cs2.sh vs Pricempire for CS2 Price Data

Choose cs2.sh when the product depends on CS2-specific history depth, completed-sale series, structured variants, liquidity with estimated sale time, BUFF range markets, or full Steam orderbooks. Choose Pricempire when 40+ marketplace coverage, multi-game support, portfolio data, or built-in comparison tooling matters more.

The products optimize for different breadth#

Pricempire is a broad market and trading platform. Its official page advertises 40+ marketplaces, one-minute price updates, CS2 plus other game economies, and APIs for prices, items, indexes, inventory, and comparison.

cs2.sh covers the six highest-volume CS2 marketplaces: BUFF, Youpin, CSFloat, Skinport, Steam, and C5Game, with the best data on each. Its narrower marketplace list is paired with sell listings (asks), buy orders (bids), active-order counts, completed sales, ask and bid OHLC, variants, liquidity, BUFF range buckets, and Steam depth.

Current differences#

Pricempire's current API documentation labels item price history as Enterprise-only and limits each requested date range to 180 days. Its marketing page separately advertises more than five years of historical data. If a project needs a backfill longer than 180 days, verify how successive ranges and retention work before purchase.

What cs2.sh returns for a CS2 item#

One request carries all six marketplaces under a single market_hash_name, each with its own collection time:

curl -X POST https://api.cs2.sh/v1/prices/latest \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer <<YOUR_API_KEY>>" \
  -H "Accept-Encoding: gzip" --compressed \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"items": ["USP-S | Printstream (Factory New)"]}'

"buff": {
  "updated_at": "2026-07-26T18:50:53Z",
  "collected_at": "2026-07-26T18:53:10.67Z",
  "ask": 109.72,
  "ask_volume": 463,
  "bid": 106.17,
  "bid_volume": 41
}

ask is the lowest sell listing, bid the highest buy order, and ask_volume and bid_volume the active order counts behind them. updated_at is the marketplace's own timestamp and collected_at is when cs2.sh read it, so freshness is checkable per source rather than per response.

For history, POST /v1/prices/history returns OHLC per bucket with sample_count, open_time, and close_time. Request ranges are bounded per request rather than per account:

A 1d request has no range limit at all, so a multi-year backfill is one call rather than a sequence of capped windows.

Pick cs2.sh when#

• The same product needs current prices, intraday OHLC, and completed-sale archives.
• Steam daily sale history back to 2013 or CSFloat daily sales from 2022 matters.
• Doppler, Gamma Doppler, or Case Hardened variants must stay structured across sources and history.
• A liquidity class and estimated sale-time range is more useful than a relative numeric score.
• BUFF float or fade ranges and Steam full-depth orderbooks are product inputs.
• A high-volume backfill would exceed a monthly call allowance.

Pick Pricempire when#

• The application needs far more than six marketplaces.
• Rust, Dota 2, TF2, or other game economies share the same integration.
• Portfolio pricing, marketplace comparison, inventory, indexes, and trading data should come from one broader platform.
• A numeric liquidity field and provider-level current pricing are sufficient.
• A metered monthly request plan fits the expected workload.

Validate before deciding#

Run the same exact items through both providers, including an illiquid skin, a Doppler phase, and an item missing on one source. Compare returned source identity, timestamp meaning, null handling, variant selection, and the historical series you will actually use.

Frequently asked questions#

Is cs2.sh a good Pricempire alternative?#

Yes, when data quality on the high-volume markets matters more than breadth: ask and bid OHLC, completed-sale history, full-depth Steam and CSFloat orderbooks, structured variants with history, and unlimited requests at 10 per second, where Pricempire's API history is Enterprise-only, capped at a 180-day range, and daily. Pricempire is stronger for 40+ markets, multi-game coverage, and portfolio and comparison tooling. See best Pricempire alternatives for the full roundup.

Does Pricempire have OHLC price history?#

No. Its documented history endpoint is Enterprise-only, requested one provider at a time, capped at a 180-day range, and returns a daily price map rather than OHLC. cs2.sh returns 5m, 30m, 1h, and 1d ask and bid OHLC since December 2025.

Which covers more marketplaces?#

Pricempire, marketed at 40+ marketplaces across several games. cs2.sh focuses on the six highest-volume CS2 markets (BUFF, Youpin, CSFloat, Skinport, Steam, and C5Game) and goes deeper on each.

Disclosure: this comparison is published by cs2.sh. Pricempire features and prices were checked against its official API and documentation pages on August 4, 2026, and cs2.sh capabilities reflect the live API on September 15, 2026.