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Monetization and Memberships
October 2, 2026 at 03:20 AM
Added global payment rules from the support FAQ and the launch FAQ summary of the business model; updated Founder's Pack claiming and Advance Access timing
AION 2 is free-to-play. The game is free to download and play to endgame, with optional paid layers built around memberships, a premium currency, and cosmetic purchases. The model described here reflects the Korean and Taiwanese live build; NCsoft published the global business model on July 8, 2026; the section below covers it. The Founder's Pack lineup and the membership benefit list have both since been published in full.
Every class, faction, region, and the core progression systems are available without paying. The live build's paid layers are mostly cosmetic and convenience items, but they are not purely cosmetic: paid Daeva Pass tracks carry Odyle Energy and Combat Enhancement Scrolls, and the membership raises Odyle Energy throughput (see below). NCsoft has framed the global model as a lighter-touch version of its other recent free-to-play release. Korean-build prices below are Korean-build reference points and are separate from the global pricing published on July 8, 2026.
From the Korean and Taiwanese launch until the June 17, 2026 update, the live build sold two separate 28-day memberships covering different benefit categories, plus a bundle of both. The June 17, 2026 update folded them into a single membership (see the Kwairing Express Membership section below). The lineup below describes how the system worked before that change, with prices from the Korean store:
Membership | Korean Price | Benefits |
|---|---|---|
Sand Breeze Membership | 19,700 won for 28 days | Remote storage, buying on the Market (listing was open to everyone), personal trading, the Kina and Quna Exchange, and the Sand Breeze merchant shop; the World Market was added later |
Chengarung Membership | 29,700 won for 28 days | More Odyle Energy Cube selections in Expedition and Transcendence (Sanctuary was added later), 50% more Odyle Energy recharge and base capacity, more Shugo Festival reward selections, and double Abyss play time |
Shugo Express Membership | 45,000 won for 28 days | Both memberships above as a bundle |
Each could be bought only when fewer than 60 days remained on its benefits, up to three times per server per month, the same limits the global Special Quai Membership uses. The split is useful for comparing the two services: the Sand Breeze side is essentially the trading and storage package the global membership sells, while most of the Chengarung side's reward perks do not appear in the global benefit list (see Global Versus Korean Service below).
Quna is the premium currency. It is bought with real money and spent on cosmetics, battle passes, and shop items. On the live build, Quna can also be exchanged for the in-game gold currency, Kina, through an in-game exchange. That Quna-to-Kina conversion is the part of the model that has driven the most player discussion, because it links real-money spending to the in-game economy. The global build keeps the exchange. NCsoft published the global business model on July 8, 2026: the Kina and Quna exchange runs player to player, with one player listing Kina for sale and another spending Quna to buy it, and the game itself neither lists nor buys. An active Membership is required to trade on the Market.
Currency | Type | Use |
|---|---|---|
Quna | Premium (real money) | Cosmetics, battle passes, shop items; exchangeable for Kina on the live build |
Kina | In-game gold | Crafting, repairs, trading, and most in-game transactions |
Daeva Passes on the Korean and Taiwanese build are sold per character and run in seasons; the season that opened on August 26, 2026 ran until September 22. Each season has a Basic track bought with Kina and a Premium track bought with Quna. The rewards are not cosmetic-only: that season's track paid out bound Odyle Energy, Combat Enhancement Scrolls, daily-dungeon Instant Completion Tickets, Abyss Rift Stones and Pass Shop coins, and pass levels can be bought with Quna. Prices for that season are in the August 2026 Shop Changes section below.
The cash shop sells cosmetic outfits, appearance items, and convenience goods for Quna. Its consumables merchant sold items such as Resurrection Spiritstones (100 Quna each) and inventory Cube expansions (200 Quna each) at launch. Purchases on the Korean service also earn Mileage, and at launch the Mileage shop listed growth items including Combat Enhancement Scrolls and Books of Souls. As with the rest of the model, the precise global catalog and pricing are being adjusted for Western markets.
On launch day the Korean service sold four monthly Quna supply boxes, and some of them bundled growth items: Zikel's Quna Supply Box (21,500 won) held 100 Combat Enhancement Scrolls, and Triniel's Quna Supply Box held 50 Books of Souls. After an emergency broadcast that afternoon, NCsoft pulled all four boxes at a temporary maintenance at 4:30 PM KST on November 19, 2025, acknowledged the monthly Quna products as a misjudgment, and granted every player the 100 Combat Enhancement Scrolls and 50 Books of Souls as an apology. The same broadcast announced lower Kina costs for skill and Daevanion resets and halved general-store prices.
On July 8, 2026 NCsoft published the business model for the global release. The headline is that AION 2 stays free to play with no purchase required, and the paid layers sit around a monthly Membership, a premium currency, per-character passes, and pre-launch Founder's Packs. NCsoft noted that some areas may still change as launch preparation continues.
NCsoft's launch FAQ of September 30, 2026 restates the model in one line: AION 2 is free to play with an optional monthly membership, and the paid options are cosmetic items, a battle pass and a membership that opens the player-driven economy and the currency exchange.
The global build runs two currencies, and they are easy to confuse because the names are close.
Currency | How You Get It | What It Buys |
|---|---|---|
Kina | Earned through gameplay, or bought from other players with Quna through the Exchange | Trading on the Market; the currency the player-driven economy runs on |
Quna | Bought with real money, or acquired from other players through the Exchange | In-game shop items, the premium Battle Pass track, and anything else priced in Quna |
The Market is the centre of the player-driven economy. Players list and buy items in Kina, and prices are set by players rather than by fixed vendor rates. The Kina and Quna Exchange sits alongside it: one player lists Kina for sale, another spends Quna to buy it, and every trade happens between players. The game itself never lists or purchases on the Exchange. Quna picked up through the Exchange spends exactly like purchased Quna on any item or pass sold for it.
An active Membership is required to trade on the Market.
Membership is sold as the Special Quai Membership, a 30-day subscription priced at $15.00. It unlocks the Market and the Kina and Quna Exchange, adds gameplay benefits for members, and opens a members-only shop where extra purchases can be made with Kina. It is optional in the sense that the game is playable without it, but it is the gate on player-to-player trading.
NCsoft published the full benefit list on August 18, 2026. Every benefit runs for 30 days from the moment the membership is activated rather than from the moment it is bought.
Benefit | Without Membership | With Membership |
|---|---|---|
Remote Storage | Storage is reachable only through storage NPCs in the world | Storage sits at the bottom of the Cube and is always available |
Market | Items can be listed for sale but not bought | Items can be both listed and bought |
Personal Trade | Unavailable | Five trades a day, and the other player also needs an active membership |
Exchange | Unavailable | Kina and Quna can be exchanged |
Wind Breeze Merchants | The shop opens only at merchant NPCs in the world | The shop opens from the menu at any time |
Odyle Energy Cube selection | Odyle Energy can be injected once when opening reward Cubes from Expedition or Transcendence content | Twice, and Sanctuary reward Cubes are included as well |
Odyle Energy capacity | Base capacity | Raised by an amount NCsoft has said it will announce later; still unpublished as of September 13, 2026 |
The membership also sells on its own from the Subscribe menu in game, with sales opening on October 5, 2026 at 6:00 AM PDT and running until further notice. It can only be bought when fewer than 60 days remain on each membership benefit, and purchases are capped at three per server per month.
Two changes announced after the Launch Scale Test bear on the membership. The notice that closed the test on September 18, 2026 said direct player-to-player trades are disabled as an anti-bot measure, so the Personal Trade row above may not be usable at launch; the notice did not say whether or when direct trading returns. The same notice gave Membership holders in good standing a priority queue when a server is at capacity, a privilege NCsoft says it can revoke from accounts with disciplinary action against them or suspected of breaking the Terms of Service.
Category | Contents | Stated Policy |
|---|---|---|
Cosmetics | Outfits, wings, pets, weapon skins, accessories | Purely aesthetic; sold cosmetics give no gameplay or combat advantage |
Consumables | Potions, resurrection stones, and similar combat aids | Can assist during combat but do not affect gear progression or long-term power, and the same consumables are earnable through regular gameplay |
The battle passes are called Daeva Passes and are sold per character rather than per account. Each pass mixes cosmetics, items, upgrade materials, and other in-game currencies across its track. The Standard Track is available to every player and fills as you engage with content across the world. The Premium Track is optional, bought with Quna, and layers bonus rewards on top of the same progress. Quna earned through the Exchange can be used to buy it.
NCsoft put Founder's Packs on sale on July 22, 2026 at 6:00 AM PDT. Buying one is the only way into advance access, which opened on September 30, 2026 and runs for five days. NCsoft's last-chance notice of October 1, 2026 (Pacific time) gave October 5, 2026 at 8:00 AM PDT, two hours after the free-to-play launch, as the final time to buy one. Three tiers are sold, each containing everything in the tier below it. All prices are set in US dollars and converted for other currencies.
Tier | Price | Contents |
|---|---|---|
Standard | $24.99 | Five-day advance access, one Daeva's Campaign Supply Chest, and the Unique-grade title Vanguard of Atreia |
Deluxe | $49.99 | All of Standard, plus the seven-piece Ascended Daeva armour skin set and the Eternal Sun weapon skin chest |
Ultimate | $99.99 | All of Deluxe, plus the Daeva's Styling Chest, the six-piece Moonlit Aria armour skin set, the Black Dragon pet and the Blazing Sun Wings |
The Daeva's Campaign Supply Chest is a levelling kit: ten each of the Return, Courage, Speed, Benediction and Absorption Scrolls, one hundred Life Potions, fifty Life Serums, thirty Healing Potions, ten thousand Power Shards and five Resurrection Spiritstones. The Daeva's Styling Chest holds a Customization Voucher and a seven-day Appearance Change Voucher. Every title, skin, pet and wing across the three tiers is explicitly appearance-only and grants no stats, which keeps the packs inside the cosmetic-plus-convenience framing NCsoft has used for the rest of the shop.
On the first global livestream on August 7, 2026, NCsoft announced that every Founder's Pack tier now also includes 30 days of Membership, applied retroactively to packs bought before the announcement. The team also said on the broadcast that Founder's Pack cosmetics will not be sold in the in-game shop later; that commitment was made on air and has not yet appeared in written official text. The membership addition itself did reach written form on August 18, 2026, when NCsoft revised the Founder's Pack product notice to list a Special Quai Membership in all three tiers, and again in a storefront post on August 21.
One pack per account per platform. Buying a second pack does not stack the advance-access window or grant duplicate rewards.
A pack is locked to the platform it was bought on. A Steam purchase can only be played through Steam, a Purple purchase only through Purple. Everyone shares the same servers regardless.
Upgrades between tiers are available on Purple only and are priced at the difference: $25 from Standard to Deluxe, $75 from Standard to Ultimate, $50 from Deluxe to Ultimate. On Steam there is no upgrade path, so the only route is a refund and a repurchase.
Refunds are available before launch. After launch they are limited to fourteen days, with under two hours played and no bundled items claimed, and are processed by whichever storefront took the payment.
The packs went on sale in some countries while age-rating review was still pending. NCsoft has stated that access may be restricted for buyers who do not meet the final rating requirements once it is determined.
The platform lock applies to the pack, not to characters. Support answers revised in late September 2026 say a Steam-created character can be played through PURPLE with the Steam login option, and a PURPLE character can be played on Steam once the Steam account is linked to the NC account (or if PURPLE was signed into with Steam in the first place). Claimed Founder's Pack items carry one of three binding types: character-bound items stay with one character, class-bound items can be shared with other characters of the same class, and server-bound items are shared with every character on that server.
First-time card payments may trigger a one-time verification step through the payment provider, including a redirect to the card issuer's secure authentication page. The pending authorization used for verification is cancelled once verification succeeds, or automatically after three hours if it is not used. Gift cards and prepaid cards are not supported.
From September 23, 2026 PURPLE also accepts Apple Pay, in 56 countries, and Cash App Pay, in the United States. Which methods appear depends on the buyer's country and setup.
The global support FAQ, revised on September 30, 2026, adds several payment rules. Quna is bought inside AION 2, and NCoin cannot be used for Quna or any other premium purchase. Checkout currently supports US dollars only; euros and pounds were accepted earlier and no longer are, and the payment provider's additional authentication only succeeds when it is set to the same currency as the store. On Steam, purchases draw on the Steam Wallet, so funds have to be added first. On PURPLE, purchases can be paid in cash, with mileage, or with both; the FAQ does not say how that mileage is earned, and no in-game Mileage shop like the Korean one has been announced as of October 2, 2026. Purchased items arrive in in-game storage. Purchases of virtual currency and digital items are generally final, with exceptions such as purchases by minors without a guardian's consent or where the law requires a refund.
Founder's Pack rewards are delivered during advance access rather than at purchase. Buyers who do not claim them during advance access can still claim them afterwards on any server through a dedicated Founder's Pack claim button. How the servers themselves are structured during and after that window is covered on Global Launch and Platforms.
In its Q1 2026 earnings disclosure, NCsoft broke down where AION 2's KR and TW revenue came from across the first full quarter the game was live. The disclosed mix was roughly a quarter from memberships, a quarter from cosmetic skins, and the remaining half from the Quna premium currency, with a meaningful share of the Quna spend converting onward into in-game item purchases. The disclosure also confirmed that AION 2 generated several hundred billion Korean won in revenue across the first full quarter on the KR and TW live build. These are KR and TW live-build figures specific to the period through Q1 2026; the global launch's monetization structure is still being tuned, so the same split should not be assumed for the Western release.
Announced for global: free to play with no purchase required; a $15 per month Membership that gates Market trading; the Kina and Quna currencies; a player-to-player Kina and Quna Exchange; per-character Daeva Passes with a free Standard Track and a Quna Premium Track; a cosmetics-and-consumables shop; and Founder's Packs carrying five days of Early Access plus 30 days of Membership in every tier.
Still pending for global as of October 2, 2026, going by the storefront announcements and the global support FAQ: the Quna price points and pack sizes, the in-game shop's item list and prices, the Daeva Pass reward tables, and the size of the Odyle Energy capacity increase, which NCsoft has said it will announce later. The rest of the Membership benefit list was published on August 18, 2026 and is covered above. The Founder's Pack tiers, contents, and prices were published on July 22, 2026 and are covered above.
Korean and Taiwanese build only: the Kwairing Express Membership and its won pricing, the collaboration cosmetics, and any mobile-specific store behaviour. The global release is PC only.
The global column was compiled from announcements before Advance Access opened on September 30, 2026; the free-to-play launch follows on October 5, 2026. The Launch Scale Test in September had the shop, Quna, passes, memberships, the Market and all trading switched off. In-game purchases went live with Advance Access, but as of October 2, 2026 NCsoft has not published global Quna prices or Daeva Pass reward tables in its storefront announcements or support FAQ, so the global column still follows the published notices. The Korean column follows the Korean service's own product notices.
Area | Korean Service | Global (Announced) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
Membership price | Kwairing Express Membership, 25,000 won for 28 days | Special Quai Membership, $15.00 for 30 days | Different name, price and term; the same cap of three purchases per server per month |
Trading and storage perks | Remote storage, buying on the Market, five personal trades a day, the Kina and Quna Exchange, the members' merchant menu, the World Market | The same list | None announced |
Odyle Energy perks | Two Cube injections instead of one, 50% more recharge per cycle, 50% more base capacity | Two Cube injections instead of one, plus a capacity increase whose size is still unannounced | No recharge boost in the global list; capacity figure pending |
Other reward perks | Double Shugo Festival reward keys and reward-card picks, double weekly Abyss time, and a members-only event pass | Not in the global membership notice | Absent from the published global benefit list |
Direct player trading | Available to members, five trades a day | Disabled as an anti-bot measure after the Launch Scale Test; the Market stays the trading hub | Global launches without direct trades |
Kina and Quna Exchange | Membership-gated | Membership-gated; runs player to player, and the game makes no listings or purchases | No difference announced |
Daeva Passes | Per character; Kina Basic track and Quna Premium track; rewards include Odyle Energy and Combat Enhancement Scrolls | Per character; free Standard Track and Quna Premium Track; rewards include cosmetics, items, upgrade materials and currencies | Same structure; global reward tables unpublished |
Shop cosmetics | Appearance items sold for Quna | NCsoft's global business-model notice says sold cosmetics give no gameplay or combat advantage | Global carries a written no-advantage commitment |
Spend-linked Mileage | At launch, purchases earned Mileage and the Mileage shop listed Combat Enhancement Scrolls and Books of Souls | Not mentioned in any global business-model, membership or Founder's Pack notice | No global equivalent announced |
Queue priority | Not among the Korean membership benefits | Members in good standing join a priority queue when a server is full | Global-only perk |
On paper, the global membership keeps the Korean trading and storage package and drops most of the reward-rate perks the Korean service sells, and the global service launches without direct player trades. The core paid structure is the same in both: a premium currency, a player-run exchange that turns Quna into Kina, a Kina-priced members' shop, and Quna Premium pass tracks that include upgrade materials. The most direct growth sales on the Korean service, the launch-day supply boxes, were already withdrawn there in November 2025, and the Korean service cut its own membership price in June 2026, before the global model was published. Advance Access opened on September 30, 2026 with in-game purchases running, but none of the notices checked as of October 2, 2026 publishes a global price list.
At the June 17, 2026 maintenance on the Korean and Taiwanese build, the separate memberships were retired and consolidated into a single membership called the Kwairing Express Membership. The three previously sold memberships, the Shugo Express Membership, the Sand Breeze Membership, and the Chengarung Membership, ended sales, and the Shugo Express benefits carried over into the new Kwairing Express tier. On the Korean build the unified membership is priced at 25,000 won, down from the 45,000 won of the former Shugo Express tier. Treat that figure as a Korean-build reference point rather than a confirmed global price, since the global terms are still being tuned for Western markets.
The same June 17, 2026 maintenance added a cosmetic collaboration with the K-pop group fromis_9 on the Korean and Taiwanese build. The collaboration adds themed costumes, weapons, a pet, and wings, plus performance emotes; wearing the full themed set changes the character's appearance to match the collaboration. Dedicated performance stages went up in Verteron and Altgard, where a player holding the collaboration performance emote can start a stage show that up to five characters join, complete with stage effects and music. A tie-in event, The Stolen Performance Props, runs alongside the collaboration through the August 12, 2026 maintenance. These are cosmetic items consistent with the cash-shop model described above, not power purchases. As with the rest of the monetization model, whether this collaboration reaches the global build is not confirmed. The collaboration event ended with the August 12, 2026 patch, which removed its NPCs and objects and reverted the affected stages to their normal appearance.
The August 12, 2026 patch on the Korean and Taiwanese build removed the wardrobe shop entirely and moved its appearance products to an Appearance tab inside the main Shop. The shop UI was redesigned around a card list with full-screen product previews, and free items are now labeled as free. The change came after community criticism of appearance pricing on the Korean service.
A pet auto-pickup convenience item also entered the shop in August: a 30-day auto-pickup ticket purchasable twice per month per character from the August 5 patch, with an on-off toggle added on August 12. The ticket's remaining time keeps counting down while the toggle is off.
The August 26, 2026 patch put a paid server transfer back in the in-game shop on the Korean and Taiwanese build, open from that date until September 1 and only between 20:00 and 24:00 each day. It costs 1,000 Quna per account plus 200 Quna for each character moved, and another 1,000 Quna per slot if the destination server has no unlocked character slot free. Transfers stay inside the same faction and are limited to one per account.
The same patch opened a new Deva Pass season on the Korean build, sold in two tiers per character: a Basic track for 2,000,000 Kina and a Premium track for 1,000 Quna that also hands over ten bound Odyle Energy up front. Both run to pass level 50, missions completed during the season award pass experience, levels past 50 pay out repeat rewards, and a single level can be bought outright for 50 Quna.
AION 2 Overview
