War Thunder is a Free-To-Play multiplayer game featuring WWII era (plus early Korean War) vehicles from airforces, armour batallions and maybe soon also navies. It's a jaw-droppingly beautiful looking game and frequently updated, patched and expanded upon. It plays fairly similarly to its competitor World of Tanks (the tank part), but with a big emphasis on realistic gameplay, rather than e-sport arcade.

Is this game pay-to-win? By definition: no! I'll try to explain why. The Golden Eagles (GE), the premium currency, that you can buy (and here and there also win/obtain freely without trying to win them on Twitch streams) can be spent on:
- premium time
- premium vehicles
- cosmetics; unlocking decals/skins you would normally need to grind for, or making your tank look clean, or unlocking a 3rd and 4th decal slot on all vehicles
- crew points
- unlocking more than 5 crew slots (first 3 are free, #4 and #5 are unlocked with silver)

How is premium time and are premium vehicles?
Premium time gives you a good bonus on your Research Points (RP) and Silver Lion (SL) gain. Those are needed to unlock and buy new vehicles and assign them to a crew, in order to play. It will only make that go faster, not something someone who would not pay would not be able to obtain.

Premium vehicles are vehicles with a bonus of RP and SL gain. Almost all of the vehicles have a non-premium counterpart who in many cases have better performance or a more favourable matchmaking than the premium vehicle. So the only REAL benefit is the RP and SL gain. Any premium vehicle that had a significant advantage over others has been 'corrected' so far.

How about crew points!? They are SURELY P2W, Right!?
The idea of boosting crew performance may feel like an significant advantage to you, but in the end you can get there without paying a single dime! So no. And besides the bonuses of a maxed out crew aren't all that great. Even if you take the max crew qualification into account that you can only get with GE, the advantage is only a few percent here and there.

And last but not least: crew slots only help you in arcade battles (planes) if you want to use more than 5 planes in a single match. You may be able to rake up more kills but possibly also have more repair costs.

War Thunder is a Free-To-Play multiplayer game featuring WWII era (plus early Korean War) vehicles from airforces, armour batallions and maybe soon also navies. It's a jaw-droppingly beautiful looking game and frequently updated, patched and expanded upon. It plays fairly similarly to its competitor World of Tanks (the tank part), but with a big emphasis on realistic gameplay, rather than e-sport arcade. Is this game pay-to-win? By definition: no! I'll try to explain why. The Golden Eagles (GE), the premium currency, that you can buy (and here and there also win/obtain freely without trying to win them on Twitch streams) can be spent on: - premium time - premium vehicles - cosmetics; unlocking decals/skins you would normally need to grind for, or making your tank look clean, or unlocking a 3rd and 4th decal slot on all vehicles - crew points - unlocking more than 5 crew slots (first 3 are free, #4 and #5 are unlocked with silver) How is premium time and are premium vehicles? Premium time gives you a good bonus on your Research Points (RP) and Silver Lion (SL) gain. Those are needed to unlock and buy new vehicles and assign them to a crew, in order to play. It will only make that go faster, not something someone who would not pay would not be able to obtain. Premium vehicles are vehicles with a bonus of RP and SL gain. Almost all of the vehicles have a non-premium counterpart who in many cases have better performance or a more favourable matchmaking than the premium vehicle. So the only REAL benefit is the RP and SL gain. Any premium vehicle that had a significant advantage over others has been 'corrected' so far. How about crew points!? They are SURELY P2W, Right!? The idea of boosting crew performance may feel like an significant advantage to you, but in the end you can get there without paying a single dime! So no. And besides the bonuses of a maxed out crew aren't all that great. Even if you take the max crew qualification into account that you can only get with GE, the advantage is only a few percent here and there. And last but not least: crew slots only help you in arcade battles (planes) if you want to use more than 5 planes in a single match. You may be able to rake up more kills but possibly also have more repair costs.