Trading

Trading
Trading is a system Valve developed so players could trade items, to get one item for another item. This sytem allows players to swap cosmetics, tools, and weapons. Later Steam made trading become Steam-wide, and you could trade Steam trading cards, and non-TF2 items.

Steam trading
Steam Trading is a feature that was introduced on August 9, 2011 as an open beta.[1] The beta updates were added to the public Steam client on September 6, 2011. With Steam trading, players are able to trade their in-game items for other in-game items and/or gift copies of Steam games. Trade requests can be sent through Steam chat windows or via the Steam Friends List window. Trading will also be disabled for Free to Play (Nothing bought from Mann Co. Store) players.

Trade Holds
When trading items with other parties and only Steam Guard is enabled, the trade may be placed on hold for up to 15 days. [2] If trading with a user who is on the player's Friends list, the trade will be placed on hold for 3 days instead of 15; if the users have been friends for over 1 year, the hold will last 1 day instead.

If Steam Guard Mobile Authenticator is enabled for both parties, trades will happen instantly once both sides have confirmed the trade, regardless of friends status.

Features

 * At first, the Steam Trading window only shows 8 slots to trade. When the 3rd slot on the last line is filled, more slots will appear. This allows for up to 256 items to be traded at once, eliminating the need for excessive trading.
 * Items can also be searched for by using the search bar, making trades quicker and easier to conduct. A chat box is also available and items are color-coded according to their quality.
 * Once a trade has been made, any received items are placed into the user's in-game Backpack and Steam Inventory, ready to be used.
 * Items from other games can also be traded by clicking the inventory drop down menu and choosing a supported game's inventory.
 * On September 4, 2013 a new feature named "Trade Offers" was released. It allows you to send a pre-packaged trade to a friend, similar to regular trading, except you propose the items for both sides. This feature includes the ability for regular traders to generate their own personal trade offer links, allowing other users to send them trade offers without needing to add them as a friend first.

Trading inside Team Fortress 2
In addition to sending trades through Steam, it is possible to send a trade to another player in Team Fortress 2, though it still uses the Steam trading system to do so. The option for this is in the Customize items section of the main menu, accessible through the "Items" button on the main menu, through the key set to open the menu (Default bind: M ), or through the console command .

This will open a small window with options to select a trading partner from the friends list, the current server, or directly through their Steam profile. If the friends list option is selected, it will show a list of users on the friends list currently playing Team Fortress 2. The current server option will show a list of users in the current server. Once a user is selected through any of the three options, a trade request will be sent to them, which they can choose to accept or deny.

Once a trading partner has been selected, the Steam Overlay will open with a Steam Trade window, which can be toggled to return to the game and vice versa. If the trade is accepted, any items received will be shown in the in-game chat box, if the player is currently in a server.

It is possible to filter the trade requests received through the game's Advanced Options menu. This option can be set to Anyone, Friends Only, Friends and In-Game Players and No-one

Additionally, Free to Play players are not able to trade any items to players, however they may trade items that they have received from another player.