in terms of deciding the skin’s price.
StatTrack
CS:GO has a Stattrack variant of almost all skins that keeps a lifetime count of how many kills are acquired with that skin. StatTrack variants of skins are always a lot more expensive than the normal versions.
Patterns
Here is where it gets really complicated. In the case of most skins, it is not that much of a concern but the pattern in high tier items can influence the value to be a few times their normal cost just because of the pattern. Also, ordinary cheap skin can be worth an immense value just because of the pattern.
Blue Gems in Case Hardened skins, Pearls in Doppler skins, Good Webbing in Crimson Web skins, perfect fades, etc are some of the rarest patterns and are worth several times more.
Stickers
Stickers are another add-on for skins that affects the rarity and price of a skin. Stickers like Katowice 2014 ones are absurdly rare and a skin’s rarity is determined by what sticker it has along with the position of the sticker too. For example, a Souvenir Dragon Lore with a KennyS gold foil on the scope is worth several times as much as the same skin with random stickers.
But the absolute most expensive CS:GO sticker in the world is the Katowice 2014 Titan Holo. Eight of these were sold recently for a whopping $500,000 USD making the price of a single one about $62,500 USD. Depending on the weapon and sticker position, a portion of the sticker price is added to the total value of the skin.
- Read More: The Rarest CS:GO Skins
Top 10 Most Expensive CS:GO skins
Now we bring you the most expensive skins in CSGO. Note that the market is fluctuating but it’s safe to say the prices you see are only going to keep on increasing. Especially due to the current downward slope of the bitcoin market, a lot of Chinese traders have entered into the CS:GO market and invested hundreds of thousands of dollars into collector items and driving up the prices along the way.
The prices listed here are just estimates as all of these items are one of a kind and the current owners of the skins can literally name any price they want. So here, estimated prices have been used.
10. StatTrack Ak-47 | Vulcan Factory New with 4x Titan Katowice 2014 Holos
We start with the 10th most expensive skin on this list; The StatTrack Ak-47 | Vulcan FN with 4x Titan Katowice 2014 Holos. You might think that why the $9000 Fire Serpent was listed as an Honorable mention but why is a $700 Vulcan in the top 10?
It’s because of the Stickers. The Titan Katowice 2014 Holos as discussed earlier are the most expensive skins in the game now and the stickers themselves cost around $50,000, bringing the total value of this skin to $100,000 USD.
9. 0.000009 StatTrack M4A4 | The Emperor with 4x Titan Katowice 2014 Holos
The 9th most expensive skin in the list is the StatTrack M4A4 | The Emperor with 4x Titan Katowice 2014 Holos. The ST FN M4A4 Emperor is nothing remarkable but what makes this specific skin worth so much is the float value and again, the Katowice 2014 stickers. Consider from now on, these stickers will be a recurring factor in the world’s most expensive CS:GO skins.
The float on this M4A4 | The Emperor is 0.000009 which is an insane number making it the cleanest Emperor to exist. Add to that 4x Titan Kato14 Holos and you got yourself a skin worth around $110,000 USD.
8. 0.0005 AWP | Medusa with 4x Titan Katowice 2014 Holos
The AWP | Medusa in itself is one of the most expensive skins in the game. The FT variant of this skin costs around $2500 and the FN costs around $6500. But this specific AWP | Medusa is the 8th most expensive skin in the world.
It was crafted by Drone and in 2017, he put 4x Titan Holos on this skin. Add to that an amazing float of 0.0005 and you got yourself a crazy expensive skin.
In the first week of June, this skin was bought by a YouTuber named ProdigyDDK for $128,000. The current value of this skin is estimated to be over $150,000 USD.
7. StatTrack M4A4 | Howl with 4x Titan Katowice 2014 Holos
The M4A4 Howl was one of the most controversial skins of CS:GO. After getting accused of stolen artwork, the skin was removed from the case and was given the skin tier of “Contraband”. It is the only skin to receive that title and afterward it there was no way to get a new M4 Howl. So the ones that have been opened skyrocketed in price making the skin extremely rare. On top of that a Stattrack with 4x Titan Holos? You’re looking at $160,000 USD.
6. 0.003 AWP | Gungnir with 4x Titan Holos
The AWP | Gungnir was one of the recent significant additions to the game and it has taken the community by storm. The AWP by itself is the most expensive AWP in the game costing around $5000 for a Field-tested one and $12,500 for a Factory new one. But when 4x Titan Katowice 2014 stickers are slapped on a 0.003 AWP the value of this skin jumps to $180,000 USD.
5. 0.003 ST FN M4 Howl with 4x IBP Holos
This is another M4A4 Howl that has a float value of 0.003 making it the lowest float Stattrack Howl in the world. The stickers on this beast are the iBuyPower Katowice 2014 Holos and although they are not as expensive as the Titan Holos, these are still worth around $40,000 USD each.
This skin is estimated to be valued at around $200,000 USD.
4. Souvenir FN AWP | Dragon Lore with 4x Titan Holos
The AWP | Dragon Lore finally makes an appearance at the 4th most expensive skin in CS:GO history. This one is a Souvenir AWP | Dragon Lore Factory new and this one is especially expensive because of the sticker of PashaBiceps on the scope. This skin’s estimated value is around $220,000 USD.
3. Souvenir AWP | Dragon Lore FN with 4x Titan Holos
We have another AWP | Dragon Lore but the one owned by Chinese trader lord belle is the one with 4x Titan Holos on them. This, at first sight, looks like normal skin but in fact, it is Souvenir skin. The owner scratched off all the gold foil stickers and then proceeded to put on Titan Kato14 Holo stickers. Absolute mad lad.
The current estimated value of this skin is thought to be around $250,000 USD.
2. Stattrack Ak-47 | Case Hardened Blue Gem with 4x Titan Holos
The Ak-47 | Case Hardened pattern #661, also known as the Scar pattern is a Blue gem and is considered the best Blue Gem pattern for the AK. What sets this blue gem apart from all the rest is that not only it is Stattrack and in Factory new condition, but also the 4x Titan Holos on it.
This is the point you all get the gist, take a nice skin, slap on 4 of the current most expensive stickers in the world and you got yourself one of the most expensive CS:GO skins in the world.
This skin is so legendary that Astralis star dupreeh can be seen lending this skin to use in professional matches.
Noticing this Ak in a match vs Virtus.Pro in the IEM Katowice 2021 Quarterfinal, here is a quote from the match “It’s a massive flex, it’s like he’s walking in the jeweled, the dazzled, covered-in-diamonds Gucci Slides”
It is currently valued at around $400,000 USD.
1. #387 Karambit | Case Hardened Blue Gem
We finally get to the most expensive CS:GO skin in the world. This skin is one of the most well-known and legendary skins in the CS:GO community. It is a Karambit | Case Hardened skin and it is a blue gem. It Factory New in the #387 pattern, the best in the game with a solid blue playside.
This skin was last sold to a Chinese YouTuber back in 2016 for a whopping $150,000 USD back then. It was the biggest CS:GO transaction in history at the time and it held that title for 5 years straight. The skin had one owner throughout these years and if he decides to sell in the current market, full of big sharks coming from the Crypto boom and bust, he can easily sell this for over $600,000 USD.
Honorable Mention: Cleanest Stattrack Karambit | Crimson Web FN
This skin is one of the most expensive because it is not only in Stattrack and in Factory New condition, but also because of its pattern. Currently owned by l0rd, it has pattern #59 and it has the best-webbed playside (Playside: Part of the karambit facing the player while not being inspected) It has an estimated value of $50,000 USD. This is extremely expensive for skin but it is only listed as an honorable mention as this price will look like pocket change compared to what was in the top 10.
Honorable Mention 2: StatTrack Ak-47 | Fire Serpent with 4x iBuyPower Holos
The Fire Serpent itself is one of the most expensive Ak-47s in the game and a Factory New version will cost around $9000. But because of the 4 iBuyPower Katowice 2014 stickers on it and each sticker costing around $40,000 USD, the estimated price of this skin is around $80,000 USD. This is also an honorable mention as this huge price tag is still not enough to bring it to the top 10.
Let that sink in, some imaginary pixels in an imaginary video game costing as much as sports cars or even a luxury house. This is the current CS:GO market with some very wealthy traders and enthusiasts with a lot of money to burn. And the prices of the skins mentioned in this list are just going up with every single change of hand.
- Read More: Best AWP Skins in CS:GO
