VAC, Game Bans and Trade Bans Explained
A Steam profile can carry three different bans, and traders mix them up constantly. One of them ends a trading career, one of them is irrelevant to whether you should trade with someone, and one of them is a flag on the account but not on the items. This guide separates them, explains what happens to the skins on a banned account, and covers the temporary restrictions that get mistaken for bans.
The three bans at a glance
| Ban | Issued by | Why | Effect on items |
|---|---|---|---|
| VAC ban | Valve Anti-Cheat, automatically | Cheat software detected while playing a VAC-secured game | CS2 items on the account become untradable and unmarketable. Permanent. |
| Game ban | The game developer, manually or via reports | Griefing, match-fixing, abusive behaviour, or cheat detection outside VAC | For CS2, the same lock as a VAC ban: the account can play, but its CS2 items cannot leave. |
| Trade ban | Steam Support, manually | Scamming, phishing, fraud, or repeated trade rule violations | The account cannot trade or use the Market at all, across every game. Items are not deleted; they are simply stuck. |
VAC bans
VAC is Valve's automated anti-cheat. A VAC ban is applied by the system, is not reviewed by a person, and is permanent. What matters for a trader is the item consequence: when an account is VAC-banned in CS2, everything in its CS2 inventory becomes untradable and unmarketable. The skins are still visible on the profile. They can still be equipped and used in game. They cannot be moved.
This is why a VAC-banned profile offering you a knife is not a negotiation. Even if the person is sincere, Steam will refuse to put their items into a trade window. The badge on a P2Trades profile is read from Steam's public ban data, so if you see it, the trade cannot happen.
Game bans
A game ban is issued by the developer rather than the anti-cheat. In CS2 that covers the Overwatch review system, in-game reports that lead to a griefing conviction, and detections that Valve chooses to apply as a game ban instead of a VAC ban. The item effect is the same as a VAC ban for CS2 items: locked in place. The difference is mostly historical, which is why the community treats "VAC or game banned" as one category when deciding whether to trade.
One subtlety: a game ban is per game. An account with a game ban in another title can still trade CS2 items freely. Steam shows the ban on the profile without naming the game, so if a profile shows one and the person's CS2 inventory is still tradable, this is usually why.
Trade bans
A trade ban is the one that actually punishes trading behaviour. Steam Support applies it to accounts found scamming, phishing, or laundering stolen items, and it blocks the account from trading and from the Steam Community Market entirely. It can be temporary, and it can be permanent. Items on the account remain there, which is why you will occasionally see a trade-banned profile with an enormous inventory that will never move again.
For you as a trade partner: a trade ban means no trade is technically possible, so the question answers itself. More useful is the softer version, the trade probation label Steam attaches to accounts that were involved in a dispute without a full ban. A profile on probation can trade, but Steam is telling you it has looked at this account recently. Weight it accordingly.
What is not a ban
Most "I got banned" messages in trading communities describe one of these temporary states instead:
- Trade hold (7 days). Items bought on the Market or received in a trade cannot be traded again for seven days. Explained in full in our trade hold guide.
- Steam Guard hold (15 days). If you have not had the Mobile Authenticator enabled for at least seven days, or you recently added it, trades you send are held for up to fifteen days. The account is fine; Steam is protecting a possibly compromised login.
- Password or email change. Changing either restricts trading for a short period. Again a protection, not a penalty.
- Limited account. Accounts that have never spent five dollars on Steam cannot trade or use the Market. Buying anything lifts it.
- Community ban. A restriction on posting, commenting and profile features. Annoying, but it does not touch items or trading.
How to read a profile before trading
Every profile and listing on P2Trades shows the account's ban state, Steam level, account age, and the number of trades it has completed here. Use them together rather than alone:
- Any VAC, game or trade ban: the trade cannot complete in Steam. Do not spend time on it.
- Account under a month old, level 0, no completed trades: possibly a new trader, possibly a throwaway. Insist on a single trade offer that shows both sides, and never send first.
- Old account, decent level, trades completed: not proof of honesty, but a throwaway account cannot fake account age. Hijacked accounts are the risk here, which is why you still read the trade window.
The badges do most of the work for you. The rest is the routine in our scam guide: read every item in the window, confirm on your own device, and never let someone move you off Steam to finish the trade.