Spectrum Case: 53% payout, 13% chance of profit. Is opening it with $100 fair
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Spectrum Case

Is it fair to open Spectrum Case

In-game case, Valve odds Opening price $5.91
E Grade
53% Payout
−$2.80 Average loss per opening

Top prize ★ Butterfly Knife | Doppler · $2016.05 · 0.0043% chance per opening

What happens to $100

Scenario: open the case 16 times with the whole $100 budget and sell every drop at market prices. Here is what you get:

Openings it buys 16
Left after 16 openings $24.08 8 times out of 10: between $14.97 and $134.62
Chance to end ahead 13%
Chance to double 3.6%
Chance at the top prize 0.07%
Openings until zero 21

Everything is worked out at today’s market prices and the odds we could read. It is arithmetic, not a forecast or advice: someone gets a knife on the first try, but on average this is how it goes.

Ranked 16 of 42 CS2 cases by payout

Cases with a similar payout

Questions

Why is the Spectrum Case payout below 100%?

The case and key cost $5.91, and almost everything that drops is a cheap skin: 79.92% for the lowest tier, 0.26% for a knife or gloves. Multiply the odds by market prices and you get 53% — that much of every 100 comes back on average.

Where do the prices come from?

The best market offers at the time of the calculation: Skinport, CSFloat, Market.CSGO, DMarket, Waxpeer and White.Market. That is what a drop actually sells for, not a display price.

What does “openings until zero” mean?

The way cases are really opened: sell the drop, open again while you can afford a case. For Spectrum Case that is 21 openings on average — then the balance is below the opening price. Everyone gets there: a payout below 100% works like gravity.

What if I get lucky?

Over 16 openings the chance to pull ★ Butterfly Knife | Doppler is 0.1%, the chance to double the budget is 3.6%. Both numbers are honest, and both are small.