Trade holds, cooldowns and the seven-day rule: how a Counter-Strike trade actually moves

These delays are part of Steam’s server-side protections against scams, and they change depending on your account’s history with Steam Guard and trading.

Trade holds and the 15-day timer

When you trade or sell items, Steam will place the trade or sale on hold for up to 15 days. The exact duration depends on two key factors: the account's authenticator status, and whether any recent authenticator changes have been made.

If your account has been made-trading-ready with Steam Guard for less than 7 days, or if your account doesn't have Steam Guard enabled and just created trading or selling order, Steam will hold your trade or sale for a full 15 days. During this time, you can't cancel the trade to return the items to your inventory. If you do, Steam will not apply the cancellation. After 15 days, the items will be delivered as originally agreed.

Even if you add a Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator to your account, Steam will still hold trades or sales created before the authenticator was added, and anything made during its first 7 days, for the full 15 days. Only trades or sales created more than 7 days after adding the authenticator, regardless of its start date, will emerge from the hold un-delayed. Steam makes it clear that adding the authenticator will not reduce the remaining length of existing holds.

The authenticator’s role

By itself, just activating a Mobile Authenticator is not enough for most items to begin moving faster. Without waiting out the full 7 days, you can only avoid holds on newly created trades or sales, while everything already in motion remains stuck.

It is important to note that if a trade or sale you made before enabling the authenticator, or while it was still within its first 7 days, runs into an issue, you will not be able to cancel the trade. If the sale runs into an issue, as always you will not be able to remove the created listing. You must allow the trade or sale to complete for the items to move.

Even if you have the authenticator enabled, if Steam suspects a trade was made fraudulently, the trade may still be held for up to 15 days. Steam does this to protect you from unauthorized activity, so while frustrating, the hold is intended to safeguard your account.

Trading and Market access restrictions

Beyond holds, Steam requires that an account have had Steam Guard enabled for 15 full days before allowing any trading or Community Market activity. If Steam Guard has not been continuously enabled for a full 15 days, your account will be unable to trade items or post listings, regardless of any active holds or cooldowns. Steam makes this very clear in its restrictions documentation.

As with trade holds, adding a Mobile Authenticator on a 15-day timer will not instantly remove trading or Market access restrictions. You must wait the full 15 days, and only then will you be able to trade or list items on the Community Market. Adding an authenticator does not immediately remove existing restrictions.

These restrictions are not related to trade holds or cooldowns, but rather a separate account security policy. Adding an authenticator places new items under its protections, but does not allow any items put in motion before its activation to move immediately, or remove any active holds or restrictions.

Restricted accounts

It's also possible for an account to be outright restricted from trading, regardless of its authenticator status or trade history. Steam can lock an account or ban it from trading if it determines a violation of the Steam Subscriber Agreement or Steam Community Guidelines has occurred. This can happen for a variety of reasons, from selling stolen items, to participating in real-money trading, to signing up multiple times to evade restrictions.

In these cases, a Steam restriction prevents pending items from moving. While restricted, items cannot be transferred, traded, or listed for sale. The duration of a lock or ban varies, and it may be temporary or permanent.

If you believe a restriction has been placed on your account in error, you can appeal to Steam. Your appeal will be reviewed, and if approved, the restriction will be lifted. Items held during a restriction will typically become available to trade again once the restriction is removed.

What doesn’t start the trade moving

It's important to note that adding the Mobile Authenticator does not automatically remove all holds or restrictions on your items. Items that were put in motion before the authenticator was activated, or that were pending during its first 7 days, will remain on the original hold schedule. Steam will still hold trades pending at the time of authenticator activation, regardless of its length.

Similarly, any current trading or Market restrictions on an account are not instantly lifted when an authenticator is added. You must wait the full 15 days before these restrictions will be cleared and your account can trade freely. During this time, trades or sales will still be held for the full 15 days if pending at the time of the restriction.

Additionally, trades or Market listings created during the first 7 days after adding a Mobile Authenticator will be held for 15 days. This is to protect your account from any unauthorized access and ensure that it is indeed you making trades. Trades or Market listings created more than 7 days after adding the authenticator will not be held by Steam.

After this initial seven days, and assuming no active holds or restrictions, you will be able to freely trade and list items. Steam emphasizes that these holds and restrictions are not intended to be punitive, but rather protective measures to guard against scams and unauthorized account access.

The 7-day cooldown is not universal

One thing not to confuse is the 7-day trading cooldown with the 15-day hold for newly activated authenticator, or the 7-day hold on newly added authenticator activity. The 7-day cooldown in Steam Support refers to the penalty for cancelling a trade while it is in the hold period. If you cancel a trade before its 15-day hold is up, Steam will lock your account from completing any more trades for 7 days. The lock applies to each party in a trade, regardless of who cancelled. This is often the root of the frustration traders experience when Steam says a trade or sale can't go through.

Importantly, this 7-day penalty cooldown only generates from cancelling a trade after it's been put in hold. Steam does not take any action on new trades or sales during the 7-day mark. Just understand that canceling a trade after it is placed in hold, as opposed to 3 days earlier, subjects you to this 7-day rule.