Today is another great example of someone who believes because their luck has changed, the casino must have made a dramatic change to payouts accordingly. In this case, they’re responding to our note that payouts haven’t drastically changed since the pandemic shutdowns and disagreeing based on their experience.
Not only will we address the larger casino issues in this case, but we’ll use publicly available data to verify if this is accurate.
I’ve been gambling for years and when I say gambling I’m a degenerate and I’m 100% certain that the payouts drastically changed post Covid. There is absolutely no doubt it’s not worth spending money in slot machines like it used to. I would take five to $7,000 to Foxwoods or encore and it would last me all night and sometimes I would leave with $150,000 worth of slips, I kid you not, I’d go up and I’d go down and sometimes I leave with money sometimes I wouldn’t but it was split down the middle not anymore, I can take 8 to $10,000 now and I can’t even get one or even two jackpots it’s an absolute joke. Don’t even bother.
Dan
Sorry Dan, but there’s doubt, and the publicly available data is working against you.
Let’s take an actual look at data from Encore (which opened in 2019, so there’s not necessarily a ton of data to evaluate pre-pandemic, but there’s some) as well as Foxwoods. Foxwoods’ reporting is more detailed, with per-denomination data, so we’ll start with the easy stuff and work our way down.
First, here’s Encore’s second half of 2019 data added up and their first half of 2025 data added up, both comprising six months of data:
| Time Period | Dollars Wagered | Dollars Won | House Hold |
| 7/1/19-12/31/19 | $1,749,152,435.16 | $130,945,881.62 | 7.48% |
| 1/1/25-6/30/25 | $2,670,668,132.91 | $216,343,020.17 | 8.10% |
SOURCE: Massachusetts Gaming Commission
While the overall house hold increased incrementally in this time period, it’s not a massive difference, and could be explained simply by the mix of play – if more lower denomination play, or more lower bettors, played in one time window vs. another, it can have an impact on the overall numbers. But this wouldn’t explain a change from $150k in wins to $10,000 in losses.
Now let’s compare Foxwoods. We’ll use the last full fiscal year before the pandemic vs. the most recent fiscal year. The data is presented differently because the reporting is offered differently, but it still allows a comparison:
| Denomination | 7/1/18-6/30/19 | 7/1/24-6/30/25 |
| 1 cent | 9.91% | 10.21% |
| 5 cent | 9.27% | 6.91% |
| 25 cent | 8.66% | 8.89% |
| 1 dollar | 7.01% | 7.89% |
| 5 dollars | 6.33% | 6.24% |
| 10 dollars | 3.74% | 5.20% |
| 25 dollars | 3.49% | 5.98% |
| 100 dollars | 6.16% | 5.70% |
| Multi-denomination | 5.86% | 8.17% |
| Overall hold | 8.05% | 8.39% |
SOURCE: Connecticut Department of Consumer Protection
Once again, the overall hold for the casino has increased slightly. Many denominations see some changes, but one important note is many of the denominations here, such as $25 and 5 cent, have a dozen or less machines left, due to the massive growth of multi-denomination machines, which more than doubled between 2019 and now. And, even despite that bump, overall the paybacks aren’t far off.
So what has changed? Clearly you are feeling something different, and we’ve defined what those things are elsewhere on the site. But to summarize:
Slots have gotten more volatile, and the high limit room hasn’t been spared. The mix of games in high limit, which your budget would likely indicate you would partake at least part of the time, has shifted, just like the main floor, to include more games like Huff N’ More Puff, Dragon Link and so on.
These games are much more volatile than the old three reel slots and classic high limit games that dominated the high limit floors for decades. This means bigger wins, less often, and what may have worked in a different era in terms of how you played and how much per spin vs. your budget has shifted. You can’t play the new slots the same way you played the old ones, or you risk running out of money before you can reach that big bonus or jackpot.
If the slots you played have changed, your odds of winning have also changed. And what may have been a working structure for you before the pandemic no longer is so. We also shared math about what happens when a bonus is designed to happen less often than in the past – you can see much larger droughts than in a different era when bonuses were more frequent, but offered a smaller payout.
That said, we certainly are bummed to hear about your challenging casino visits, and encourage anyone who’s not having fun to put gambling down, whether temporarily or permanently. But don’t blame the bogeyman – gambling has gotten harder, but it’s not because casinos are holding a much larger percentage for themselves.
Slots were already among the most profitable games for the casino, and they haven’t needed to make changes on the payback percentage side, because players are playing the new, harder games a lot more.
I respectfully disagree. You used to be able to hit a big amt on first spin or lower amounts. Now its not so . Theyve made bonuses harder to get & the players playing big amounts win . Slot techs have told us the change is obvious, we arent imagining it. But I understand how younger players wouldnt see that.
You’re actually agreeing with us! We didn’t say the bonuses weren’t harder to get. We said the overall payback hasn’t changed. But there are less winners because the big wins are bigger, and happen less often, precisely because of those harder to reach bonuses – this is the volatility aspect which we emphasized in our answer. They can make these changes without slots paying worse in the long run is the point we were emphasizing here.
This is all well and good, but they have taken all the fun out of it. I’ve been playing for years and until recently it was fun. Ive never won big, but I use to enjoy myself, you know, up down up down up down. Most nights I didn’t come home with money but that’s what I expect. The last couple of years have been horrible. Very little up down up down, now it’s mostly boring so I come home early, not even spending all I alloted.
Hi Dana – whether things changing have made casinos less fun is certainly a valid consideration. We know of players who think games have gotten too tough, and it’s changed how or how often they visit casinos. We offer some advice throughout the site on how to combat this (for those who want to), whether it’s finding lower volatility slots or managing your bankroll more carefully. But if casinos are supposed to be a form of entertainment, and you’re not having fun with what they’re offering, we don’t blame you if you find yourself spending less time there.