VALORANT economy guide: What to buy and when you should buy it

Managing the economy is one of the most important parts of VALORANT. Knowing what weapons, armor, and abilities to buy and when to buy them can easily be the difference between winning or losing.

The basics are pretty easy to understand. You start each round with a certain amount of credits to buy weapons, armor, and abilities. After a round, you earn more credits depending on how well you did, and those credits will go towards replenishing your gear if needed.

But it’s not always so simple, so we’ve prepared a guide for players of all levels explaining how the economy in VALORANT works.

How many creds do you earn from kills and rounds in VALORANT?

At the beginning of each half, each player starts with 800 Creds. This is called the pistol round, but we’ll get more into what to buy in each round later.

You earn 200 Creds per kill, regardless of which weapon you use or if you get a kill with an ability. The attacking team receives 300 Credits per player for planting the Spike.

The team that wins the round receives 3000 Creds per player no matter what. But the amount of Creds you receive for losing a round depends entirely on how many consecutive rounds you’ve lost:

• Losing a round rewards 1,900 Creds
• Losing a second round in a row rewards 2,400 Creds
• Losing three or more rounds in a row rewards 2,900 credits per round

If you survive in a round where your team lost, you only earn 1,000 Credits.

In overtime rounds, each player starts with 5,000 Creds no matter what.

How should I spend Creds in VALORANT? What should I buy?

How you should spend your Creds depends on what round it is, what’s happened in the previous round, and how much money both you and your teammates have. Before deciding on what to buy, check your scoreboard to see how much money everyone on your team has. These factors will determine whether you should buy or save in the next round.

Here are some common situations in VALORANT and how you should approach them.

The pistol round

In the first round of each half, you start with 800 Credits, meaning you can buy either an upgraded pistol, a small handful of abilities, half armor, or a combination of all of these. What you choose depends on so many factors, including the map you’re on, the pistols you prefer, and your agent composition.

These are some reliable pistol buy combinations you can choose from:

• A Ghost (500 Creds) and one or two abilities. The Ghost is one of the best pistols given its damage range, low recoil, and quick fire rate. Depending on the agent you are playing, you can also get one or two more abilities with your leftover 300.
• Half armor (400 Creds) and one or two abilities. Instead of upgrading your pistol, give yourself some more protection with half armor.
• A Sheriff (800 Creds). Feeling frisky with your aim? Instant kill any opposing player with a perfect headshot with the Sheriff.

Full buy

If you and your team have plenty of money, say 4,400 or more Creds per player, you will want to full buy. With this amount of money, you should be able to buy full armor, either a Phantom or Vandal and a full kit of abilities.

Save or eco

Saving is when your team doesn’t have enough money to properly buy for that round, so you either buy nothing or just one or two items that you still have around 4,400 Creds each when the next round starts.

Half buy

A half buy is when you buy enough weapons and abilities to compete in the round, but still saving enough to buy full in the next round. This is common for players and teams that are on a maximum loss bonus, since win or lose they will have plenty to spend next round. Instead of a rifle, full armor, and full abilities, players on a half buy might be an SMG or a shotgun, half armor, and just one or two abilities.

Force buy

Force buys are typically when a team is losing in the second half when their opponents have reached match point or 12 rounds. Since losing the next round means the match would be over, the losing team buys as much as they can to give them the best chance at winning.