EVE Online is a space-based, persistent world MMORPG, where players can fight in open space battles, work in a variety of professions from mining to cargo hauling to piracy against other players, or even form large corporations and alliances to control and expand player-owned territory. Almost every ship and item in EVE is made by players, creating a vast economy across the game's 7000+ star systems.

EVE is available as either as free-to-play ("Alpha" account) or with a paid subscription ("Omega" account). Notably, the entire game runs on one instance or server called "Tranquility" (with the exception of China, that runs on its own regional instance called "Serenity"), compared to other MMOs which may have dozens of separate servers, giving the game a large regular population.