The short answer
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| Is it free? | Yes — free-to-play since Oct 5, 2026 on Steam and NC's launcher. |
| Does the shop sell gear or stats? | No. NCSOFT says purchases "do not affect gear progression or long-term power" (notice, Jul 8, 2026). |
| Can you buy power indirectly? | Yes: Quna → exchange for Kinah → gear and materials on the Market. |
| Can you clear all content without paying? | Yes, just slower. Without membership you can't trade and you get less dungeon loot. |
| What does "reasonable" play cost? | Membership at ~$15 / €12.75 per 30 days. Passes are optional on top. |
Two currencies: Kinah is earned in game, Quna is bought with real money.
What Quna buys
Prices per Space4Games (Oct 4, 2026): 400 Quna = €5.09, 1,000 = €12.75, 2,000 = €25.49, 4,000 = €50.99 — no bulk discount (about 1.27 cents per Quna).
| Item | Price | Gameplay advantage? |
|---|---|---|
| Outfits, weapon skins, wing and pet appearances | full outfit ~2,200 Quna | no — NCSOFT calls them "purely aesthetic" |
| Storage, name change, extra character slots (1,000 Quna, up to 4) | varies | convenience; more characters = more Odyle energy (each has its own) |
| Consumables like Battle Enhance Scroll (+10% damage for a few minutes) | varies | tiny — the same items drop in game and come from codes |
| Daeva Pass Premium | 1,000–1,500 Quna per pass | yes, small — see below |
Sources: Space4Games, NC's notice (via aion2hub and Timesaver), mein-mmo, MassivelyOP.
Special Quai membership: what it gives and what you lose without it
Price: about $15 per 30 days (NC, ExpCarry, mein-mmo), €12.75 in Europe (Space4Games). Early-access Founder's Packs included 30 days.
With membership (ExpCarry, Game8, Space4Games):
- access to the server Market and the Kinah ↔ Quna Exchange;
- Odyle energy cap of 840 instead of 560;
- a second chest opening after Expedition, Transcendence and Sanctuary runs (for a second helping of energy);
- remote storage and the remote Wind Breeze Merchant: Odyle energy (100,000 Kinah, up to 4 a week per character) and Daily Dungeon instant-clear tickets;
- more Shugo Festa reward keys (up to 21);
- priority in the queue for full servers.
Without membership you can't buy on the Market or use the exchange. Direct player-to-player trading doesn't exist on Global for anyone — it's disabled as an anti-bot measure (ExpCarry, misti.services, NC notice of Sep 18). You keep what you earn yourself.
How big a difference is that? Draupnir's guaranteed gold armor piece takes 14 chest openings normally and 7 with membership (couga54). That's not a stat from the shop, but the same play time yields more loot. It's why mein-mmo calls membership "optional, but essentially mandatory" for regular players.
Daeva Pass
The pass has a free track and a Premium track bought with Quna, and it's bought per character. Season 1 has two: Ishalgen Mercenary (Premium 1,500 Quna, ~€19) and Planet's Call (1,000 Quna, €12.75), per Space4Games. Korean passes also sat at 1,000–1,500 Quna (Timesaver).
Premium isn't just cosmetics: across the 100 levels of the Ishalgen pass it gives 120,000 Enhance Stones instead of 48,000 and 96 Amplify Stone Fragments instead of 32 (Space4Games; NC's notice lists "upgrade materials and currencies"). A real but small speed-up. The pass also has a weekly XP cap, so you can't clear it in one sitting (Game8).
The Quna Exchange and the Market — the indirect path
This is where the pay-to-win argument comes from:
- You buy Quna with money.
- On the exchange, other players buy your Quna with Kinah they farmed.
- You spend that Kinah on gear, Enhance Stones and materials on the Market.
On Oct 4, 2026, a million Kinah cost about €5.40 this way (Space4Games; players set the rate and it moves). For scale: Kinah from mobs and dungeons is capped per day — 1,000,000 (Game8). So about €5 buys you roughly one day of farming to the cap. The Market takes a 10% tax and bought Quna is locked for up to 72 hours (Space4Games).
Limits worth knowing: the Market is per server, and a lot of top dungeon loot is bound to your character and never hits the Market. Exactly what high-end gear is tradeable wasn't confirmed at Global launch (Timesaver).
Real advantage vs cosmetics
| Thing | Advantage | How much |
|---|---|---|
| Membership | yes | big for pace: more loot from the same runs, higher energy cap, Market access |
| Quna → Kinah → Market | yes | scales with your wallet — this is where whales pull ahead |
| Daeva Pass Premium | yes | small: extra upgrade materials |
| Extra characters | some | more energy and weekly bonuses, but they cost play time too |
| Shop scrolls and potions | minimal | you get the same in game |
| Outfits, skins, wing and pet looks | no | appearance only |
Battlefield PvP (10v10) normalizes stats (ExpCarry, misti.services), so money matters least there. Open-world PvP in the Abyss uses your real gear, so gearing speed does matter.
How Korea compares
- Korean launch (Nov 19, 2025): shop packages included character enhancement items, despite the promise that those would be gameplay-only. About 15 hours in, producer Kim Nam-joon apologized on stream ("we were complacent and unthoughtful") and pulled them. NCSOFT stock fell 14.6% that day (Korea JoongAng Daily, guildorder).
- Korea launched with two subscriptions and merged them into one in June 2026. Global starts with one (ExpCarry, guildorder).
- Global's model is lighter than Asia's: no Heroic gear in Season 1, a single membership, a looks-focused shop (mein-mmo, playnews). Korean players were also promised "no pay to win", though — keep an eye on the shop after every patch.
More differences: Global vs Korea.
What players say
- Steam (Oct 6, 2026): "Mixed" — 7,675 of 11,155 reviews positive (69%). Reviews cover the whole game (queues, combat, business model), not just the shop.
- r/Aion2: the common take is that a relaxed player doesn't need to pay, membership helps a lot, and topping the rankings needs either money or a huge number of hours. Some assume "Korean MMOs turn pay-to-win over time" by default. Disabling player trading gets credit for making gold-seller Kinah harder to buy.
Don't buy Kinah from third-party sellers. NCSOFT warned at launch that it can get your account banned.
Should you pay? Three steps
- First 1–2 weeks: don't. Before 45, membership barely matters — Odyle only starts charging at 22, and you shouldn't open leveling dungeon chests anyway (first week guide).
- After 45, if you play daily: membership is the best buy. About €13 a month gets you the Market, more energy and a second roll on chests.
- Pass and outfits only if you want them. The pass gives some materials; outfits give nothing but looks.
Playing a few hours a week and not chasing rankings? Free play is enough to clear dungeons through Fire Temple and beyond, just slower. See the dungeon list, or pick a class with the quiz.