Steam Refund Policy
Last verified: 2026-03-19
store.steampowered.com/steam_refunds
How to Get a Refund — Step by Step
- 1Go to help.steampowered.com
- 2Select 'Purchases'
- 3Find the game or item and select it
- 4Choose 'I'd like to request a refund'
- 5Select your reason and preferred refund method (Steam Wallet or original payment)
- 6Submit the request
- 7If denied, you can resubmit with additional information
When You Can Get a Refund
- Both conditions must be met: purchased within last 14 days AND less than 2 hours of playtime
- Valve may approve refunds outside this window on a case-by-case basis but is not obligated to
- You can request a refund for any reason if within the window
All Refund Methods
- Steam Wallet: 24-48 hours after approval
- Original payment method (credit/debit/PayPal): up to 7 days after approval (up to 14 days for international payments)
- If original payment method is unavailable (expired card), defaults to Steam Wallet credit
- You choose the method at time of refund request
Partial Refunds
- Pre-purchase/pre-order refunds: can request at any time before release; after release, standard 14-day/2-hour window begins from release date
- Early Access and Advanced Access: playtime counts from the moment you play, even before official release
- DLC refunds: within 14 days if base game played less than 2 hours since DLC purchase; DLC must not be consumed/modified/transferred
- Third-party DLC that irreversibly modifies game state may be marked non-refundable (indicated on Store page)
- Bundle refunds: full refund if no items transferred AND combined playtime under 2 hours across all bundle items
- In-game purchases (Valve games like CS2, Dota 2): refundable within 48 hours if not consumed/modified/transferred
- In-game purchases (third-party): developers opt in; if not opted in, generally non-refundable
- Gift refunds: unredeemed gifts follow standard window; redeemed gifts can be refunded by recipient, funds go to original purchaser
- Subscription refunds: within 48 hours of purchase/renewal if not used during current billing period
- Steam Wallet fund refunds: within 14 days if funds not spent
- 2025 policy update: if a developer cancels or fails to deliver promised DLC in a season pass, refund offered for unreleased DLC value
Dispute Process
- If denied, resubmit the request with additional details through help.steampowered.com
- All support is ticket-based — no phone support
- Contact Steam Support through help.steampowered.com for further assistance
Additional Notes
- Non-refundable: video content (movies, tutorials), third-party CD keys, physical gift cards, games with active VAC ban during play, consumed/modified/transferred content
- Refund abuse: Valve allows buying before a sale and refunding to rebuy at sale price without penalty
- But excessive refund patterns (many refunds, few kept purchases) will trigger a warning
- Continued abuse after warning may result in revoked refund privileges
- No published numeric limit — it's pattern-based detection
- Warning may disappear after weeks/months of normal purchasing behavior
- Refunds within 24 hours of purchase: the original transaction may be cancelled entirely; bank may take up to 30 days to release hold
What Redditors Are Saying
How GGG failed loyal POE players with its “unauthorized Steam refund” bans
TL;DR: Without notice or inquiry, GGG banned several players, including me, for financial discrepancies — some from *three or more years ago* — many of which ultimately proved to be Steam’s fault. The bans were implemented mere hours before the launch of Betrayal (3.5), meaning GGG has been overwhel
Fell for the Plyxaltd 'Steam account' scam - just got a refund
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How Microsoft took $150 of my money, promised to refund it and then didn't. TL;DR: Goodbye Xbox, hello Steam!
**Update** - *Called one last time to explain everything and see what their system shows. According to the customer service rep (again, super nice as always) the refund never went through by the looks of things. She escalated the new ticket to get the refund with additional explanation about the CC
Anyone ever had a successful PayPal dispute with Steam?
So basically I recently spent 85 Dollars on FF14 and was unable to play it ultimately, I spent 5 hours in settings trying every setting to see if I could prevent the game from crashing, ultimately I decided to give up and just ask for a refund. Unfortunately, Steam logs FF14 game hours EVEN IN the o