How free games make money: where the £0 download pays for itself

Quick checks

• Open the shop and add-ons list before downloading to see what is for sale.
• Check whether paid items change looks only, or also power, speed or odds.
• Look for paid random items and their published odds.
• Note how currency packs compare to item prices to spot leftover-balance traps.
• Set a spending limit or approval rule on the platform before play starts.

Why publishers give the game away

A free download removes the biggest barrier to trying a game. More players means fuller matchmaking, more friends inviting friends, and more people who might, at some point, decide to buy something. Free-to-play games are built on the expectation that most players will spend nothing and a smaller group will spend regularly.

That has a useful side effect for non-payers: the game needs you. A shooter with empty lobbies fails, so free players are part of the product, not an afterthought. The trade-off is that the game is also designed to give you reasons to spend, and some designs push harder than others.

It also explains why free games change so much over time. A paid game is mostly finished at launch. A free game is a service that keeps adding maps, characters, modes and events, because each update is a reason for lapsed players to come back and for active players to visit the shop. That ongoing work is funded by the same purchases described below.

Cosmetics: paying for looks rather than power

The cleanest model sells things that change how you look, not how well you play: character outfits, weapon finishes, emotes, banners and similar. Most of the big team shooters we cover lean on this model, and it is why they tend to score well on our pay-to-win checks.

Cosmetic-only does not mean cheap. Popular outfits are often sold in bundles, shops rotate stock so items come and go, and some cosmetics are only available for a limited period. Those are pressure tactics, not power advantages, but they are still worth recognising.

Shops in these games also tend to be built around rotation. Items appear for a day or a week and then leave, sometimes to return later and sometimes not. Knowing that the shop will change tomorrow is a useful brake: if an item really matters, it will often come round again.

Premium currencies and why packs never match prices

Almost every free game sells its own currency rather than pricing items in pounds. You buy a pack of points, gems or crystals, then spend those in the shop. For example, the UK Xbox listing for Valorant showed VALORANT Points packs starting at £3.99 when checked on 3 November 2026.

Currencies have two effects worth knowing about. First, they make prices harder to judge, because you are no longer looking at pounds. Second, pack sizes and item prices often don't line up, so you can end up with a leftover balance that nudges you toward buying another pack to use it. Once currency is in a game, it generally stays in that game.

A simple habit helps: before buying anything, work out the price in pounds using the pack you would actually have to buy, not the cheapest per-point rate on the biggest pack. If an item costs slightly more than the smallest pack, the real price is two packs, minus whatever is left over.

Seasons and passes: paying for a reward track

Many free games run in seasons of several weeks, each with a pass: a ladder of rewards you unlock by playing. There is usually a free track and a paid premium track with more rewards. Passes are popular with publishers because they encourage regular play across the whole season and turn a one-off purchase into a repeating one.

The details vary a lot between games, especially around whether a pass expires. Our battle passes explainer covers how they work and how to judge one.

Random draws, loot boxes and gacha

Some games sell chances rather than items. You pay, directly or with currency, for a random reward: a loot box, a card pack, or a draw on a "gacha" banner, as used for characters and weapons in games such as Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail. These games usually also give out draws for free through play, which is how non-paying players progress.

This is the model regulators watch most closely. In the UK, industry principles published in July 2023 with government support commit companies to clear probability disclosures and to technical controls that stop under-18s buying paid loot boxes without a parent's consent. And under PEGI's 2026 rules, games with paid random items now default to a PEGI 16 rating. More on both below.

Random-draw games often add "pity" systems, where a guaranteed reward arrives after a set number of draws. That limits bad luck, but it also gives a clear target that can be reached faster by paying. If a game publishes its odds and pity rules, read them before deciding how you feel about the model.

Expansions, unlocks and time-savers

Some free games make money more like traditional games. Destiny 2, for example, is free to start, but much of its story content is sold as paid expansions. Other games let you unlock characters either by playing or by paying, and sell boosts that speed up progress.

Time-savers sit in a grey area. Buying a boost doesn't make you better at the game, but if the free route is slow enough, paying starts to feel like the intended path. How grindy the free route is gets its own score on every game page on this site.

A useful test is to look at what a new player can do on day one without paying, and what is locked. If the locked part is a later story chapter, that is closer to a traditional expansion. If it is the strongest gear in competitive modes, it moves towards pay-to-win.

Platform memberships and perks inside free games

Console subscriptions also earn money from free games without charging for entry. Sony's PS Plus page advertises exclusive content packs for select free-to-play games, and Xbox advertises in-game benefits for Game Pass members, including an option on the UK Valorant listing to unlock all current and future Agents by linking a Riot account. None of these is needed to play.

Whether you need a subscription for online play at all depends on the console. Our subscriptions guide covers it platform by platform.

What this means if you never plan to pay

Understanding the money model helps you predict the pressure. Cosmetic shops mainly push limited-time items. Pass-based games push regular play. Random-draw games push "just one more" pull, especially around new characters. PEGI's 2026 criteria reflect these designs: from June 2026, newly submitted games with time-limited or quantity-limited offers default to PEGI 12, and features that reward returning daily default to PEGI 7, rising to PEGI 12 if missing days punishes you.

None of this means a game is bad. It means you can choose games whose model you are comfortable with, set the spending controls on your PS5, Xbox, Switch or phone, and enjoy them for free.