The Complete Gibbed Guide for Borderlands 2

This is the one to read first. I've split the fiddly parts — downloading, errors, console saves, codes — into their own deep guides, but everything you need to go from "I just heard about this" to "my level 80 has the gear I want" lives right here, in order. Where a topic has its own page, I'll hand you off at the right moment. Think of this as the map; the other pages are the streets.

What it is, and who Gibbed is

The Gibbed Save Editor is a free Windows program that opens your Borderlands 2 save and lets you change almost anything in it — level, money, Eridium, skill points, and the contents of your backpack and bank. It was written by Rick Gibbed, a modder who's been "poking at games since 1996." Most people just call the tool "Gibbed" after him. Open it and it even links his blog and Patreon right from the window; he's the reason this exists, so if it adds to your fun, that's where to say thanks.

The current and final version is 1.0.46 (May 30, 2020). It's been quiet since 2021, but it still works perfectly with today's Steam and Epic builds.

The whole workflow in one breath

Before the details, here's the entire process so the shape's in your head:

That's it. Everything below is just doing each step without tripping.

Step 1 — Get the editor (from the one real place)

Download bl2_saveedit_1.0.46.zip from the verified release — not "Source code," not a file portal. Extract the whole folder and run Gibbed.Borderlands2.SaveEdit.exe, the one with Handsome Jack's mask for an icon.

GitHub Releases

Step 2 — Find your save and back it up

Your saves live here, same path on Steam and Epic:

Each character is a SaveXXXX.sav file; profile.bin beside them is your account-wide profile. Before you touch anything: close the game, then copy that whole numbered folder somewhere safe.

Step 3 — The tabs, tab by tab

Open your save with Open (platform stays PC for Steam/Epic). Across the top you get New, Open and Save; below that, the tabs where the work happens:

• General — save slot, platform, and a save GUID I'd leave alone (it identifies the save; no reason to touch it). There's an Import option for pulling skills or missions from another character — handy for cloning, though honestly it's easier to just copy and rename a save file.
• Character — class (all six: the four base Vault Hunters plus Gaige and Krieg), level, XP, Overpower level, skill points, name, and appearance. This is where most edits happen.
• Currency — money, Eridium (capped at 500), Seraph crystals and Torgue tokens.
• Backpack — your carried inventory: edit items, or add new ones by building them or pasting a code.
• Bank — storage; behaves exactly like the backpack.

There are a couple more (Fast Travel, and the deep Raw tab where backpack SDUs live). For a field-by-field breakdown of all of them, see every field, tab by tab.

Step 4 — Edits that actually stick

Here's what trips up newcomers: the game runs a sanity check when it loads a save and quietly reverts anything that doesn't add up. So the trick isn't making the edit — it's keeping things consistent.

• Level and XP go together. Set yourself to level 72 but leave level-1 XP and the game drags you back down. Bump both, or set the level and sync the XP to match.
• Don't max money to the limit. Setting cash to the integer maximum (2,147,483,647) actually breaks the check — pick a large but sane number.
• Don't add gear from DLC you don't own. The game deletes unrecognized DLC items on load.

When edits "don't save," this is almost always why. I cover every variant — the edit that never wrote versus the sanity check quietly undoing it — in why the game reverts your edits.

Step 5 — Items and weapon codes

Two ways to get gear: build an item from scratch in the Backpack tab by picking its parts, or paste a code someone already made. Codes start with BL2( and go in via Paste Code.

The catch is getting working codes and pasting them right (one continuous line, no element suffix). I cover the mechanic, where to find verified codes, and why a code fails in BL2 weapon codes & how Paste Code works.

Step 6 — Save without losing your work

Hit Save File, close Gibbed, launch the game. One last trap: Steam Cloud. If the cloud copy and your edited local copy disagree, Steam shows a conflict prompt at launch — choose thelocal save, or the cloud version overwrites everything you just did. (You can also disable Cloud for BL2 while you work.)

When it breaks

Three problems cover almost every "it's not working," and each has a dedicated fix:

Is it safe?

Short version: yes. Borderlands 2 has no VAC or anti-cheat, so single-player editing carries no ban risk, and the antivirus flags are explained false positives. The only real danger is overwriting a good save — which your backup from Step 2 already solved. The long version, including the console-reinjection caveat, is in is Gibbed safe.

Other games

Gibbed made separate editors for The Pre-Sequel (bloz_ files, 1.0.25) and Mass Effect 2 (me2_, 2.0.5) — never mix them with the BL2 editor. For Borderlands 3, there's a catch worth knowing before you go searching: there's no Gibbed editor for BL3, and what to use instead. Playing Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep? Whether you use the normal editor depends on whether it's the BL2 DLC or the standalone.

FAQ