Casino House Advantage

November 4, 2008 |

Casinos can never lose, that’s why they are rich. Every casino has a house advantage on every bet made in games against the player. It is known as the “house edge”. The house advantage is basically a percentage of all the bets made in every casino game. This percentage may be as low as 1% and as high as 16%, which means for every $100 bet a player loses $1 to $16 according to the percentage. Unfortunately for the player this house advantage is unavoidable.

House advantages vary with the casino, the game and the player’s skill. The house advantage vary for the different casino games ranging from 1% to 12% for slot machines, 3% to 5% for roulette and 2% to 5% for blackjack to mention a few. Skill games maximize a player’s chances of winning whereas chance games are based on randomness. In skill games the advantage is determined by the player’s skill and the cards played can may variate from player to house. Thus some games can have positive return on the basis of the pay table. In chance games like slots or money wheel, the player cannot strategize to influence the outcome which is taken by the house advantage. Odds always favor the casino thus the more one plays, the more one loses.

In each casino game each bet is paid at odds and the house advantage is made from making those odds lower than the true odds. The true odds are the real odds of what you bet on. Let’s say we flip a coin. The probability of getting either a heads or tails is 50%. One gets true odds if one was to wager $100 and was paid $100 upon winning. In a casino your odds are less than $100. Thus the house advantage is the percentage difference between the casino odds and the true odds.

The house advantage is calculated in different ways. The house vigorous is the fee paid by players when they wager. If a round is $100, one pays $105 of which $5 is for the house vigorous. Whether one wins or loses, the $5 belongs to the casino. The return percentage is another way of calculating house advantage. It is the percentage of the bet that goes to the players when they win. This method is usually used on slots.

It is best to understand the house advantage before playing so that one does not lose big!

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Casino House Advantage

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