A skin market with a roulette wheel on top
CSGOEmpire is a CS2 skin gambling site, and its biggest draw is the marketplace behind the games. You don't buy skins from the site. Other players list theirs, you pay in Empire coins, and the seller sends the skin to you through a normal Steam trade. Its help centre says there are no fees for depositing or withdrawing skins.
It has been running since 2015. Its help page names the owner as Monarch, who started building it in 2015 on an 11,000 euro loan, and the company as Moonrail Limited in Curacao. Our owner records identify Monarch as the Finnish entrepreneur Ossi Ketola. Monarch also launched Duel in 2025. About 6.3 million visits came in August 2026, and traffic has stayed between 6.1 and 6.8 million a month since March. Sweden is the biggest market at about 14% of visits, then Norway, Germany and the US.
Coins, and what they're worth
Everything is priced in coins. CSGOEmpire's help centre puts 1 coin at $0.6142808, so 100 coins is about $61.43. Skin prices come mainly from BUFF market data, and the default price sits about 6% below the BUFF listing. By the price data we track, buying on its market costs about 3.5% more than on CSFloat.
What the house keeps
The house edge is the share the site keeps on average. At 8.8%, every $100 you put through cases returns about $91.20 in the long run. The help centre states these:
| Game | House edge |
|---|---|
| Cases and case battles | 8.8% |
| Roulette | 6.66% |
| Coinflip | 0.5% (down from 3%) |
Roulette is the classic one: 15 slots, and green pays 14x, which is where the 6.66% comes from. Coinflip at 0.5% is close to free to play. The 8.8% on cases is lower than CSGORoll (9.1%) and Clash.gg (9.9%) in our case study, though for CSGOEmpire we use its stated figure. The games are provably fair: you can check after a round that the result came from seeds fixed before you bet.
There is a rakeback on top. 25% of the house edge on your roulette, case and battle bets (5% on match bets) goes into your daily pool. Once a day you can take 5% of that pool, either as 90% cash or as a low, medium or high-risk daily case. Unclaimed days are lost. Our estimate is that a player who claims every day pays about 6.8% on cases instead of 8.8%. XP from betting also unlocks seven tiers of level cases, from Rust to Unbreakable, with cooldowns of 1 to 6 hours.
The code BETREFS
Code BETREFS opens one free Gift Case, with no deposit, after you sign in with Steam and verify your email. It holds two items: an SG 553 Waves Perforated worth 0.01 coins at 99.99%, and a Butterfly Knife Marble Fade worth 2,050 coins (about $1,259) at 0.01%. On average it is worth about 13 cents. It costs nothing, so take it, but it is a 1 in 10,000 ticket, not a bonus. If you already have an account, you can switch to BETREFS only after 30 days without a bet.
Paying in and cashing out
Skins. You list skins for sale. Listings priced at 6% or less above the suggested price first go to a 3-minute auction. Once sold, you have 30 minutes (auction) or 12 hours (normal listing) to send the Steam trade, or you get a trade punishment. Since Steam made every trade reversible for 7 days, CSGOEmpire has held seller payouts: a seller may now wait up to 8 days for the coins. An instant credit limit pays part early, but tiers above zero need level 40 or more.
Crypto. Its help pages list BTC, BCH, ETH, LTC, USDT, USDC, TRX, BNB, SOL, DOGE and XRP, with no minimum deposit. Withdrawal fees are network fees plus a small processor charge, which CSGOEmpire says it doesn't profit from. LTC, SOL, XRP, BNB and TRX are always instant, while a slow Bitcoin withdrawal can take up to 24 hours. Cash payment options depend on your country, and gift codes count as cash.
The rule to know before you deposit. If you deposit cash or crypto, you must bet the full amount once before you can withdraw crypto. Skin deposits are exempt. CSGOEmpire says it is not a crypto exchange, and accounts that deposit and withdraw crypto without betting can have crypto withdrawals and tips switched off. Skin withdrawals are the way out in that case.
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ID checks and proof of address
KYC is an identity check. CSGOEmpire's help centre says it usually starts after you have withdrawn 4,500 coins in crypto in total, about $2,764, and its security system can ask earlier. You need a live photo of a passport, driving licence or ID card, plus proof of address: a bank statement, utility bill or other official letter in your name, issued in the last 90 days.
That second document is what many complaints are about. One player in August 2026 says the account was blocked after a $300 deposit and a football bet, and they couldn't give proof of address because their home is in occupied Ukraine. If you live in student housing, with your parents or anywhere bills aren't in your name, sort this out before you deposit, not when you want to withdraw.
What players say
CSGOEmpire scores about 3 out of 5 on Trustpilot from more than 3,600 reviews. The recent bad ones follow a pattern: bans with no explanation, support called rude and sarcastic, and one player who used a housemate's referral code and says both accounts lost their referral rewards. The help centre allows several accounts but bans referring yourself from an alt account. One good review, from June 2026, says crypto cash-outs landed in under a minute.
Licence and the founder
The help centre says CSGOEmpire holds a Curacao gambling licence, shown through a badge in the footer, and that the countries it can't accept are listed in its terms. Both are loaded by script, so on 24 October 2026 we could not read the licence number or the blocked list ourselves. Check that list before you sign up.
Monarch is a public owner, which is rarer than it should be in this business. He is also combative: in April 2024 CSGOEmpire claimed responsibility for protesters storming the stage at the PGL Major in Copenhagen, in a feud with CSGORoll. That says more about his style than about whether the site pays.
Who it suits
CSGOEmpire suits players who trade skins and want low, published edges, especially on roulette and coinflip. It is strict: plan for ID and proof of address, bet any cash deposit once before cashing out in crypto, and expect sold skins to pay out after about a week. If you want to stop, the "Take a break" self-lock is on your profile page, and support can apply an indefinite ban.