Learning the techniques of card counting (meaning, accurately keeping track of the cards as they are played out) can be mastered by most serious players. Yet, most counters often fail to become successful because of one (or more) of the following blunders:

1. OVERBETTING THEIR BANKROLL

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve observed this happen to fledging (and even experienced) card counters. They sit down at a $25 minimum blackjack table with a $250 session bankroll and expect to win hundreds of dollars every time. If you don’t know how many sessions and long-term bankroll you should have for your betting level, to minimize the risk of going broke, you are making a big mistake. I’ve yet to meet a successful card counter who doesn’t know about risk-of-ruin and doesn’t have an adequate bankroll. (An experienced card counter told me nearly 50 years ago that to be successful at card counting your needed “B&B.” When I asked what that meant, he wryly responded, “Brains and a Bankroll.”)

2. PLAYING GAMES THAT ARE UNBEATABLE

I’ve seen counters play six- and eight-deck games with only a 1 to 4 unit bet spread. I’ve seen others play casino games with a terrible mix of playing rules, such as no doubling after pair splitting, no soft doubling, and dealer hitting soft 17. Likewise, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve witnessed counters playing a multi-deck game where the cut-card penetration was, at best, 50%. You must have a good mix of playing rules and acceptable penetration to gain a respectable edge on the game.

3. WON’T PUSH OUT THE BIG BETS

Many counters can’t come to grips with pushing out a big bet when they have their maximum edge. The reason: a player’s emotional bankroll has been exceeded. I’ve seen players break out into a sweat with hands shaking when making a max bet. You must make those big bets regardless of whether you are having a losing session or any other excuse you can think of.  You can never be successful at card counting if you don’t adhere to the bet spread designed for your card counting system. You will have losing sessions (plenty of them) when you card count but successful counters understand that today’s score means nothing because card counting is a lifetime journey.

4. PLAYING LONG SESSIONS

Two issues here doom counters. The first is that card counting requires concentration, and the longer you play, the more likely you are to make mistakes that can wipe out the small edge you have. The second issue is the preservation of your longevity. When a counter sits at the same table for a long period of time it gives the casino ample time to evaluate his or her skill level. This is something that you, as a card counter, want to avoid, so adhere to the principle of playing short sessions to keep under the casinos’ radar.

5. LACK OF COVER

Most card counters will look intently at the cards being dealt, never show any emotion when they lose a hand, and never talk to the casino dealer or a fellow player. Your best cover is to look and play like a typical gambler. Learn to talk to your fellow players and the dealer while keeping the count, whoop it up when you win a hand, congratulate the brilliant play made by the third base player that resulted in the dealer’s busting, talk about how unlucky you were to lose a hand with a big bet, and while you’re playing, go ahead and make a modest tip bet for the dealer on your hand once or twice each hour. Emulating the play of the majority of (losing) blackjack players is the best cover for a counter.

6. BEING AFRAID OF A BIG LOSS

Casinos want and like losers. If you are having a rough session and losing, don’t try to bet more or play longer to get “even.”  Go ahead and book the loss, making sure you let the casino bosses within earshot know that you were just unlucky, again (booking a loss will give the perception to them that you are a loser).  (Remember what I wrote earlier: blackjack is a lifetime endeavor so you’ll have plenty of opportunity going forward to recoup your losses.)

7. NOT PLAYING THEIR BEST GAME

This may seem corny, but trust me, it isn’t. Ever see a professional baseball player (or any professional sport) play his best if he parties all night the day before a big game? Keeping track of the cards as they are dealt in a live casino environment requires concentration. You need to be well rested to be able to maintain your concentration during a session, period; otherwise, I guarantee you will be making costly mistakes in either your count, how much you bet, the play of your hand, or all of the above.

You can find more tips on card counting, how to disguise your skills, and what countermeasures the casino may take when they suspect someone is card counting by reading Chapters 10.11 and 10.12 in my Ultimate Blackjack Strategy Guide.

My late mentor, the Atlantic City legend known as the Captain of Craps, taught me many valuable concepts when it came to gambling in general and casino gambling in particular. One of the most important was his idea that risking one’s money in a casino had to be a “manageable thrill.” 

“You can’t bet too little because there is no thrill in that. An under-bet is really no bet,” he said. “An under-bet could be considered dull and not worth the time to make the bet. 

“A person worth hundreds of thousands would not find it fun just betting pennies at roulette or craps or blackjack or any other casino game. But that same person might have a heart attack if he had to bet, let us say, half his wealth on one bet where the house had an edge over him. That would be way too much money for anyone who wasn’t insane to wager on a bet where that person was an underdog.

“Even if a player with a slight edge over the casino makes a wager that was too big would, of course, be too big to make.”

So how much a person bets must have some kind of “kick to it” or there isn’t that delicious feeling of anticipation that comes with putting one’s money on the line. Still the kick shouldn’t be a devastating one if that bet is lost. That is not fun. That is not a mere disappointment. That is a severe kick in the one area no one wants to be kicked.

[Please note: There are three general categories of casino players; 1. advantage players who actually have an edge on the games they play and manage their money appropriately, 2. good players who do not over-bet though some do not always make the best bets vis a vis the house edges they play against, and 3. extremely poor players when it comes to money management and such players will get themselves into trouble time and time again.] 

About Those Player Categories, let me first discuss the “advantage players.”

ADVANTAGE PLAYERS

With an edge over the casino these players must have a casino bankroll that can take the ups and downs of advantage-play. That’s right; their bankrolls must be quite large in relation to the bets they make since they are looking to turn the casino games on their heads and to do so they must be well-financed. 

These players are looking to make money from the casinos, not through luck as are most players, but through skill. They cannot blanche when things go wrong and they can’t get too excited when things go right. They are in the long run, day in and day out and their emotions have to be totally in check. Most casino gamblers have no interest in joining the advantage-player company – it’s too much work and something of a major hassle.

REGULAR PLAYERS

The second category of player – maybe I should call this category “regular players” – contains the overwhelming majority of casino players. These players have a decided understanding of how much they can bet without becoming bored or nearing the heart-attack stage. 

A five-dollar bet by a certain player might make such a player feel bored by it because he needs at least twice this much to get that thrill. Still, the total amount wagered in a given session, day or trip is controlled by a full understanding that “thus and such” is the maximum that he will allow himself to lose. In short, regular players do manage their money quite well regardless of whether they are having good luck or bad luck or something in between. 

THE POOR PLOPPY PLAYERS

Now our third class of player contains the ploppies, or sad sacks or, worse, casino gamblers that should consider taking a break and thinking about the best way for them to play with the money they can actually afford to lose. These players are not in the problem category; they are merely uninformed and in fact silly as they take risks that are ridiculous with more money than they should wager.

If a player wakes up the next morning and thinks, “I bet how much last night?” or “I can’t believe I lost so much,” then that player has lost more than just money; that player has lost whatever modicum of discipline might exist in other aspects of this player’s life. Even a player who is rejoicing loudly the next day about an epic win has to reflect on the fact that betting what this player bet might not be a good idea next time the casino calls for him or her to play.

[Please note: The problem or degenerate gambler is a whole other category of player and such an individual is far better handled in a medical article and not a general gambling piece geared to recreational casino playing. Some people can destroy recreational activities and compulsiveness is an illness and not a playing prescription.]

Judging what a manageable thrill can be is not all that hard. Here is a look at two ways to know whether you are betting more or the amounts you should:

COMING HOME DEVASTATED

You are in the car, cab, train or airplane coming home from a bad day or extended trip to the casino. You lost a lot. Now you are thinking to yourself, “I wish I never decided to go to the casino. I feel awful. What the heck got into me?”

In such a case it is probable that you bet way over your head and with a bad streak or a few bad streaks in a row, Lady Luck seriously frowned on you during your whole time in her house of hope. Her house became your horror.

I am guessing that someone who wishes he never went to a casino probably pegged his betting limits way too high and was not emotionally ready to accept the possibility of a major loss.

HANDLING RISK

Let me take this by way of an analogy. I remember a friend of mine who decided to start investing his money in the stock market. His investment advisor asked him what kind of risk he was willing to take and able to handle. My friend thought he could go for the bigger deals with more risk, “I can handle risk. No problem, buddy, no problem. I can handle it!”

In his mind he had (I’m guessing here) a dream that his high-risk investments would pay a tremendous amount and although his lips said he could handle risk, in reality, he couldn’t. Reality can strike hard on all of us.

Well, as most investors know the American stock market can go ka-bloop on occasion and those individuals who have high-risk investments will find themselves shaking their heads and hoping their hearts hold out when their investments plummet. My friend actually couldn’t take the risk he thought he could take (“I can handle it!”) because when the market headed for a swift and significant decline – well, you just had to look at his ashen face to understand that he never really thought he would lose such an enormous amount of money. He over-estimated his self-estimation.

You see, he thought he could take the risks but when the bad times actually happened – and these were not just a theory of bad times over which he mused but a brutal fact – he just wasn’t emotionally prepared to handle it. 

I think it is a truism that most people think they can take more risk than they really can. That applies to casino gamblers too – it applies big time to them.

So memorize this precept: You probably can’t take the level of risk you believe you can take. Make that your mantra. If you think you can handle a bet of $50 per roulette spin, you might consider lowering that to $25 or $10. 

[Please note: The manageable thrill must also be looked at as handling a total amount wagered over a given period of time. It is not just your minimum individual bet but the total you can handle losing. This must be factored in as well. You might be able to handle a $25 wager but those can add up when good luck disappears. So what level of total losses can you handle must be considered – and remember, don’t overrate your heart because it might not be able to handle your fantasies!]

COMING HOME JUST SOMEWHAT SAD

Let me take the exact same scenario as I used above: You are heading home from the casino after a losing trip. You feel a little sad that you didn’t win. Oh, well, you’ll get them next time. Other than losing, you had a good time. Your stomach is not churning in anguish. You are fine.

Okay, unlike our player in the first scenario, instead of losing an arm or a leg or a shirt or a purse, you just had a single fingernail clipped. It wasn’t fun but it will have no impact on your life or on your emotions in any big way. You will not curl up into a fetal position when you get home moaning your loss. Are you sad? Yes. Are you devastated? Not at all.

If this is your reaction to a bad streak, no big deal; you can handle yourself, you can handle your betting levels and you can handle your emotions. That is the manageable thrill that the Captain talked about.

GAMBLING SYSTEMS

Gambling systems can be fun to play as long as the player doesn’t actually think such systems will lead to an advantage over the casino. (I’ve covered many systems in other articles and guides for our website and I’ll cover more in the future.) Systems do give players a schematic way to approach essentially random games or games where the casino has stacked the edge in their favor by shorting payoffs. 

But can gambling systems actually give the player an edge over the house? No. With the exception of true advantage-play which so few of the casino players can accomplish, systems merely structure how one plays the games. They give you a way to think about what to do next as opposed to “Uh, ahm, I’ll do this, ah, ahm.”

So let us say you have found a system you like to play. It makes decision-making so much easier than just taking what you think is a random shot at a possible win. The result is “thus and such” then you bet “this and that” and onward you go.

Is this good for the casino player? Not really but it does feel better for most players. They have a place to go after something happens. “If that happens, I do this.”

There is a very deep problem that can occur with most systems as many call for increasing one’s bet in situations where you have lost some or several bets in a row (think of the deadly Martingale in this regard) so this way of playing is courting disaster. You might be betting a manageable amount at the beginning but suddenly your system is saying to you, “Bet this large amount now!” But this “large” amount is much too high for you; and now you start to sweat.

Here is another simple precept to also make a prescription: If you start to sweat, you are betting too much. Sweat is not good. Stop what you are doing and take a break and think about what you can afford to bet and what it really means for you.

[Please note: Only you can really decide what to bet. Yet, if you read this article carefully you will hopefully understand there are many pitfalls for casino players. What should you do? Avoid them!]

All the best in and out of the casinos!
 

*Credits for main photo in this article belongs to Eran Alergant

“Like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel,
Never ending or beginning on an ever spinning reel,
As the images unwind; like the circles that you find
In the windmills of your mind”
From “The Windmills of Your Mind”
By Legrand, Bergman & Bergman

The roulette wheel is a seductive and alluring way to test fate and ply your trade as a professional gambler. Some of the most fascinating tales of gambling surround this form of gambling, and some of the most fascinating – and high-rolling – players have tested their luck, tempted their fate, and made their fortunes, playing it.

What is a High Roller?

It could be someone with more money than sense or a true pro, old or young, a man or a woman. The only requirement is that he bets big, and can do so again and again.

Though the specific dollar values are different for various locations, even among specific casinos, generally speaking a ‘high-roller’ is a gambler who wagers large amounts of money on any specific gambling game, sports event or spin of a roulette wheel.

Individual casinos compete in terms of bet limits to entice the high stakes players to their establishments. The high-end gamblers often negotiate benefits, specific awards (called “comps”) and even discounts and cash-backs (reduction of losses based on the volume of the loss) if they lose!

From a gambling site’s standpoint, these “whales’ are themselves something of a risk to woo; should the gambler win, the level of the losses, plus the cost of the aforementioned benefits and perks can be considerable; But with the odds usually still in the favor of the house, a whale’s losses will more than likely well exceed the costs involved, an net the casino a big win!

The casinos know their prey, too. From the same source quoted above, the average ‘whale’ has these characteristics:

• 80% are Asian
• All have an instant credit line of a $1,000,000 or more
• Prefer to gamble with bet minimums above $10,000
• Usually has their own entourage
• Extremely generous. They play big and tip big
• Generally, their net worth is near or above $1,000,000,000.

The ‘little wheel’

Nearly everyone is familiar with the live roulette table (named, simply, from its compact size, the French word for its size and shape), its 37 pie-shaped sections (38 on American wheels) and their associated ‘pockets’, the shiny ball that counter-rotates until gravity, and the little ‘canoes’ that randomize its fall into the pockets.

Originally, the wheel only had 36 sections; when the nation of Monaco got into financial difficulty, the king, Charles III, commissioned the creation of wheels with the zero, which increased the house odds. Then, when he opened a casino, he offered roulette to the masses. It did help that the same year, France outlawed gambling. So, between those two events, Monaco was saved as a nation, and Monte Carlo, where the casino was built, became the staple of European gambling it remains to this day.

The Wheel and the Whales

What may surprise you is that it has been at the center of some great stories dealing with High Rollers. Here are some examples.

• Joseph Jagger, an Englishmen, determined by sheer observation that a given roulette wheel at a casino in Monte Carlo had a predisposition to hit a certain collection of numbers more often than should be statistically consistent. (Taking advantage of a biased wheel is one of only two known ‘exploits’ to the game of roulette). Mr. Jagger won more than $120,000 in value, which would approximate today to SIX MILLION DOLLARS!
  • The Casino caught on, made some procedural changes, and sufficiently disguised the particular wheel, and thus ended the exploit.
• In 1891,Charles Coborn, a noted English swindler, took a tiny bankroll of roughly 400 British pounds Sterling, and more on a run of luck than any form of strategy worked that up in one night to a staggering million francs ($500,000), and ‘broke the bank’ –meaning that paying him his winnings closed their operation for the day.
• In a repeat of the biased wheel exploit much more recently (1990’s), Gonzalo Garcia-Pelayo discovered a biased Roulette table, in the self-same city, and successfully extracted over a million Euros (in that case, the casino attempted legal action against him, but the courts determined he had done nothing wrong, and ruled against the Casino).
• In 2004, a gambler decided to make a single-spin all –or – nothing bet. Ashley Revell, another Englishman, sold his home and all his possessions and walked in with a bankroll of 135,500. As the wheel began spinning, he put all his money on Red. When the spinning stopped, it was on Red 7, and leaving a tip of $600, Ashley walked out with a whopping $270,000!
• The Sultan of Brunei, at one time the richest man in the world, once played roulette placing $250,000 all over the board (no claim to total wins or losses from that particular tale, though).
• So-called “Fat Man” Fouad al-Zayat, a renowned whale, is said to have lost, over a fifteen-year period a whopping $19 million dollars. Ironically, in 1996, he had won approximately that same amount from a casino in Mayfair (The Guardian)
• Jimmy Chagra, notorious drug dealer and whale in his own right was said to have tipped a croupier a massive $600,000 after a successful session with the wheel.

What it takes to become a whale?

With the perks and benefits that define the life of a ‘Whale’, what does one have to have, to be in order to enter this lifestyle? What defines them? What drives them?

From the outset, it would seem that life for a whale is part ecstasy, part agony. The paradigm one must have, stems from an economic anomaly, an obscenely large financial base from which to operate. Whether you be a business creator or facilitator, with access to nearly limitless resources,  a family treasure chest of immense proportion, or you control and dominate a whole nation whose gross national product is your personal piggybank, you can back, at least initially, all your plays with measurable worth.

As wealthy as you are, you must also have extensive, if not limitless, time to pursue the passion. You must be able to follow the streak (when it is hot) or remove yourself from the premises (when it’s not). The appeal of the big win is so great, you aren’t able to control your losses, any more than you can drive your wins. The clock, the calendar, simply must fall to your desires.

Your appreciation and respect for the dangers of risk have to be dimmed. You must be able to put your all at risk. In the vernacular, you need nerves of steel and brass cajones, because big wins take big risks to achieve. There cannot be any hesitation or fear of the loss, for the sharks that swim with the whale are in it for the big kill. Taking a whale down has big rewards, but the level at which they are playing is dizzying, the risks immeasurable, the rewards immense.

Next, to be a whale you have to have a plan. Individuals who are operating at this level are sharp negotiators. They know the odds of roulette, but they also know how to mitigate them, to manipulate them, and on occasion, how to mine them.

To be a successful high stakes player, aside from a huge betting bankroll and sound money management, you need to calculate the risk, reduce the losses when possible, and go for the kill without the hesitation of a fly.

Two more characteristics that seem incongruent, but that define perhaps better than the rest, are generosity and honor.

On the one hand, as the money flows through the system, the workers that provide the support for a whale rise and fall on the same wave of success. If you perform well in the pressure of that world, the high roller offers a significant reward, through seemingly excessive tips and perks alike. When a whale goes down, therefore, often he still has hidden resources, even among his own entourage. Never count the whale as out; they know the odds, they depend on them, and despite the great and terrible losses and dangers they face, they take care of their friends.

On the other, it takes a strong constitution to face the hard reality of what is euphemistically called “adverse results’. Imagine all the money you would ever need in the world, for the rest of your life, as your bankroll. Now, imagine playing a hand wherein the possibility exists to double it or more… few might be willing to make that wager, but a Whale would. Up or down, ahead or behind, the big players of the world would, if the odds were acceptable. They accept their lumps, but they negotiate for the best possible outcome, the greatest mitigation of their losses. They own a lot; they have a lot to lose, but the world to gain. It isn’t about the money, for money has lost its meaning. They do not think about the values for which they compete. For them, it is about the win. Pure. But never simple.

Where did the famous casino game of roulette originate? Perhaps in several places and from some or many people and cultures. What follows are some examples of roulette’s possible origins and how players have played the wheel in an attempt to beat it

His name was Blaise Pascal and he was one of the most famous and astute mathematicians and scientific geniuses of the 1600s. He was also quite religious, often driven by science and theology to discover the ultimate truths of existence, and he created what has become known as Pascal’s Wager, a notion that to this very day contains persuasive power, if not overall theocratic authority, being thus: 

You bet your life and soul (if you have one) that either God exists or doesn’t exist. If He doesn’t exist and you believe in Him then you have given up some worldly pleasures to discover nothing as death ceases your full existence. However, if you do not believe in God and He does exist then death is going to be a horrid experience as you find out that not only were you wrong but…well, you can guess the rest. Thus it is best to believe in God than not to believe in God.

Thanks to Pascal, this is – short and sweet – a coin flip, a gamble: Yes or no? God or no God. It is the ultimate gamble with your life and with your soul. To Pascal the best bet was to believe in God as that gave you the greatest chance for perpetual happiness.

THE PERPETUAL WHEEL

However, Pascal wanted even more than this. He wanted to discover something that was eternal right here, right now in this world and that something is what we call a perpetual motion machine.

A perpetual motion machine is one that runs on no outside energy. Read that correctly – it is an amazing concept. Perpetual motion violates the laws of motion that prove some outside force must be used to move objects, as objects cannot move themselves. Energy must be pushed into the system to get it to move. When that energy stops then that movement stops.

The attempt to discover and/or invent such a perpetual motion device has been a vision of many scientific visionaries – all of them wrong in their assumption that such a thing is possible.

[Please note: Some of the greatest frauds in the “pseudo-scientific” world have lied and said that perpetual motion is possible and that they have invented such a machine. That would great, wouldn’t it, as we’d have cars that ran on nothing and would not cost us any energy costs, such as fuel. Sadly that’s not to be.]

Pascal worked a long time in the privacy of his mind to come up with such a machine, indeed a perpetual roulette wheel, but he couldn’t succeed. Instead, what he did accomplish was his version of the first wheel, actually a probability machine, which we credit as the first one in human history. It became known as roulette, which means the little wheel. It might not have been a perpetual motion machine but it certainly has been in almost perpetual motion in the casinos around the world for centuries.

SOME OTHER POSSIBILITIES

It is also believed that two aristocrats helped create the single-zero little wheel as a gambling device in order to make money from the game of roulette for King Charles III of Monaco in the mid-1800s. This allowed the “house” to extract quite a lot of money from the players, most of whom had no idea of what kind of house edge they were facing (2.7 percent) with that zero. King Charles was a happy monarch when this device was used against his own citizens! 

[Please note: At some point along came the Americans who decided to use a double-zero wheel (0, 00) in order to almost double the house edge over the players. Strangely enough this double-zero wheel also came from Europe but the Americans fully adopted it!]

OR WAY DEEP INTO THE PAST!

Let me take this history back even more in time. In the ancient world, definitely, Rome and even pre-Rome, perhaps Greek and pre-Greek, and in ancient Africa, in China, even among the American Indians, playing games or using “little wheels” as precognitive devices was something of a norm. 

Here is an example: “Og, my heavenly king, let me spin my shield and where my symbol points is the land I shall ravage!”

Or, 

“Come my comrades, let us amuse ourselves by sitting on our little, round shields and spinning ourselves ferociously. Whoever does not get sick wins the contest!”

[Please note: Perhaps the two greatest discoveries of human beings are fire and the wheel. People often talked and then wrote about the circle of life and many wrote about the cyclical nature of nature. The fiery sun was often worshipped as a god. Once we had the wheel, the world became shorter and distances shrunk quite a lot.]

THE WHEEL OF ALL WHEELS

The key to roulette is, of course, the very wheel itself; after all the game is actually the little wheel. In my over 30 years of casino play, I have noticed that not all that many players have much interest in the wheel itself as in knowing its components, its structure, or how it works. Many players also have no idea of how the casino actually gets its edge at the game.

Most players will look at the ball spinning on the rotor and watch as the ball descends but how and why the wheel looks and acts as it does actually has little interest for them. For them, the ball spins and then drops into the pockets and finally settles into one and the losing bets are removed from the layout and the winning bets are paid off.

The process is then repeated over and over again – a perpetual game!

THE COMPOSITION OF THE WHEEL

The wheel, like ancient Rome’s government, is divided into three main parts:

1. The ball track where the ball is spun and goes round and round until it loses energy and plummets to the base track
2. The base track that sees the ball actually descending towards its ultimate goal, the pockets
3. The wheel head contains the pockets where the ball will bounce and bounce some more before settling into a single pocket

When the ball spins on the bottom track, there are elements that interfere with its descent. These are variously called “bumpers” or “pins” or “diamonds” or “those darn things that screw up the landings.” The casino does not want a clean line of descent for the ball into the pockets. These interference elements are intended to make the game random because no one can really tell how a ball will deflect – that is, bounce – off these bumpers.

[Please Note: Modern casino games of roulette will often have two balls being used, a large one and a small one. These spin and land somewhat differently – making it almost impossible to figure how and in which pocket a ball will come to rest.]

NUMBERS ON THE WHEEL VS. NUMBERS ON THE LAYOUT

The arrangement of the numbers on the wheel and how they are laid out on the betting layout are completely different. Take a look at the American double-zero wheel and you’ll see that the number “1” does not have number “2” next to it but instead number “2” is across the wheel. On the layout numbers “1” and “2” are next to each other (as they would be in counting). 

The same is basically true of the European single-zero wheels. 

Casinos do not want the betting layout to reflect the wheel’s positioning of the numbers because those players who wish to bet groups of numbers will not be able to do so. If you wish to bet numbers 1, 2 and 3 on the layout these numbers will have nothing to do with the wheel. Since most players have no idea of how the numbers are laid out on the wheel, they usually think betting 1, 2 and 3 means these numbers are near each other on the wheel when they are not.

This is an attempt to keep the betting methods random – and when a game is random it benefits land-based and also the online casino.

HOW THE CASINO GETS ITS EDGE

The casino does not pay off the bets based on their real value. The American double-zero wheels has 38 pockets. If players were to put $1 on each pocket, 37 pockets would lose and one would win. In a fair game the winner would receive $37 while the casino would win – you guessed it – $37 and the game would be an even contest between player and casino. 

But casinos cannot make money this way so they short the players $2 by paying back $35 for a $1 bet instead of $37, keeping the other $2 for themselves. That means the house edge is 5.26 percent. The same is true of the European wheel’s payout of $35 for a $1 bet. Since there are only 37 numbers on that wheel, the house edge is reduced to 2.7 percent.

A HOST OF BETTING OPTIONS

Roulette has a multitude of betting options for the players. They can bet on inside numbers or combinations of these; they can bet on outside proposition bets of various kinds. Like craps strategies, players have plenty of choices to make. Some of the greatest gambling systems have been developed in order to beat the game.

Read other roulette articles on this site to learn about these

PROBLEMS WITH THE WHEELS

The betting layouts of roulette do not reflect the position of the actual numbers on either the European single-zero or the American double-zero wheel. This is to prevent players from betting groups of numbers that are physically adjacent on the wheel without actually looking at the wheel. You want five numbers that bump against each other on the wheel? Then you have to actually look at the wheel’s pockets, something most players won’t bother to do. Therefore betting 1, 2 and 3 will not see those numbers next to each other on the actual wheel although they are continuous on the layout.

Casinos know that some players – some very, very few players over the centuries – have worked on trying to beat the wheel in various ways and some have actually accomplished this. We call such players “advantage players.”

• Players have studied various wheels to see if they had certain pockets that would trap the ball more often than other pockets because they were (usually) somewhat deeper or (rarely) somewhat wider or shorter than the adjacent pockets. This was often called “big number” play as the players followed the numbers that were hitting.
• Some players wanted to see if the wheel was no longer aligned properly so that the ball would tend to fall into the biased part – the part that was fractionally tilted. This was often called “biased wheel” or “tilted wheel” play.
• Some players attempted to predict where the ball would land by using visual cues, they looked at the wheel and estimated how the ball would travel and land (generally in a particular section of the wheel). Yes, these players went up against wheels with bumpers on them. This was called “visual tracking.”
• Some players, convinced that some dealers could control the landing of the ball into certain sections of the wheel, would study such supposed dealers, clock their throws and bet the sections these dealer’s would hit. This was called “dealer signature” watching. 

The good news is that over the centuries some (okay, some few, some very, very few) players have actually beaten the wheels. Unless the casino owners were ferociously checking their wheels with regularity, bad things (for the casino) or good things (for the players) could happen that alerted advantage-players that the time had come to jump into the game and reap some rewards.

That’s the good news. Here’s the bad news: Today’s wheels are almost perfectly balanced, the pockets are the same width, depth and thickness, and constant computer checking of these wheels prevents them from being anything less than almost perfectly working devices; perfect enough that as long as they are checked frequently no player can get an edge over them. 

The little wheel has been a big favorite of casino players, past, present and (I presume) future.

[Please note: Are there players still out there in the world of the casinos who are beating roulette? Maybe, but my guess is that “probably not” is the right answer. It is hard to beat the advanced wheels that exist today.]

All the best in and out of the casinos!

The year 2012 was a sweet one for celebrity poker pro Phil Ivey and Cheung Yin “Kelly” Sun, a woman who would become known as the Queen of Sorts. 

Sun had designed a high-probability approach to beating mini-baccarat. It employs a technique known as edge sorting – hence, her nickname – in which, by spotting subtle asymmetries of patterns on the backs of playing cards, she is able to identify the game’s key cards.

The play requires Sun to prompt dealers to turn the game’s most important cards (7s, 8s and 9s) so that their shortly cut edges face the dealer when divvied out in coming shoes. Sharp eyesight, social engineering and casinos with favorable conditions allowed her to perform her responsibilities for the play. 

Ivey, with a giant bankroll and a reputation as a casino whale, was able to get down five-figure bets and convince gambling dens to use brands of playing cards and types of shuffling machines that Sun could most effectively work with.

Over the course of 2012, they traveled the world and won 10s of millions of dollars from casinos. But that was then. The last 12 months have been decidedly sour for the pair of high-rollers.

In October 2017, the Supreme Court in Great Britain issued a ruling that Crockfords Casino in London does not need to pay them 7.7-million-pounds (worth approximately $11 million in 2012) that they won by using the edge sorting technique. Never mind that Ivey and Sun lost more than half-a-million dollars on their first day of running the gambit in London.

More crippling, on August 2018 a New Jersey court put out a decision that they need to return $10.13 million that they won from Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa in Atlantic City. Ivey’s lawyer entered a request for a stay on the payment while the decision is appealed. That request was turned down. The eight-figure sum was won over the course of four sessions in 2012.

Both decisions are anti-player to the extreme. Any casual or pro-casino gamblers should be rattled by such outcomes. A lawyer, representing Ivey and Sun, maintains that making the payment will have a “devastating impact” on the wellbeing of his clients.

Sun says, “My feeling is that we won the money and we should not pay it back. My feeling is very bad. The casino took our bets and they paid us. Now they want us to pay them back 10 million. That is crazy. The casino takes big advantage. If they won $10 million from me, would they give it back? No way. Why should they expect me to give it back to them?”

Robert Loeb, a Chicago-based attorney who frequently works with advantage players, agrees with Sun. She and Ivey, says Loeb, “followed the rules that the casino agreed to. They agreed to those rules because [Sun and Ivey] were playing for the highest denomination chips and the casino thought it could win a lot of money. This was a product of greed and blindness.”

Weirdly, by the time Ivey and Sun made their last trip to Borgata, in October 2012, news of their tiff with Crockfords Casino in London had already broken. A headline in UK tabloid the Daily Mail trumpeted, “World’s number one poker player wins $11m in two nights – but top London casino REFUSES to pay.” US gambling sites quickly picked up on the report. By the time Ivey and Sun entered the Borgata, word of their situation with Crockfords had spread widely. In fact, according to Sun, that publicity is precisely what led her and Ivey to embark on their October trip to Atlantic City.

That journey is rooted in the final play that Ivey and Sun engaged in at Crockfords. It took place in August 2012 and ended with them ahead by some $11 million, a monstrous win by any standard. At the time, Sun feared that the casino would not pay them. Similar outcomes had already transpired for her at sore losing spots in the United States. But, as the front person in the play, Ivey was responsible for negotiating payment – and he did.

Representatives of Crockfords promised to wire the money into Ivey’s bank account. Sun says that the casino provided a receipt that stated as much. Satisfied, Ivey and Sun went their separate ways. He headed home to the United States where a close relative – a fabulously roguish uncle who Ivey referred to as Unk – was dying. Sun went to Paris where she hung out with friends.

The money, however, failed to materialize. Sun became convinced that Ivey was holding out on her. Ivey insisted that the casino was not paying. Finally, after a week, she told me that she called Ivey and said, “Phil, you don’t give me the money, it’s okay. It is only 10 million. It’s fine. You keep it.”

Coincidentally, though, just after the story broke in the Mail, Sun and Ivey encountered one another in Nice, the French city where a poker tournament was scheduled to take place. “Phil told me not to play the tournament,” Sun related to me. “He said that reporters were there and they knew about London.”

At that point, it became clear that Ivey had been honest about the missing millions. He did not receive the money. “We decided to fly to Atlantic City and play Borgata,” said Sun. “Phil and I flew private and split the cost.”

They encountered terrible weather en route to Atlantic City. There were fears that the jet would go down. Rough travel conditions could have been viewed as an omen, but the game at Borgata was too good to turn away from.

On their previous three visits, Ivey and Sun won more than $9 million. During one session, they were not even slowed down by an uninvited visit from blackjack whale Don Johnson, a friend of Ivey’s. 

As Johnson recalls it, he saw Ivey and Sun playing baccarat at a private table. Sun, Johnson told me, “did not look like she’d be on of Phil’s playmates.” It led him to believe that the two gamblers were playing at an advantage. Johnson maintains that he slipped in, mirrored Ivey’s bets and won a tidy sum.

As Sun remembers it, “I said that I would not play until Don left. Phil said that Don is a friend. He wanted Don to stay. But finally Don left and we continued playing.”

During their fourth and final trip to Borgata, it’s easy to imagine that Ivey and Sun would feel concern about the possibility of being turned away. News of their issue with Crockfords was in the poker and gaming media. But Borgata management   allowed them to play seemingly unfettered. They won more than $900,000 and cashed their chips without obvious incident.

It all changed in 2016. That was when, in the wake of a positive outcome for Crockfords, in the suit brought by Ivey and Sun, Borgata began rallying to get its money back. The casino’s legal maneuverings resulted in the original December 2016 ruling that the advantage players have to pay back their money. What will ultimately get refunded and when it will happen both remain unknown. One thing, though, is certain. As of now, the hand being dealt Ivey, Sun and the Borgata has yet to completely play itself out – and Ivey is no stranger to catching a miracle card on the river.

Any live or online blackjack player’s stress level increases when the dealer flips over an Ace as her upcard. That’s because she has only an 11.5% chance of busting and a whopping 88.5% chance of getting to a final hand that totals17 through 21 (assumes the dealer did not peek at her down card to determine if she has a blackjack).

It’s clear the dealer has a significant advantage with an Ace upcard but since we can’t change the cards that we are dealt, we must play them in a way that will decrease our expected long-term losses. This means being more aggressive when we are a dealt a stiff hand (hit rather than stand) and less aggressive when we are dealt a two-card soft hand (hit rather than double down). We also should surrender several hands (even when it results in forfeiting half our bet), and play some hands differently depending upon the composition of the cards in our hand.  What follows is the accurate playing strategy for any hand when the dealer shows an Ace upcard. 

Notations used in this article:
S17 = Dealer must stand on soft 17
H17 = Dealer must hit soft 17
DAS = Doubling down after pair splitting is allowed
NDAS = Doubling down after pair splitting is not allowed
H = Hit
S = Stand
P = Split
Dh = Double down if allowed; otherwise, hit
Rh = Surrender if allowed, otherwise hit.
Rs = Surrender if allowed, otherwise stand
Rp = Surrender if allowed, otherwise split

MULTI-DECK GAME

There are several differences in the playing strategy for multi-deck games depending if the blackjack rules are S17 or H17. I’ll summarize the strategy for S17 first, then show the changes when the game is H17.

WITH S17

• Surrender if allowed, otherwise hit, if holding a hard 16
• Split if holding a pair of As or 8s
• Hit if holding a hard 5 through 15, A-2 through A-7 or a pair of 2s through 7s
• Stand if holding a hard 17 through 20, A-8 and A-9  or a pair of 9s and 10s

Below is the corresponding blackjack strategy arranged into three color-coded tables for Hard Hands, Soft Hands, and Pairs. The first row in each table represents the player’s hand (in the case of hard hands, it represents the total count of the cards), and the second row contains the correct playing strategy against a dealer’s Ace upcard for an S17 game.

WITH H17

If the rules are H17, make the following four changes to the above strategy against a dealer Ace upcard:

• Surrender hard 15 if allowed, otherwise hit
• Double down Hard 11 if allowed, otherwise hit
• Surrender Hard 17 if allowed, otherwise stand
• Surrender a pair of 8s if allowed, otherwise split

The color-coded strategy chart below for hard hands and pair splitting corresponds to the above H17 strategy.

WHAT IF YOU ARE PLAYING A DOUBLE-DECK GAME?

WITH S17

The playing strategy for a double-deck game with S17 is the same as it is for multi-deck/S17 game except for one change:

• Double down hard 11 if allowed, otherwise hit

WITH H17

If the rules are H17 with NDAS, the playing strategy is the same as it is for the above multi-deck/H17 game.

If the rules are H17 with DAS, the playing strategy is the same as it is for the above  multi-deck/H17 game with one change:

• Split a pair of 8s (instead of surrendering)

WHAT IF YOU ARE PLAYING A SINGLE-DECK GAME?

WITH S17

The strategy is the same as the above multi-deck/ S17 strategy except for these two strategy changes:

• Double down hard 11 if allowed, otherwise hit
• Stand on A-7 instead of hitting

WITH H17

The strategy is the same as the above multi-deck/ H17 strategy except for these two strategy changes:

• Surrender a pair of 7s if allowed, otherwise hit
• Split a pair of 8s instead of surrendering

FOR MORE PRECISION

You can gain some precision in your playing strategy if you take into consideration the composition of the cards that comprise certain hands. This is especially the case with a double- and multi-deck game when the blackjack dealer is showing an Ace upcard.

DOUBLE-DECK GAME

If the game is S17:

• Hit a hard 11 consisting of 9-2 or 8-3 instead of doubling

If the game is H17:

• Hit a hard 15 consisting of an 8-7 instead of surrendering

SINGLE-DECK GAME

If the game is S17:

• Hit a hard 16 consisting of 9-7 instead of surrendering

If the game is H17:

• Hit a hard 15 consisting of 8-7 instead of surrendering 
• Stand on a hard 17 consisting of 9-8 instead of surrendering

PRACTICE PLAY

To be sure you have the strategy down pat for playing your hand against a dealer’s Ace upcard, determine how you would play each of the 10 hands listed below, jot down your decision on paper, and then check it against the correct play at the end of this article. (Your goal is to be able to play every hand accurately, regardless of the number of decks of cards or mix of playing rules.)

For more playing strategy tips, consult Chapter 3 in my Ultimate Blackjack Strategy Guide.

Correct plays for the hands in the above table are:

• Hit
• Split
• Surrender if allowed, otherwise split
• Hit
• Double down if allowed, otherwise hit
• Surrender if allowed, otherwise stand.
• Hit
• Stand
• Surrender if allowed, otherwise hit.
• Stand

When a dealer shows a 10 upcard at online or live blackjack, she or he is in the driver’s seat because they have a 77% chance of getting to a final hand that totals 17 through 21 and only a 23% chance of busting. A ten, therefore, is a very strong dealer upcard. This means we have to be more aggressive when we are a dealt a stiff hand (hit rather than stand) and less aggressive when we are dealt a two-card soft hand (hit rather than double down). We also should surrender several hands even when it results in forfeiting half our bet. What follows is the accurate blackjack strategy for any hand when the dealer shows a ten upcard. 

Fortunately for players, the playing strategy against a dealer’s ten upcard is nearly the same for any number of decks of cards or mix of playing rules, with only a few exceptions discussed below.

Notations used in this article:
S17 = Dealer must stand on soft 17 (A-6)
H17 = Dealer must hit soft 17
DAS = Doubling down after pair splitting is allowed
NDAS = Doubling down after pair splitting is not allowed
H = Hit
S = Stand
P = Split
Dh = Double down if allowed; otherwise, hit
Rh = Surrender if allowed, otherwise hit.
Rs = Surrender if allowed, otherwise stand

MULTI-DECK GAME

Regardless of the blackjack rules, use the following strategy when facing a dealer’s 10 upcard.

Surrender if allowed, otherwise hit, if holding:

• Hard 15 and 16

Double down if allowed; otherwise hit, if holding:

• Hard 11

Split if holding:

• Pair of As, and 8s

Hit if holding:

• Hard 5 through 10
• Hard 12 through 14
• A-2 through A-7
• Pair of 2s through 7s

Stand if holding:

• Hard 17 through 20
• A-8 and A-9
• Pair of 9s and 10s

Below is the corresponding blackjack strategy arranged into three color-coded tables for Hard Hands, Soft Hands, and Pairs. The first row in each table represents the player’s hand (in the case of hard hands, it represents the total count of the cards), and the second row contains the correct playing strategy against a dealer’s 10 upcard regardless of the mix of rules.

MULTI-DECK: HARD HANDS VS. A DEALER'S 10 UPCARD

MULTI-DECK: SOFT HANDS VS. A DEALER'S 10 UPCARD

MULTI-DECK: PAIRS VS. A DEALER'S 10 UPCARD

WHAT IF YOU ARE PLAYING A DOUBLE-DECK GAME?

You are in luck. The playing strategy for a double-deck game is identical to the above multiple-deck game.

WHAT IF YOU ARE PLAYING A SINGLE-DECK GAME?

The strategy is the same as the multi-deck strategy above except for the following two strategy changes:

• Hit (rather than surrender) hard 15 against a dealer 10 upcard
• Surrender 7-7 against a blackjack dealer 10 if allowed, otherwise stand.

SINGLE DECK: HARD HANDS VS. A DEALER'S 10 UPCARD

SINGLE DECK: PAIRS VS. A DEALER'S 10 UPCARD

FOR MORE PRECISION

You can gain some precision in your playing strategy if you take into consideration the composition of the cards that comprise your 15 and whether your 16 is multi-card or the result of a split.

• In a double- or multi-deck game, if your 15 consists of an 8-7, hit against a dealer 10 upcard (rather than surrender).
• •    In all games, if your 16 is multi-card or the result of a pair split, stand against a dealer’s 10 upcard instead of hit.

PRACTICE PLAY

To be sure you have the strategy down pat for playing your hand against a dealer’s 10 upcard, determine how you would play each of the 10 hands listed below, jot down your decision on paper, and then check it against the correct play at the end of this article. (Your goal is to be able to play every hand accurately, regardless of the number of decks of cards or mix of playing rules.)

For more playing strategy tips, consult Chapter 3 in my Ultimate Blackjack Strategy Guide and see the Blackjack Chart tables

Correct plays for the hands in the table are:

• Surrender if allowed, otherwise hit
• Stand
• Hit
• Surrender if allowed, otherwise hit
• Split 
• Stand
• Surrender if allowed, otherwise stand
• Hit
• Surrender if allowed, otherwise hit
• Double down if allowed, otherwise hit

This guide covers the best blackjack strategies—from beginner tips to advanced plays—so you can reduce the house edge and make mathematically correct decisions at the table.

If you’re searching for how to win at blackjack, the real advantage comes from consistently applying basic strategy, not relying on luck. You’ll also learn how to use a blackjack strategy chart and avoid common mistakes that cost players money over time.

Key Takeaways for Blackjack Strategy

• Use a basic strategy chart for every hand—perfect play keeps the house edge under 1% in many rulesets.
• Avoid 6:5 blackjack payouts; they add ~1.4–1.5% to the house edge compared with the standard 3:2 payoff.
• Split Aces and 8s, skip insurance, and master the core double‑down and surrender spots to protect your bankroll.
• Know the table rules (S17 vs H17, DAS vs NDAS). Small rule changes can shift the correct play.
• Beginners: focus on one thing—follow the chart consistently. Consistency beats “gut feel” over the long run.

Note: Unless stated otherwise, these blackjack tips apply to most games and assume recreational play (not card counting). Always check the table rules first.

If this article interests you, keep reading. Alternatively, explore other topics like blackjack side bets and roulette strategy.

Blackjack Basics: Key Rules and Abbreviations (S17, H17, DAS, NDAS)

•     S17 = Dealer stands on soft 17
•     H17 = Dealer hits soft 17
•     DAS = Doubling down after splitting pairs allowed
•     NDAS = Doubling down after splitting pairs not allowed

Top Blackjack Strategies to Win More (15 Tips)

Blackjack strategy #1: Always double down on hard 11

Hard 11 is one of the best double‑down spots. In most games, doubling down against any dealer upcard outperforms hitting. The only exception is multi‑deck S17 versus a dealer Ace, where hitting is marginally better.

Blackjack strategy #2: Always split 8s and Aces

Always split 8s and Aces, regardless of the dealer’s upcard. Splitting 8s turns a weak 16 into two hands with better potential. Splitting Aces gives you two high‑upside starting hands. Note: In H17 multi‑deck or H17 double‑deck NDAS, surrender 8‑8 vs Ace if offered.

Blackjack strategy #3: Never split 5s or 10s

Never split 5s or 10s. Treat 5‑5 as a hard 10 (a prime doubling hand), and keep 10‑10 together because 20 is already one of the best totals in blackjack.

Blackjack strategy #4: Hit hard 12 vs dealer 2 or 3

Hard 12 against a dealer 2 or 3 is a losing spot either way, but hitting loses slightly less than standing. That makes hitting the mathematically correct play.

Blackjack strategy #5: Hit soft 18 vs dealer 9, 10, or Ace

Against a dealer 9, 10, or Ace, soft 18 (A‑7) isn’t strong enough to stand. Hitting improves your chances of reaching 19–21 without busting. Exception: in single‑deck S17 versus a dealer Ace, standing is marginally better.

Blackjack strategy #6: Double 10 vs dealer 9 or less

With a two‑card 10, double down when the dealer shows 2 through 9. You’re the favorite, and doubling wins more often than hitting over the long run.

Blackjack strategy #7: Key adjustments for H17 tables

In H17 games (dealer hits soft 17), make these double‑down adjustments: hard 11 vs Ace, soft 19 (A‑8) vs 6, and soft 18 (A‑7) vs 2. These are minor changes, but they add up over thousands of hands.

Blackjack strategy #8: Double soft 13–18 vs dealer 5 or 6

Double A‑2 through A‑7 (soft 13–18) when the dealer shows 5 or 6. These dealer upcards are “bust cards,” so increase your bet when holding a flexible soft hand.

Blackjack strategy #9: Stand on 9‑9 vs dealer 7

With 9‑9 against a dealer 7, stand—don’t split. Holding 18 performs marginally better than breaking it into two hands against a likely dealer 17.

Blackjack strategy #10: Surrender the toughest hands when offered

If surrender is available, give up hard 16 vs 9, 10, or Ace—and hard 15 vs 10. This saves half your bet in the worst spots and reduces long‑term losses.

Blackjack strategy #11: Single‑deck—double 8 vs dealer 5 or 6

In single‑deck blackjack, double an 8 against a dealer 5 or 6. The single‑deck card mix shifts the math so doubling outperforms hitting in this spot.

Blackjack strategy #12: Split 2s/3s vs dealer 2–3 when DAS is allowed

With 2‑2 or 3‑3 against a dealer 2 or 3: split if DAS is allowed; otherwise hit. Exception: in single‑deck, split 2‑2 vs a dealer 3 even if doubling after split isn’t permitted.

Blackjack strategy #13: Never take insurance (or ‘even money’)

Never take insurance. The 2‑to‑1 payout is worse than the true odds of the dealer having blackjack, making it a negative‑EV side bet. “Even money” on your blackjack against a dealer Ace is simply insurance in disguise.

Blackjack strategy #14: Multi‑card 16 vs dealer 10—consider standing

Basic strategy says to hit hard 16 vs a dealer 10 (if surrender isn’t offered). A small accuracy tweak: if your 16 is a multi‑card total (e.g., 7‑5‑4), standing performs marginally better than hitting.

Blackjack strategy #15: Avoid 6:5 blackjack payouts

Avoid 6:5 blackjack tables. Switching the payout from 3:2 to 6:5 adds about 1.4–1.5 percentage points to the house edge, and in many multi‑deck games the total edge can exceed 2%.

Common Mistakes to Avoid in Blackjack

• Playing 6:5 blackjack tables (the payout cut costs more than most players realize).
• Taking insurance or “even money” against a dealer Ace.
• Standing on soft 18 (A‑7) vs a dealer 9, 10, or Ace instead of hitting.
• Ignoring table rules like S17 vs H17 and DAS vs NDAS (strategy shifts with rules).
• Chasing losses with betting systems instead of focusing on correct plays and bankroll discipline.
• Trusting “gut feel” when a strategy chart gives the mathematically best play.

Blackjack Strategy Chart Explained

A blackjack strategy chart shows the optimal play for every hand based on your cards and the dealer’s upcard. It’s the fastest way for beginners to play correctly and avoid costly mistakes.

• Find your hand on the left (hard total, soft total, or pair).
• Find the dealer’s upcard across the top.
• Follow the symbol at the intersection: Hit, Stand, Double, Split, or Surrender (if available).

Example Plays from the Strategy Chart

• 6‑6 vs dealer 4 — Split (P): Splitting 6‑6 gives you two hands starting at 6, both with strong potential against a weak dealer 4.
• 15 (10‑5) vs dealer 6 — Stand (S): Standing on 15 is correct because the dealer’s 6 is a bust card; hitting risks breaking a hand that already has favorable odds.
• A‑7 (soft 18) vs dealer 9 — Hit (H): Hitting improves your chances against a strong dealer upcard; standing leaves you too weak.
• 10 vs dealer 9 — Double (D): Doubling on 10 is powerful because you’re favored to draw a strong card against a vulnerable dealer.
• 16 vs dealer Ace — Surrender (R): If surrender is offered, giving up half your bet here saves money in one of the worst spots.

Use a Strategy Chart Matched to Your Rules

A blackjack strategy chart is only accurate if it matches the rules of your game. Key variations to check before you play include:

• Number of decks (single‑deck vs multi‑deck): Fewer cards shift probabilities and change some plays.
• Dealer on soft 17 (S17 vs H17): Whether the dealer hits or stands alters doubling and standing decisions.
• Doubling after split (DAS vs NDAS): Impacts pair‑splitting strategy and overall EV.
• Surrender availability: Changes how you handle tough hands like 15 or 16 vs high dealer cards.

Using the wrong chart leads to systematic mistakes. Always confirm the rules first, then follow the chart consistently.

Multi‑Deck Blackjack Strategy Chart (4+ decks, S17, NDAS)

House Edge Comparison (With vs Without Strategy)

Use One (or a Mix) of These Methods to Learn Basic Blackjack Strategy Faster

Here are four ways to memorize the best playing strategy when playing at a casino:  

1. Flashcards: Drill the most common hands (soft totals, 12–16 vs strong upcards, and split rules) until the correct play is automatic.
2. Blank Strategy Chart: Draw a blank strategy chart and fill it in from memory. For repeated plays, such as hard 17, write the strategy once with a line across the row to save time.
3. Card Practice: Deal yourself two cards and a dealer’s upcard, decide how to play, and check your answer against a strategy chart.
4. Blackjack Software: Use apps or online tools to practice making the correct decisions. These programs provide immediate feedback on mistakes.

Blackjack Strategy FAQs

What is the best blackjack strategy for beginners?

Use a basic strategy chart matched to your table rules. It’s the fastest way to improve your odds and reduce the house edge without guessing.

Should I split 8s and Aces every time?

Yes. Always split 8s and Aces in standard basic strategy. It’s one of the biggest long-term EV gains for recreational players.

Can I use a blackjack strategy chart at the table?

Yes—especially online. In live casinos, discreet pocket charts are usually allowed, but always follow venue rules.

Should I ever take insurance in blackjack?

Almost never. Insurance is a negative-EV side bet unless you’re counting cards and know the deck is rich in 10s.

How long does it take to learn basic strategy?

With daily practice (flashcards or a trainer), most players can learn the core decisions in a couple of weeks and keep improving from there.

Does basic strategy guarantee I’ll win?

No. Blackjack has short-term variance, but correct strategy reduces long-term losses and helps you make the mathematically best decision each hand

** Originally published on August 15, 2018

** Article updated on January 20, 2025

You see the casinos have locked in certain percentages that are difficult to overcome by adding something extra to the game. So what is to be done to push the house at roulette?

It is important to know how the edges are arrived at – in reality, that is important in any casino game that you play. 

THE TWO ROULETTES

There are two roulette games extant in the world; the American double-zero game with a 0 pocket and a 00 pocket on the wheel, and the European single-zero roulette game with just a 0 pocket on the wheel. The European game is far superior to the American game as its house edge is almost half that of the American version, 2.7 percent to 5.26 percent respectively.

Please note: House edges can be translated into money by putting a dollar sign in front of the first number and making this the amount one loses for every $100 wagered. Thus, the American house edge will lose the player $5.26 per $100 wagered, while the European game will lose the player $2.70 per $100 wagered.

Given access to the European game and having the betting limits that a player can handle – meaning the money wagered is the same the player would bet at the double-zero wheel – then selecting the European game is the way to go. Doing that is not just pushing the house; it is merely common sense. 

HOW THE CASINO GETS ITS EDGE

Here is a simple way to understand how the edges at both roulette games are established. I am taking this directly from our guide to roulette which can be found on this site.

The American wheel has 38 numbers and the payment for a winning bet is 35 to 1. In a fair game, one where the casino does not have the edge, the payout for the winning bet should be 37 to 1. In short, you bet 1 and you win 37. So you will lose 37 times but win once and the game is even; there is no edge for either the player or the casino. That is zero percent.

Casinos cannot make a profit on such a game, so they pay back less than the bet is worth, 35 units instead of 37 units. It keeps two units for itself. Just divide 38 into 2 and the house edge is 5.26 percent. This 5.26 percent is the house edge on the inside numbers and the outside propositions such as red-black, odd-even and so forth.

The European game as stated is better than the American game, because of that single 0. There are 37 numbers and the casino pays back 35 to 1 for a winning bet. The casino is keeping “1” as opposed to the American casinos keeping “2.” Just divide 37 into 1 and the house edge is 2.70 percent. 

However, you will find that the casinos that offer both games might make the minimum roulette bet at the European single-wheel higher – maybe $25 instead of $10. If that happens you must do some quick figuring or check this chart in order to see what the expected loss of your bets would be (I’ve rounded the money) and choose the bet that loses you less money over time;

Please note: The reason that the European game is better has to do with the absence of that second zero. The payout for a win is based on one hit in 37 attempts in the European wheel but one hit in 38 attempts in the American wheel. The actual payouts for those hits are the same at 35 to one, making the European Roulette wheel far better to play.

SUCKER BETS AT ROULETTE

Although most bets at roulette come in with either the 5.26 percent as on the American wheel or the 2.7 percent on the European wheel, you’ll find that some bets are actually different at each of the games and one bet at the American game is so decidedly awful that it has a far higher house edge than all the other bets. The casino does not explain these bets on their signage at the tables; you have to figure them out for yourself.

Sucker Bet #1

Separately betting two or more individual numbers directly on the layout with two or more bets.

If you decide to bet two or more numbers by putting up the same amount on each of the numbers you are betting too much. A $10 bet on the five and a $10 bet on the six means the casino is going for their percent on both bets. The more bets you make, the more games you are playing which means, naturally, the more money you stand to lose.

If you must bet multiple numbers you can use special “line bets” where you bet one chip to cover two or more numbers. This keeps the bet low but gives you the chance to win at roulette if one of your numbers comes up. 

Let me give you an example from our roulette guide of such a roulette strategy: The Street Bet, or Three Number Bet or “Side Bet” or The Trio (French: Transversal)

You’d think with all these titles for the bet that it would pay off at thousands to one. Nope. It is merely a bet on three numbers. You make the bet by placing your chips on the outside border of the three numbers. A winning bet pays off at 11 to1. The house edge on the American double-zero wheel is 5.26 percent and it is 2.70 percent on the single-zero European wheel.

You can find many such “line bets” on the numbers at both roulette games so do check out our roulette guide for all of them. These will make you ignore the big mistake of making multiple bets on multiple numbers.

However there is a far better way to bet multiple bets as I shall show you shortly. Many players, for their own idiosyncratic reasons, prefer to go the tougher route of betting more of the numbers and spending more of their money to do so – go figure.

Sucker Bet #2

Never bet the “monster” on the American roulette game. 

The monster isn’t under the bed but right there at the game of live roulette – the American version of the game that is. The “monster,” also known as “the beast,” is a “line bet” of the first five numbers: the 0, 00, 1, 2 and 3 with a win paid at 6 to 1. The house edge is a huge 7.89 percent, an expected loss of $7.89 per $100 wagered. Never make this bet. Here the house is pushing the player to make a major mistake – don’t be fooled! Pass this bet by.

Sucker Bet #3

Here it is folks: get your chips, start putting them on the layout, bet it up and never ask the most important question that must be answered to understand what is really happening at the game you are playing.

There is an option in both the American and European versions of roulette that can reduce the house edge in half! That’s right, the American game can drop to a 2.63 edge from a 5.26 percent while the European game can go down to a wonderful 1.35 percent – which stands as one of the best bets in the casino.

This bet, called “surrender,” can be found at some casinos in the United States and its European equivalent, called “en prison,” can be found at many casinos outside the United States.

This pushing of the house can only occur if you are betting any of three propositions, the odd/even, the red/black and the high/low. 

If the 0 or 00 appears in the American game one-half of your bet on any of these propositions is returned to the player. The house edge drops to 2.63 percent from 5.26 percent. That is some bargain.

Now, in the European game the result is even better. If the 0 appears the “en prison” rule applies. Your bet is locked up, meaning it is neither won nor lost. It awaits the next spin of the wheel. If the spin shows a winner, you get your full bet returned; if decision shows a loser, you lose your bet.

This rule reduces the house edge from 2.7 percent to 1.35 percent. This wager is now better than the Pass Line or Come bet at the game of craps. It is truly silly to play a European wheel that has this option and not just stick to these three propositions.

ROULETTE BETS: THE ONE, THE MANY OR THE MAYBE?

There is a tension, so to speak, between those roulette players who prefer to bet one chip and those who prefer to spread out their money on multiple bets. To me the one-chippers have the right idea because one chip can actually be a multiple-number wager. 

That is correct.

If you take a look at the premier propositions at roulette, the odd/even, the red/black and the high/low you only have to bet one chip yet you are actually betting on almost half the numbers in the game. On the American wheel you are betting 18 numbers of the 38, while on the European wheel you are betting 18 numbers of the 37. That’s a lot of numbers for just one chip.

Throw in the “surrender” or “en prison” rule and you have multiple bets with one-half the normal house edge at the game. There is no reason to bet any other way.

But what of the players who just love that big payout on betting directly on those inside numbers? I certainly recognize that a 35 to one win is a great payout. Still, those wins do not come very often do they? 

Yes, the house edge is always 5.26 percent or 2.7 percent on any single bet but your chances of winning on any given decision with the premier even-money proposition bets is far better than your chances of winning that 35 to one payout. In addition, many players cannot resist putting out more (or far more) money when the bet on the inside than they would if they were betting one of the premier even-money bets. Consider that.

Please note: the premier bets of the odd/even, red/black or high/low are also called even-money bets because they pay out at one-to-one. You bet $10 and a win is $10.

If you wish to save money and still have loads of fun at roulette let me encourage you to seriously consider betting those premier even-money bets. If the casino game has either “surrender” or “en prison” then there should be no question about only using these as your betting options. Why would anyone want to play against a house edge that is double at games with “surrender” or “en prison”?

All the best in and out of the casinos!

Among all the skills needed to get the most out of casino games online and offline, one of the most important for casino players is choosing your wagers wisely.

And an important part of choosing your wagers wisely is knowing which bets never to make.

Sometimes that means avoiding bets with extraordinarily high house edges. Sometimes it means skipping a bet because a better option is available that accomplishes the same thing with a lower house edge.

Here are a big four among common casino wagers you should NEVER make:

BACCARAT: THE TIE BET

Only two hands are dealt in baccarat: a player hand and a banker hand. 

Everyone can bet on either hand. Banker wins more often than player, so those who win banker bets must play the house a 5 percent commission -- the payoff is even money minus that 5 percent. Winning player hands are paid at even money.

Both are among the better bets around, with a 1.06 percent house edge on banker and 1.24 percent on player.

There's a third option. You can bet that the two hands will tie.

Winning bets on ties are paid at 8-1 odds. That's tempting for those looking to make a fast profit instead of grinding it out with even-money payoffs.

But the true odds against winning a tie bet are 9.526-1, not 8-1, and the house edge is a whopping 14.4 percent.

When you have two available bets with house edges just a little over 1 percent, why would you make a bet with a 14.4-percent edge? No reason at all.

CRAPS: BIG 6 AND BIG 8

There are many bets to avoid in craps, especially in the one-roll propositions. House edges of 16.67 percent on any 7, 11.11 percent on any craps and others are too high to overcome.

But there are a couple of multi-roll bets with a sneaky high house edge.

In two corners of the layout, you'll see a big red 6 next to a big red 8. Those are Big 6 and Big 8.

They play exactly like place bets on 6 and 8. If you bet on Big 6 and the shooter rolls a 6 before rolling a 7, you win. If a 7 comes first, you lose. No other numbers matter -- if the shooter rolls a sequence such as 5, 9, 3 12, 4, 5, there is no decision. Your bet either stays in action or you can take it down.

The difference is that place bets on 6 and 8 pay 7-6 odds, while Big 6 and Big 8 pay even money.

That difference in payoffs lead to a dramatic gap in the house edge. The house has a 1.52 percent edge on place bets on 6 and 8, but 9.09 percent on Big 6 and Big 8.

Because of the 7-6 payoffs, you want to bet in multiples of $6 when placing 6 or 8. There is no such imperative on Big 6 and Big 8. But you actually average more in losses when betting $5 on Big 6 or 8 than when placing 6 or 8.

Here's how that works:

Let's say I place $6 on 8 for each of 36 spins in which each combination of two dice comes up once. You bet $5 on Big 8 on the same 36 spins.

On 25 of the spins, the roll is neither a loser 7 or a winner 8, and we just keep our money. 

We can focus on the 11 wagers on which bets are decided. On those, I have $66 at risk on my place bets, while you're risking $55 on Big 8.

On each of the five winners, I get my $6 back and get $7 in winnings. That means at the end of the trial I have $65 of my original $66.

On each winner, you get your $5 bet back and get $5 in winnings. Your total is $50, while the house has kept $5 of your original $55.

I've bet more money than you, and we've won and lost on the same rolls, but you've lost five times as much money as me.

Never bet on Big 6 or Big 8. If you want to bet those numbers, use place bets instead.

ROULETTE: THE FIVE-NUMBER BET IN DOUBLE-ZERO

This is not a factor if you're playing roulette with a single-zero wheel. The five-number bet doesn't exist.

But on the double-zero wheel used by nearly all American casinos and which also is available in many online or international casinos, you can bet on 0, 00, 1, 2 and 3 all at once.

The payoff is 6-1, but that's no bargain. The house edge of 7.89 percent is one and a half times the house edge of 5.26 percent of available bets.

You can bet on the same five numbers and get the lower house edge on many different ways. 

If you bet $5 on the five-number bet and I bet $1 each on 0, 00, 1, 2 and 3, we each risk the same amount per spin.

In 38 spins in which each number comes up once, we each bet a total of $190.

On each of the five winning spins -- when the ball lands in 0, 00, 1, 2 or 3 -- you get your $5 bet back and get $30 in winnings. At the end of the trial, you have $175 of your original $190.

My single numbers win five times and are paid at 35-1 odds. On each winner, I get the $1 back that I bet on that number, and get $35 in winnings. When all is done, my total is $180 of my original $190.

We've bet the same amount on the same numbers, but at the end of the trial I have $5 more than you do.

You can accomplish the same thing in different ways. You could bet $3 on the three-number street 1, 2 and 3 and a $2 split on 0 and 00. You could bet a $2 split on 1 and 2, a $1 single number on 3 and a $2 split on 0 and 00.

However you want to do it, the house edge on your combination will be 5.26 percent as long as you avoid the five-number bet. That's one of those bets you never want to make.

BLACKJACK INSURANCE

This one needs a qualifier: You should never take insurance in blackjack unless are a card counter. For card counters who know there is a higher than usual concentration of 10-value cards remaining in the deck, insurance is a viable option. For the vast majority of players, it's a bet to avoid.

The basics, when the blackjack dealer has an Ace face up, he asks players if they want to take insurance.

Taking insurance requires making a wager half the size of your original bet. If you have a $10 bet, you'd then bet $5 on insurance. 

Insurance pays off if the dealer has a 10-value card face down to complete a blackjack. That yields a 2-1 payoff on blackjacks.

If a third of the cards were 10-values, insurance would be an even bet. Then you'd win on insurance an average of once per three hands. If you bet $5 on insurance three times for a total of $15. You'd lose twice, but the one time you won, you'd keep the $5 insurance bet and collect $10 in winnings - the $15 on the one winner would balance your $15 total risk.

However, only 30.8 percent of cards are 10 values, so you lose insurance bets 69.2 percent of the time and the house has a 7.6 percent edge.

When you have blackjack, a form of insurance is offered called "even money." Instead of playing the handout and risking the hand pushing if the dealer has a 10 value down, you tell the dealer "even money." You give up the chance at a 3-2 payoff if your blackjack wins, but you are guaranteed to win every time.

It's a bad tradeoff for the player.

In an average 1,000 trials in which you're betting $10 a hand and have blackjack, you could call even money and guarantee $10,000 in winnings.

However, if you take your chances and play out the hand, you win an average of 692 times. Multiply by 1.5 for the 3-2 payoff, and you get 1,038, and multiply that by your $10 in wagers, and you bet $10,380 in winnings.

Pushes may be frustrating, but by risking the pushes and declining insurance, you win more money.

Unless you're counting cards and know there's an excess of 10-values, NEVER take insurance, including its even-money form.