Valve dropped its clearest hint yet that Cache is about to return to Counter-Strike 2. On April 23, 2026, the official Counter-Strike X account changed its profile banner to what appears to be a screenshot of T-spawn on a rebuilt version of Cache. The next day, Valve followed that up with a short highlights video on X titled “What are you doing next week?” – a direct tease at a release within days.
The community noticed something beyond just the banner swap. Fans compared the new banner side-by-side with FMPONE’s Workshop version and noticed clear differences in color palette, texture quality, and lighting, which confirms Valve has been building its own version from the ground up rather than simply porting the existing Workshop map.
A Long Road Back to the Map Pool
Cache has been out of competitive CS since March 2019, when Valve removed it from the Active Duty pool in favor of Vertigo. That’s over seven years on the sidelines.
The map was originally created by Shawn “FMPONE” Snelling and Salvatore “Volcano” Garozzo as a community Workshop map. FMPONE released a full CS2 remake on the Steam Workshop on March 3, 2025, rebuilt with Source 2 lighting, textures, and environmental detail.
FMPONE confirmed that Valve showed immediate interest from day one: “They reached out to buy it on day one of release. It was a great honor.” He also explained why the remake avoided major gameplay changes: “Cache is fair and balanced, so changes come with more risk than reward.”
By May 2025, FMPONE publicly confirmed the sale was complete. Valve later confirmed they were working on the map in January 2026, replying “It’s cooking” to a NAVI social media post about the map.
FACEIT Has Already Brought Cache Back
Cache was added to FACEIT matchmaking in April 2026 after winning a community vote, with nearly 150,000 players choosing Cache over alternatives like Train and Vertigo.
Players on FACEIT need to subscribe to Cache on the Steam Workshop before queuing, as the map is over 3GB in size. There is a timer to join FACEIT matches, so a slow download could result in a ban.
Cache joining the Active Duty pool means one map gets dropped. Cache was added to the Active Duty pool in 2014 and remained there until 2019, when it was removed in favor of Vertigo. The community debate now centers on whether Mirage, Inferno, or another map gets replaced. Valve has not announced which map will leave.