AK-47 | Cartel (Well-Worn)

The AK-47 | Cartel (Well-Worn) is a Classified rifle skin finished in dark, polished metal engraved with skulls, roses, and serpents in a gothic Day-of-the-Dead cartel style, here in a more battle-worn state. It's a cheaper route into the design, with wear the dark base still partly disguises.

Design

On Cartel, dark polished metal engraved with skulls, roses, and serpents runs across the receiver and body — a gothic, Day-of-the-Dead cartel aesthetic of dark tones and red accents, with the natural wood stock and handguard retained. A community design from the artist Anders, it carries the fitting in-game line: "One little squeeze turns every morning into the Day of the Dead."

AK-47 | Cartel (Well-Worn) Float and Wear

At Well-Worn the finish shows clear scuffing and paint loss across the magazine, receiver, and edges, where it thins out, and the wood furniture looks more faded. The engraved skulls, roses, and serpents still anchor the look, but there's no hiding that this is a worn grade. For players who care about price over pristine detail, it delivers the same recognizable design for less.

AK-47 | Cartel Rarity

Classified is the rarity: the pink tier, positioned just beneath Covert and second-highest among the standard weapon grades. It's a genuinely uncommon grade to see come out of a case.

AK-47 | Cartel Case and Collection

Cartel is one of The Chroma Collection skins and is unboxed from the Chroma Case, which arrived in January 2015. The Classified tier as a whole comes up about 3.2% of the time from the case; with every copy sourced that way, the bulk of them are bought on the market rather than pulled directly.

AK-47 | Cartel Patterns

No random pattern variation applies to Cartel — the engraved skulls, roses, and serpents appear the same on every copy, meaning there's no paint seed or "blue gem" to hunt down. What separates copies is purely wear and float.

StatTrak & Souvenir

The Cartel comes in a StatTrak™ flavor that adds a confirmed-kill counter; it's rarer and pricier than the standard drop, and its counter is permanent, following the item whenever it's traded or sold. There's no Souvenir variant, since Souvenir weapons are issued only through Major-tournament souvenir packages and the Cartel never appeared as a Major drop.

AK-47 | Cartel Price

Well-Worn sits near the bottom of the Cartel ladder, below Field-Tested and above only Battle-Scarred — a budget route to the design for players who won't pay the mid-grade premium. It's an affordable mid-tier skin to begin with, and this is one of the cheaper ways into it. It's available to buy on Skin.Land with instant delivery and no hidden fees.

FAQ

How worn does the Well-Worn Cartel actually look?

Noticeably. Expect visible scratches and paint thinning on the magazine and around the edges, plus more fading on the wood — more than Field-Tested but short of the heavy battering of Battle-Scarred. The dark base and engraved motifs keep it recognizable, so it still reads clearly as a Cartel in-game.

Is Well-Worn worth buying over Field-Tested?

Only if price is your priority. Field-Tested looks a good deal cleaner for a modest step up in cost, so most buyers prefer it. Well-Worn makes sense when you want the Cartel design as cheaply as possible without dropping all the way to Battle-Scarred.

Which gloves go with the AK-47 | Cartel?

Its dark metal with red accents and natural wood suits a moody, high-contrast loadout, so black or red gloves work best — a red pair picks up the accent tones, while dark brown or black wraps echo the wood and the gothic feel. Warm-toned knife finishes round the set out nicely.