A Premium membership is Neopets’ version of an upgraded account. You receive exclusive perks that can make the game a lot easier to play — but they are by no means necessary, and do not give users an upper hand in gameplay. Still, there are a lot of fun shortcuts and items for Premium users that make it worth it to some!

The Space Faerie is Premium’s mascot.

SIGNING UP FOR NEOPETS PREMIUM

Signing up for Premium is extremely simply. Simply go to the top of your navigation bar and select “Become a Member” from the Premium tab:

⊳Payment Options

There are three payment options available to users:

NOTE: All prices are listed in US dollars. If you do not have a US credit card, you can pay Neopets through a Paypal option. We highly recommend making all payments on Neopets via Paypal.

• 12 months/1 year of Premium for $69.95 ━ Please note that this is advertised as $5.83 per month, but you must pay for the whole year up front. This means you will make one payment of $69.95 at the time of purchase. This is automatically renewed every year unless you go into your options and specify otherwise.
• 4 months of Premium for $24.95 ━ Please note that this is advertised as $6.25 per month, but you must pay for all four months up front. This means you will make one payment of $24.95 at the time of purchase. This is automatically renewed every four months unless you go into your options and specify otherwise.
• 1 month of Premium for $7.95 ━ This is the monthly Premium plan, meaning you will be billed once a month for $7.95 and can cancel anytime. This is automatically renewed every month unless you go into your options and specify otherwise.

After you select an option, you will be asked to enter your password (for security purposes) before being re-directed to the payment options.

⊳Paying for Neopets Premium

You can pay for a Premium membership one of two ways:

• Credit or debit card payment ━ You will be asked to enter your credit and debit card information and personal information as if you were making any other online purchase. You will be asked if you would like to save your card information before checking out. We highly recommend never asking Neopets to save your information for a “faster checkout” next time.
• Paypal ━ While this guide is not an advertisement for Paypal, this is a much more secure payment system than Neopets so we do recommend it. Accounts are free, and you can process your credit or debit card information through it, meaning you do not need to take out a line of credit with Paypal to use its services.

You may notice this when you are checking out:

You do have the right to be concerned over the fact that the URL is not considered secure. Neopets does have security, but it is currently more vulnerable than most modern secure payment systems. This is simply yet another reason why we recommend the Paypal payment option.

⊳ Manage your new account and Canceling Neopets Premium

To check the status of your account, payment plan, and to change your auto renewal options, visit Manage Your Membership under the same Premium tab in the nav bar. Here, you can choose to cancel your Premium membership, which will take effect at the end of your current pay period. This means if you create a Premium account on June 1st and pay $7.95, and then cancel your Premium account on June 2nd, you will still have Premium all throughout June because you paid for one month of Premium.

*** WARNINGS ***

The first thing any Neopets players knows is that neopets.com is not a perfect place. In fact, it’s buggy, it’s laggy, and JumpStart, the company that now owns the website, is not a fan favorite. As Neopets is a very old site with… how do you say… less-than-stellar technologies, there have been many serious issues with payment options. We are in no way attempting to sway you one way or the other about whether Premium is worth it — you can read the next section and decide that for yourself! That being said, it is very important that the common issues with Premium are clear to you before you put your account and personal information on the line.

⊳ Common Premium payment issues

• Multiple billings for a payment period (i.e. being charged $7.95 two times for a single month)
• Billings continuing even after cancellation
• Sudden and unplanned cancellations
  • Remember, if you are taking advantage of the fifth pet slot and your membership is cancelled, you will be asked to either renew your Premium membership or transfer/pound one of your pets on the spot ━ this cannot be delayed and you will have to choose one or the other in order to play on your account.
• Premium perks and toolbar taking up to two weeks to appear, even after a payment has clear
• Responses to issues regarding Premium and payments taking upwards of 6 months to a year

⊳ Sending in a ticket about a Premium issue

If you have any sort of issue with your Premium membership — including payment issues — you should send in a ticket as soon as possible with every detail of important information that you can remember. Simply go to the Help section (at the nav bar at the bottom of any Neopets page) and select Submit a Ticket.

While there was once the guarantee of faster ticket response for Premium (“paying”) members, there is no indication that, currently, TNT responds to one ticket subject faster than any other ticket subjects.

• The only instance in which ticket responses are notably faster are after users have filed claims with Paypal. This means that a user was billed too many times or billed after canceling their Premium membership, and Paypal gets into contact with Neopets for having essentially “stolen” money from someone. Of course, Neopets wants to avoid any sort of legal trouble, so they tend to respond to these issues much more quickly!
• Other methods for having a ticket responded to more quickly is to post on the Neopets Facebook page, and make sure to always leave your ticket number in your comment. Briefly explaining your issue and how long you’ve waited can illicit a response from TNT. You can also email them at support@neopets.com; make sure not to spam their email or they are less likely to respond to you!

THE PERKS OF NEOPETS PREMIUM

Now that we’ve covered all of the super risky, annoying, and downright unacceptable issues that could arise (they don’t for everyone!), let’s talk about what you actually get for all of that trouble and money — and surprisingly, it’s a lot!

⊳ Premium Toolbar

The first thing you’ll notice with your new Premium account is what is called the Premium toolbar, found at the bottom of your screen:

Here, you’ll have convenient access to many things on the site that you’d usually need the top navigation bar or Explore tab to find. For example, you have immediate access to Super Shop Wizard, a tab with your dailies, and bank and shop till balances.

The yellow rectangle is for Cheeseroller… without a reminder, I’ll never get that avatar!! *shakes fist*

Your Dailies tab is customizable, so you can decide which dailies appear and in what order. You can even pick up to six dailies that are not offered by this tab’s options, like what I did with Cheeseroller in the image above.

Hmm… my stock aren’t doing too well…

Your Bankroll tab is very useful for keeping an eye on your finances, and does you a favor by adding the amount of NP you have between your bank, shop till, and on-hand. You can also manage your stock portfolio with just a glance!

The other icons in your toolbar link to the Premium game of the day, Create-A-Pet Page, Space Faerie scratchcards, Premium collectible cards, the Premium NeoBoards, and the Premium FAQ/help page.

⊳ Super Shop Wizard

One of the most-used — if not the most-used — perks of Premium is Super Shop Wizard, very often referred to by its acronym SSW. Unlike Regular Shop Wizard, which only searches a certain number of shops in Neopia at once, you can get the cheapest prices for any searchable item on the entire site via SSW.

No one wants to pay more for those dastardly Eo Codestones than they have to…

Most buyable (under 100k) items in the game are dictated by SSW. This means that if an Eo Codestone, for example, is listed as roughly 15,500 NP on SSW, it is unlikely an Eo Codestone priced at 20,000+ will sell any time soon.

⊳ Premium Neoboards

There are special NeoBoards accessible only to Premium members. You can access these boards by going directly to them (via your toolbar) or going to Neoboards in the general navigation bar (under Community) and then clicking “Premium Boards!” The image below shows this link’s location:

The Main Hall is the general board accessible to all Premium members, whereas the Charter board is for Premium members of 4mo+. The Premium boards are all-around much slower than the active, all-player Neoboards, such as the Pound Chat, NC Mall Chat, Avatars/NeoSignatures Chat, and Newbie Chat.

⊳ Fifth Pet Slot

In a very rewarding turn of events in 2012, TNT began allowing the site’s Premium members to adopt and transfer up to five pets on one account instead of four.

As mentioned before, the fifth slot only exists as long as you have a Premium membership. If you cancel your membership or your membership is not automatically renewed, you will be given three options upon logging into the site:

• Renew your Premium membership and retain your fifth pet slot
• Transfer one of your five pets to a side account
• Pound one of your five pets
  • If you chose this option and pound one of your pets, it will not go straight to the pound. Instead, the pet will remain in a “limbo” — off of your account but not in the pound — for 90 days. No one will be able to re-adopt it but you during those 90 days. If you do not re-adopt the pet, it will be up for grabs in the pound.

⊳ Space Faerie Scratchcards

Every Friday, Premium users are gifted special scratchcards that can be accessed via the toolbar (the Space Faerie icon). Because they can only be accessed via this link and not through your inventory, they cannot be sold or traded.

The prizes include Neopoints — generally between 1,000 and 5,000 NP — and a Space Faerie item.

If you do not use your scratchcard before the next Friday rolls around, have no fear! You can simply stack your scratchcards as long as you like. As you can see in the picture above, I have five unused cards. Many people hoard their cards to use with the Full Pockets Premium Boon, available to Premium members after winning a round of Battleground of the Obelisk. This boon increases the likelihood of a good prize from the Premium scratchcards.

Full Pockets

⊳ Extra Random Events

With Premium, you may notice that you’re getting Random Events (REs) all the time. It turns out that the Space Faerie is very generous! These random events are always good news: you either find some NP (usually between 1,000 and 3,000 NP) or an item “falls” from space (up to r75). Thanks, Space Faerie!

⊳ Premium Featured Game

Everyday on the site, there is a featured game in which users can win x2 the amount of NP as usual! (You can see which game this is everyday by going to the Games Room via your navigation bar and then clicking “Featured Game.”) Premium users are given a second featured game everyday! This can be accessed via the Featured Game tab of the Premium toolbar.

My favorite!

⊳ Birthday Training

Generally, a pet receives free training at the Swashbuckling Academy when it is their specific pet-themed day (you can see a calendar here). For Premium members, pets also receive free training at the Academy on their individual birthdays! To check your pet’s birthday, simply go to it’s lookup and it can be located under their age.

⊳ NC Monthly Collectibles

One of the most coveted perks that make Premium “worth it” for many users is the addition of a monthly NC collectible item awarded on or around the 15th to all Premium members. These items are only released this one time and never again, so many are well sought-after and become worth more over time. Users receive a neomail and the item is immediately placed in their inventories on the day the collectible is released.

To get a taste of what sorts of items are given out, here are some past collectibles that are quite popular:

February 2013	October 2013	January 2014	December 2014	May 2015	August 2015
Premium Collectible: Opalescent Wig	Premium Collectible: Spiky Black Lace Cape	Premium Collectible: Heart Contacts	Premium Collectible: Holiday Boat Ride Background	Premium Collectible: Stone Bridge Foreground	Premium Collectible: Blue Moon Field Background

It is relatively common practice for users to buy Premium for one month (and immediately cancel it) if they particularly like a Premium Collectible item or know it will eventually be worth more than ~$8 in NC trading.

If you purchase Premium after the Premium Collectible for the month has been released but before a new month has rolled over (the 16th-30th/31st of the month), you will be given the NC item upon paying for a membership.

⊳ Battledome: The Cosmic Done

Activating a Premium account will unlock a special dome in the BD called the Cosmic Dome. Its two opponents are Giant Space Fungus and Jetsam Ace, the latter of whom is famous for giving away Nerkmids. These two opponents simply appear under your “FIGHT” tab in the Battledome once Premium is active.

⊳ Premium Site Theme, Space Faerie Charm, and Avatar

Upon registering, you’re immediately awarded with a special site theme, avatar, and “charm” that appears on your lookup like a trophy! Read more below.

AVATAR – PREMIUM SPACE FAERIE

This avatar is automatically awarded when you sign up for a Premium membership.

Before 2012, users had to refer a certain amount of people to Premium. Now, referrals are not needed to obtain a Premium membership therefore the requirements for the avatar were changed.

NOTE: If, for any reason, you cancel your Premium membership or it is not renewed, you will lose this avatar. Remember that is does not count towards your total avatars – whether you have it or not – but it will not be available to use on the Neoboards. Don’t say we didn’t warn you!

NOTES

• Never feel pressured to have Premium!!! Having a Premium account does not mean you cannot play the game as well as other people, and it does not make you more or less impressive to anyone. If you genuinely enjoy the perks of Premium and it is something you can realistically afford or feel comfortable paying for, then by all means, Premium away! Never feel as though you need to justify your reason for or for not having a Premium membership. If you witness peer pressure or shaming, report this as harassment.

• If you had to cancel your Premium account and lost access to perks such as your pre-set Dailies Tab and Premium NeoDeck, these things will reappear once Premium is renewed — even if this is at a much later date.
• The FAQ for Premium users is not currently available. The Premium Help NeoBoard is available, as well as the general ticket submission.
• Premium used to be quite different.

Author: Sarah