Useful tips

Casino Strategies to Help you Win

We as humans are almost always looking for a quick fix or a way to make a quick buck. That’s the main draw that casinos offer.

It’s a way to blow off some steam and possibly earn some cash while you’re at it. And if you are lucky, it could be a lottery-like substantial amount of cheddar.

However, for most people, that isn’t what happens. They walk into a casino or hit up a great online casino, and lose their bankroll. Often re-upping on their bankroll and losing that too. So, what are a few strategies that you can use both in the casino and online to increase your chance of winning and limited your losses?

Let’s start with your bankroll itself.

Don’t ReUp Your Bankroll

This isn’t necessarily a strategy to help you win. It’s more to help you limit your losses so that you have money to win another day. Kind of like the old saying, live to play another day.

I’ve seen it time and time again: people burn through their bankroll – usually on a losing streak– then start chasing the dragon. They go to the cash machine and pull out more money, usually whatever their bankroll was or even more. Then they burn through that and pull more money.

Before going to your favourite casino or logging into your online gaming account, choose an amount that is acceptable to lose. This way, you are playing for entertainment’s sake. If you win, great; if you lose it all, it isn’t going to mess up your mortgage.

If you are ok with going to the casino with $400 dollars in hand while you’re still clear-headed but not ok with the potential of losing $800 in a night, why on earth would you pull another $400 dollars out after losing the original roll?

Don’t chase that dragon.

If you go on a bad run and lose all your cash, you’re having a bad night and it isn’t likely going to turn around for you. It ‘s much better to just call it a night than to keep pulling money trying to recoup your losses. Most likely, you are just going to keep losing. First, because it’s literally just not in the cards for you and second because you start to play aggressively and desperately.

Understand What You Are Trying to Accomplish

You can’t make an effective strategy without first knowing what you intend to accomplish. Are you playing exclusively to win money? If so, how much? Are you playing to have a good time? Your goal will dictate your strategy. For example, if I am playing just to have fun, I might be playing low minimums and just trying to make my bankroll last for as long as possible.

If I’m trying to win some money, I might try some low-risk strategies such as D’Alembert or Martingale. If I am trying to win more money, I might start with a lower-risk strategy to build my bankroll a bit, then move to a riskier, higher reward strategy like a reverse martingale.

Play Blackjack and Utilize Basic Strategy

Play Blackjack

Instead of some of the other games that have enormous house advantages, learn how to play blackjack and stick to the gameplan. The practice is your best friend in this case and the only way to do it is going physically to the casino or doing it online, SBR offers a list of sites where you can put your hours, on Blackjack for free or for money, an example is Betonline, here you enable you to play from the comfort of your own home and gain some knowledge.

Those who just sit at a blackjack table and play willy-nilly, give the house around a 3 to 3.5% edge. That said, if you understand the game and basic strategy, you can reduce the house edge down to 1-1.5%.

I’m not going to get into all of the blackjack strategies, but it isn’t super difficult. You don’t have to count cards or be a math wiz to follow the basic rules that help you to win.

Here are a few BJ best practices:

  • Never take insurance
  • If you can’t resplit, look at your hand as a hard total
  • If there is no row for splitting, like 5s and 10s, look up your hand as a hard total (10 20)
  • Surrender hard 16 but not a pair of 8s against. dealer 9, 10, or A, and hard 15 versus dealer 10.
  • Always hit hard on 11 or less.
  • Stand against a dealer’s 2-6 if you have 13-16.
  • Always stand on 19 or more.
  • Soft stand on 18 but hit if the dealer has 9, 10, or A
Updated:
Shawna Dudley

Shawna is an ambitious and free-spirited digital nomad with expertise in creating high-quality and SEO-friendly guides and reviews in the iGaming and travel industry. Follow her on Twitter or Linkedin or send her an email.