Post Sections ⇅
- What are the LOTRO Account Types?
- Features that Vary per Account Type
- LOTRO Free-to-Play / F2P Accounts
- LOTRO VIP Accounts
- LOTRO Premium Accounts
- The “One Month of VIP” Strategy
- So, Is VIP Worth It?
Like other online games, LOTRO has 3 types of accounts – Free-to-Play (F2P), Premium and VIP. In this guide I want to take you through each of those and give you to pro’s and cons of each. I’ll also pass my personal opinion on whether LOTRO VIP is worth it or not. But mostly, I want to help you find the right account for your Lord of the Rings Online experience.
So let’s get down to it.
What are the LOTRO Account Types?
The simple definitions are:
- Free-to-Play/F2P: Any account that has never been VIP, nor purchased anything for real money in the LOTRO Store.
- Premium: Any account that has either been VIP in the past, or has purchased something for real money. This usually means buying
LOTRO Points. - VIP: This is LOTRO’s term for “subscriber”, where you pay while you play.
For the purposes of Premium, spending LOTRO Points earned through deeds does not count as “real money”, given you didn’t part with any!
Do LOTRO Expansions Change My Account Type?
The answer is “No”, but I want to explain it in more detail given expansions can be purchased from two places.
From the LOTRO Website
These expansion purchases take place outside of the game experience, so do not change your account status. Packs are usually delivered in the form of a code to apply to an account. This allows you to purchase for yourself or others, and someone could buy the expac for you too.
What about Supporter Packs?
Buying a supporter pack does not change your account status either, as they are delivered in the same way as expansions.
From the In-game LOTRO Store
Some quest-packs/expansions are available in the in-game store. These are not the same as Before the Shadow Ultimate or Fate of Gundabad Ultimate which have the added extras. These are pretty much content-only.
As they’re in the LOTRO Store, you can purchase them with LOTRO Points. But when you buy an expansion this way, it is not that transaction that changes your account type. It is the loading of real money in the form of LOTRO Points to convert into your expansion, that does.
Features that Vary per Account Type
Shortly, I will try to compare and explain the pro’s and con’s of each account. But first, I thought it would be good to explain various features that change depending on your account status. This should help newer players particularly.
So what features are limited or unlocked depending on whether you’re Free-to-Play, Premium or VIP? Here are the main ones that benefit from explanation!
Character Slots
This is how many active characters you can have before you need to purchase more. And by “how many”, this means per server not in total.
There’s nothing to stop a F2Per creating two characters on Evernight, then switching to Crickhollow and doing the same.
Quest Packs
Unlike any other game I’ve come across, LOTRO offers Expansions and Quest Packs. Expansions usually cover various new regions, as well as their quests, deeds, factions etc. Expansions are sold in various packages, with a varying amount of in-game items. Months after release the content-only version hits the LOTRO Store.
Quest Packs also relate to other regions added that do not form part of a wider expansion. The Wildwood of Bree-land and the Angle of Mitheithel are examples of these.
Auction House
If you’ve played another MMO, you’ll be familiar with a player-to-player market. The Auction House (or ‘AH’) is almost the same in LOTRO – except often players can place bids – and be out-bid too.
LOTRO’s account types grant varying levels of access to the AH in terms of how many items you can sell and how many items you can bid on.
Rested XP
Rested XP (or Rest XP) is a kind-of passive XP boost.
This is not progression XP – you won’t level up while you sleep! But when you log on again and start earning XP, it will be at a higher rate until the amount of Rest XP you have is used up.
The official page
says you get
100% XP for 30% of a Level (daily upon login)
Destiny Points
Whether you are aware of it or not, every a character of your levels up after L10, you gain destiny points.
All players will gain points, but only VIPs can spend them.
Shared Wardrobe
This is one of LOTRO’s best features! It allows you to create a bank of cosmetics which all characters can use to make outfits. Even better it is class and level agnostic. If you have a Level 100 item in your wardrobe, your new Level 5 character will be able to wear it cosmetically – except if it’s an incompatible weapon (or shield, etc).
All account types can unlock slots, by the way, and is one of the things players wait for a sale on!
Hobbit Gifts
Also known as “Hobbit Presents”, these are random free items selected from either “Silver” or “Gold” lists. These are often buffs like XP boosts, damage or defence buffs – or potions (instant or HoT). They also deliver a small 
Virtue XP ‘potion’ every time.
Each day you log on, you’ll be able to see if you’ve claimed your Hobbit Gift or gifts. Silver ones are available daily, but do not “bank up”. See them as log-in bonus items.
LOTRO Free-to-Play / F2P Accounts
What Exactly Does F2P Mean?
A Free-to-Play account is the starting status when you first sign up to play LOTRO. The game is not pay-to-play. You can enjoy everything within the limits of a free account without paying a single penny, cent, centime or…some other tiny coin in another currency!
Does Free mean Free?
Yes it does. A LOTRO F2P account is not time-limited, and characters can level to the current level cap. This is true even if your free account does not have the latest content. Level up using LOTRO Festivals and Events if you like!
Is the Free-to-Play Experience Any Good?
In my opinion, yes. The Lord of the Rings Online has one of the best free-to-play (F2P) setups even now. When I first started playing…eight or nine years ago now, I couldn’t afford content. But I knew I could earn it and other unlocks just by completing deeds.
That same experience is still in-play in 2024, when I wrote this post. The major difference is how much free content you have now – and it’s massive in comparison to when I first started!
My daughter sometimes plays LOTRO with me doing any combat, but I have an F2P account that can one day be hers.
This is one of her characters and there are no real reasons not to start LOTRO as an F2P-er.
Free-to-Play Pro’s and Con’s
F2P Account: Pro’s
- It’s Free: No upfront, monthly, quarterly or annual cost.
- Loads of Free Content: All content up to Helm’s Deep (Level 95) available for free.
- Don’t Miss the Epic: The core story (also known as the ‘Epic’) is always free.
- No real currency limit: I think the maximum for all players is
9,999, 
999, 
99
per character! - No time limit.
- Free First Mount: You can earn the riding trait at Mossward for free and get your first mount at the same time.
- Freedom to Roam: Explore Middle-Earth! You can go (almost) anywhere as an F2Per, even in areas you have not paid for yet. You’ll only be restricted if you cannot access an unlock quest. Exploring and defeating enemies is open to you even when quests aren’t.
On the second point, I had to unlock everything after the Lone-lands by using deeds when I first joined!
F2P Account: Cons
- No Swift Travel: Swift-travel horses are the same as regular horse-taxis but without the journey. Without that you need to walk, ride or take a regular horse taxi to destinations. The only exceptions are those between starter zones.
- Login Queue: I don’t know if this is still an “issue”, but it still exists. Your login to the game worlds will be deprioritised compared to VIPs.
- Few Initial Character Slots: You start with only two available character slots per server. Honestly, that’s not an issue. You can still cover six Crafting Professions, meaning you can pretty much gear up both characters.
- No Crafting Guilds: As an F2P you will need to purchase access to Crafting Guilds.
- Content After Level 95 must be purchased: while this may be true for VIPs too, VIPs get some other Quest Packs for free. F2P players must earn or buy LOTRO points to acquire that content.
- Auction House Limit: F2Pers cannot sell items, but can still bid on (or simply buy) items sold by other players.
The Black Book of Mordor
I had to check this one, but free access to the “Epic” does not include the whole of the Black Book of Mordor story. To get this, you need to purchase Mordor or Minas Morgul (for real money or LOTRO points. Though, if you’ve done deeds to earn 3000LP in one go, you probably need medical assistance).
You can also get the Black Book by purchasing any expansion that relates to the questline “The Song of Waves and Wind”. While that’s confusing terminology, it includes the questpack Gondor Renewed (aka King’s Gondor) and the Corsairs of Umbar.
I’m Supposed to Have 3 Outfit Slots But I Have 2!
Yes, you do. And technically you have 3. This is because LOTRO classifies your “Equipment Outfit” as an “Outfit Slot”. Whether you want to be seen wearing the mish-mash of stat gear you’ve acquired along the way is up to you.
Reminder: you can choose the “Equipment Outfit” and toggle off any items you don’t want people to see. This is one of my daughter’s characters. I’ve shown it with the “full armour” screen, then the fact that on “Equipment Outfit”, the only item she didn’t toggle off was the boots!
LOTRO VIP Accounts
I am going to cover VIP next, because one way you can obtain Premium Status is by having been VIP in the past. You do not completely lose everything when you stop your subscription either. So I want to cover the Pro’s and Con’s of VIP, so that when I explain what features you keep or lose, they make sense in context!
What is a VIP Account?
A VIP (Very Important Person/Player) is one either with an active subscription or with time remaining on their current subscription.
By that I mean, if you have cancelled a Direct Debit but it’s before your renewal date, you’ll be VIP until that date.
How Much Does LOTRO VIP Cost?
The packages (in £GBP) available are:
- Monthly: £8.99
- Quarterly: £20.97 (the equivalent of £6.99 a month)
- 6-Monthly: £41.94 (the equivalent of £6.99 a month)
- Annually: £79.99 (the equivalent of £6.67 a month)
Which Plan’s the Best?
This depends on you and your finances – mostly how much you can afford to pay upfront. But I would say these things:
- If you want to give LOTRO VIP a real try, it’s £6 cheaper to pay for three months up-front than monthly for three months.
- There is no real benefit in renewing every six months rather than three, except the minor inconvenience of letting your subscription renew.
- If you are going to commit to VIP, then Annually is the cheapest pro rate cost per month.
Cost Per Year per Package
If you were to let all the packages run for a year, here’s how much they would cost you:
- Monthly: £107.88
- Quarterly: £83.88
- 6-Monthly: £83.88
- Annually: £79.99
You won’t find many out-of-game hobbies coming in at £6.67/month with the amount of time you can enjoy in The Lord of the Rings Online!
VIP Pro’s and Con’s
Pro’s
- Bonus: 500× LOTRO Points/month (this benefit is worth £4.15 GBP)
- VIP Events: earn bonus XP during Recognition weekends.
- Many Quest Packs: many zones, quests and deeds available to you while you’re VIP.
- Character Slots/Server: 7 – this is two more than Premium and five more than F2P.
- Inventory: an extra 30 bag slots available without additional purchasing.
- Shared Wardrobe: 20 ‘free’ slots of Wardrobe for your characters to share outfit items with each other. (See Premium Status after VIP to understand why I wrote ‘free’).
- Rest XP: the ability to get Rest XP is automatic, no purchase required.
- Auction House: you can sell up to twenty items at a time.
- Swift Travel: Swift Travel destinations you have discovered can always be used.
- Conveniences: Mail can be used in the field, and Town Services from Wenda Cranesbill allows access to
AH, 
Wardrobe, 
Shared Storage and 
Vault wherever you are in Middle-Earth. - Item Wear: using Wenda Cranesbill’s Subscriber’s Jug, your gear takes no wear-and-tear damage, even on defeat.
- Gold Hobbit Gifts: one free
Gold Hobbit Gift per week. - Destiny Points: VIPs can spend Destiny Points on Perks, giving free temporary bonuses. These include things like Bonus XP allowances, combat stat buffs and runspeed increases.
Con’s
- It costs real life money: For some people, as it was for me for a very long time, this is enough of a barrier.
- There are some features not expanded for VIPs that you might expect, such as unlocked outfit slots, or shared storage.
- Some conveniences are arguably minor: Vault-keepers are found in many settlements as you quest through LOTRO, you may not care about selling in-game items for coin, saving on item wear is minor – at least for the casual player. Though I would counter this to say the volume of content, plus character, inventory and wardrobe slots are worth far more than the amount you pay for VIP.
- Once you’ve been VIP it can be hard going back to Premium! It shouldn’t be, but once you’re used to in-the-field conveniences, the ability to sell on the Auction House, the additional free content – even the exta LOTRO Points etc, it is hard to go without them.
How Do I Become VIP?
You do this through the in-game store. This can be done at the character selection screen.
- Open the Store with the usual button.
- At the top select “Become a VIP”.
- Choose your preferred package.
- Complete the payment process.
How Do I Cancel VIP?
- Open the LOTRO Store from inside the game. This can be done at the character selection screen.
- Click your username in the top left (next to the gold “VIP” tag)
- Choose “Account”
- Switch the the “Subscriptions” tab
- Click the “Cancel” button under “Cancel Renewal”
How Do I Change my VIP Payment Plan?
You can also change your payment plan from the same “Subscriptions” tab in the LOTRO Store. Just click “Change Plan” instead of “Cancel”.
LOTRO Premium Accounts
How Do I Get Premium Status in LOTRO?
As I already mentioned, your account will become Premium if you either
- Stop your LOTRO VIP Subscription, or
- Purchase something for real-world money as a Free-to-Play account.
On the second point this can be as easy as loading the cheapest pack of LOTRO Points into your account. This is £4.99GBP, or whatever the LOTRO Store says the 600LP pack is in your local currency.
What Do Premium Accounts Get You?
Let’s start with the common features, regardless of whether you’re ex-VIP or ex-F2P.
- 3×Additional Character Slots per Server
- Quicker login compared to F2P Accounts
- 5×Auction House slots to sell items to other players
- Full Access to Support for 30 Days after your real-money purchase.
Three characters slots are pricey in terms of LOTRO Points, and are worth more than the £4.99-worth of points you might have loaded in to get Premium Status. In fact you could use your 600LP to unlock 10 Shared Wardrobe slots and you have gained a lot for just £4.99.
If you like the idea of selling to other players for additional coin then having even five Auction House slots is worth it.
Why I Have Multiple Accounts
I can show you screenshots of different account types because I have more than one account – and with good reasons. The primary one is to enable me to Duoquest (aka Dualboxing) when I feel like it. My only reason for doing this is RPing, usually life-partners, but sometimes family members.
I have also used them in the past to stage screenshots for LOTRO FanFiction. Sadly I had to stop writing this a long time ago to focus on stuff people wanted to read. But I enjoyed it, even though I stopped mid-storyline.
Premium Status After VIP?
The answer to this is…complicated, so bear with me.
Again, I don’t want to duplicate the Wiki, and I’ll link them shortly. But, while you have all the above benefits of being Premium, you do not completely lose all your VIP features when you cancel.
- Swift Travel: any characters you logged in while a VIP will keep Swift Travel. New ones created when your account becomes Premium won’t. Instead, you’ll need to purchase
Writs of Special Passage for those characters from the LOTRO Store to use Swift Travel. - Bonus Bag Space: any characters that had benefitted from the +30 inventory slots get to keep them. New characters thereafter will not have these slots.
- Wardrobe Slots: your ‘free’ 20 items won’t be removed, but you’ll need to purchase 20 slots before you can add additional ones.
How to Adjust to Life After VIP
LOTRO-Wiki has an excellent list of points under “Handling of Removed Features” so you know what to expect once your VIP expires.
Is Premium Worth It?
If you cannot afford to commit to VIP, but can treat yourself to the smallest LOTRO Points package, then Premium is very much worth it.
The extra character slots allow you to experiment with classes, races and crafting professions without the annoyance of rebooting the game to change server. Being able to sell the occasional item to other players is a bonus and, if you have any issues with initially being Premium you have 30 days of support from LOTRO.
On top of that, you’ve given yourself 600LP, which can be used on Shared Wardrobe slots to save mailing items between characters! Or whatever you like.
The “One Month of VIP” Strategy
Why Bother With Just One Month?
There is a “thing” in the LOTRO Community and it appears in World Chat sometimes – going VIP for a month. The simple reason for this is the features you gain that you also keep post-VIP.
- +30 Bag Space slots for characters logged in while VIP
- Swift Travel for characters logged in while VIP
- Kinda-temporary 20 Wardrobe Slots
- +500 LOTRO Points
Why This Is Worth Doing
To unlock 30 Bag Slots separately requires you to buy them from the LOTRO store at 325 for 5 slots (when not on discount). That comes in at 1,950!
And if you make sure you’ve used your 20 Wardrobe slots before your VIP expires, you’ve delayed spending 1,190 LP on 20 Shared Wardrobe slots. This gives you time to get used to how it works – and longer to earn the LP. Though you’ve got 500 from your one month of VIP too!
Total Value: before considering Swift Travel: 1,950 + 1,190 + 500 = 3,640 (about $USD 60 of benefits).
So, Is VIP Worth It?
In my opinion, yes. What you get as a VIP is good value for the real-life cost of subscribing. Even if the only bonus was the “Free to VIPs” Quest Packs and the free LOTRO Points, you’re in the green. And VIPs get more than that.
Do the Minimum and See
I reckon you should at least have one month of VIP and maybe up to three (pay it quarterly if you know you’re going for three!), so you can save the LOTRO Point grant to buy some of the unlocks you are restricted from once downgraded to Premium.
Make sure you play a fair amount while a VIP and use the tools and bonuses you’re given. Then see how you feel without them again. You may be fine, or you may realise the benefits of a subscription.
For Me, It’s Less About What I Get
But whether a LOTRO Subscription is worth the money, for me, goes beyond solely “what stuff do I get?” Employing story-writers, designers, coders, voice actresses and actors, world-builders, server admins – these things aren’t free. If we want LOTRO to continue we need to support it in some form or other.
Naturally, not everyone can afford to pay. Support it by playing, by “talking it up” in World Chat or the Forums, share your shots, videos, streams etc on social media. Maybe even mention it to any Lord of the Rings fans you know.
TL;DR LOTRO VIP Subscriptions Are Worth It
That is my conclusion. Whether you pursue it for one month only or can commit to longer, LOTRO VIP has a lot going for it. From extra storage to character slots, from bonus LOTRO Points to portable Town Services – when you add all that up with any LOTRO Zones that come “Free to VIP”, if you are a medium or long-term player, being a subscriber makes a lot of sense.
And if you are not ready to commit, why not treat yourself to a month and get some bonus points and storage? Even with those allowances, you might stick around and live longer in Middle-earth.
Whether you’re a resident, or just passing through, have fun in LOTRO and do what you can to make sure others do, too.
About the Author
I have been playing MMOs for about ten years and began writing guides to The Lord of the Rings Online in 2017. I've only been creating content about Final Fantasy XIV since 2022, but I am glad for the mix. My current games include LOTRO, FFXIV and the occasional Palia session too.
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