On real money gaming sites, you can often find some of the same games that you would on physical casino floors. So, is there a difference? For example:
Is online gaming the same odds as in the casino?
Sarah H.
When we get questions like this, we tend to answer them in two ways. First, the odds – if you see a game like Dancing Drums online and in a casino, it’s the same game, so they tend to keep the odds of a bonus, a big line hit, and so forth pretty similar. Higher payout games would be slightly higher frequency, but it won’t be so drastically different that you’d notice.
But sometimes, when people say the word odds, they mean payback. When it comes to online slots the payouts tend to be considerably better than the in-casino versions. Whereas in casino machines on lower denominations often go as low as 85 percent payback, online many casinos offer in the range of 94-96 percent payback. This means your money, on average, would last three times longer with similar sized bets. That’s significant!
Online slots do this for a few reasons, from lower cost structures (no big buildings or floor staff to maintain, no massive vaults to have to fund and secure) to the goal of attracting more players with a better gamble. And that means better gambling conditions for us as well.
These conditions don’t stop at slots – we tend to see better options for Video Poker, table games and so on online as well. And with the information more publicly available, such as payback percentages in the pay table, players can even compare for themselves and decide where to spend their money. So all in all online gaming can be good.
The place to be careful is there are gray area online sites in places without regulations. These casinos won’t have the games you’re familiar with seeing on casino floors, or even on other regulated online sites, and so you should always be careful. That’s why we have our recommended options in the Online Casinos section of Flip The Switch – they’re all in highly regulated markets, and we’ve played and reviewed them ourselves.
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