What Are Steam Points And How Can You Spend Them?
If you've had a Steam account for a while, you may have noticed that you can collect Steam Points. This is an accumulation of points that users receive whenever they buy something from the Steam store. For every dollar you spend, you gain 100 Steam Points. This includes games, DLC, hardware, applications, soundtracks, or in-game items. These points can then be used in the Steam Points store (via Steam). If you've purchased games on Steam, you probably already have a fair amount of Steam Points to spend.
Steam points can also be obtained when other Steam users give you an award. Users can give you these awards for contributions you have made in the Steam community, such as writing reviews, posting screenshots, making guides, etc. The amount of points you get this way varies depending on the type of award, so the most straightforward way of gaining points, ultimately, is to buy products from the Steam store.
How to use Steam points
To use Steam points you have earned from buying games or other products off the Steam store, you'll just need to head over to the Steam Points store. At the store, there are a few different items available you can spend points on. You can spend your points on a few different things. If you've ever seen your Steam friends sporting unique backgrounds, themes, profile graphics, and more, it's because these are some of things you can get with your points. From there, you can add them to your profile to display. These vary in price, especially between animated or non-animated items. For example, an animated background tends to be 2,000 Steam points, while non-animated ones go for about 500.
To buy an item on the Steam Points store, all you need to do is click on what you want, then select the blue button with the Steam point amount to buy it. You should receive a notification that a new item has been added to your inventory. Points can only be redeemed for items on the Steam Points store, however. You can't use them to buy things from the physical Steam store.