Playing Online Roulette

Roulette is hands-down one of the most popular and well-liked casino games of all time. The game does a masterful job of mixing simplicity with excitement to create a truly amazing gambling experience. For many, roulette is one of the first gambling games they ever learn to play.

The premise of the game is simple. There is a spinning wheel that a dealer drops a small white ball into. Before the ball makes its stop in one of the numbered slots on the wheel, you have the chance to bet on where you think the ball is going to land.

Get it right, and you win! It’s hard to describe the excitement and rush you feel when the spinning wheel starts to slow down and the white ball slowly bounces toward its final resting spot.

Roulette is a game that used to be limited to being played inside a brick-and-mortar casino. Thanks to the growth of internet technologies, though, you can now enjoy this high-action game of chance from the comfort of your own home.

Today we want to look at everything you need to know to get in on the roulette action without ever having to put your shoes on or leave your house.

For many, casino games have always been something that you played in a, well, casino. The idea of playing these games online can be new and sometimes a little weird for people. This is completely understandable, because any time you try something new, it’s going to feel different.

What we want to show you today is that weird is good. We want to point out all of the awesome features and benefits that you get from playing roulette online instead of in a brick-and-mortar setting.

You Can Reach the Table

One of the most annoying parts of playing roulette in a brick-and-mortar casino is the shape of the table. If you’re the only one playing, it’s hard to reach all sides of the table to make your bet.

Throw in a few more players, and now you’re stuck trying to reach over people or having to ask them every time to help make your bets.

Honestly, this takes away from the experience and is far from relaxing. It can make you feel like you’re stuck in a crowded airport and can never reach the ticket counter. Online roulette takes care of this.

All of your bets are made on your computer screen with your mouse or your keyboard. This means that you only need to be able to move your mouse a couple of inches and you can reach all of the bets.

No longer do you have to bump into other people, get drinks spilled on you, or have to bug the other players on every single spin of the ball. You can instead relax and be sure that you’re always going to get your bets in. This is just the start of the comforts and conveniences that come with playing roulette online.

When you play at a brick-and-mortar location, there is a limited number of tables. This means that if it’s a busy night, you may end up waiting for a long time to get a seat at the table.

No one wants to do this. Thanks to technology, online casinos are able to create as many tables as are needed to sustain the volume. This means you’ll always have a seat without having to wait at all.

Play at Your Own Pace

When you play roulette in a brick-and-mortar casino, you’re forced to play at the speed that the dealer dictates. If they’re all hopped up on caffeine and want to fly through each game, then you better be on your game and ready to keep up. If they missed their afternoon nap and are moving at a dinosaur’s pace, you’re stuck plodding along with them.

Online roulette, though, gives you your very own table. The ball only spins when you tell it to. Feel like taking two hours between spins? Okay! Feel like rocket man and want to get your adrenaline fix as quickly as possible? You got it!

There’s no way this would ever work at a brick-and-mortar casino because you can’t appease everyone.

The only time that you are not in control of the pace is if you’re playing live dealer roulette from home, which we will cover shortly. All other variations of online roulette afford you this awesome luxury.

Shorter and Cheaper Commute

People tend to forget how much time and money goes into playing roulette at a brick-and-mortar location. First, you have to take care of all of your responsibilities at home.

Next, you have to actually get to the casino, which may or may not be close. If you are lucky enough for it to be in the same town, you still have to load up in your car and make the commute. This means gas costs, wear and tear on the car, tolls, parking fees, and more.

If you don’t have your own vehicle, this means bus fare, Uber costs, taxi costs, or costs for however else you get to the casino.

All of these considerations cost time and money. Remember, your time is worth something, too. If it’s taking you forty-five minutes each way to get to the casino, ten to fifteen minutes to get parked and inside, and then ten to fifteen minutes to find a table, you’re wasting A LOT of time that you could spend playing roulette.

Surprise, surprise…online roulette fixes all of this. You don’t have to get a babysitter or find someone to watch the dog. You don’t have to put on your clothes and brave the commute to the casino. You don’t have to pay for gas, tolls, parking, or anything else.

It costs you zero dollars and takes about thirty seconds to walk from where you are right now to your computer or smart device. If you’re on your computer now, that commute cuts down to zero seconds.

More Rewards and Bonuses

Brick-and-mortar casinos used to shower guests with free rooms, free food, and anything else fun they could get their hands on. Times have changed. You now have to gamble thousands and thousands of dollars in hopes of maybe scoring a few free buffet coupons.

Online casinos are different. Because they don’t have the overhead of all of the staff and the building rent, they’re able to offer you bonuses and rewards right away.

You can start to see bonuses and rewards before you even start playing at online casinos! They’ll usually have some sort of juicy deposit bonus to get you started. Because everything is digital, they can also track your play much more accurately and start giving you rewards immediately.

In a brick-and-mortar setting, you have to get “recognized” by the pit bosses and then hope that they record your play correctly and feel like giving you some perks. Online, it’s all automatic, so you never have to fear whether you’re getting rewarded for your play.

Some of you may like the social aspects of playing roulette in the casino. Some of you may be hesitant to trust the computerized roulette wheel (even though you really shouldn’t be). Some of you may like the idea of a real person spinning the wheel.

If you fit into any of these categories, you can enjoy the benefits of online roulette while still getting the perks from playing online.

How? Online casinos have an awesome category of casino games known as live dealer games. These games are a mix of brick-and-mortar play and online play.

Somewhere in the world, a real roulette table is set up with a living and breathing dealer. You’re able to “take a seat” at this table from the comfort of your own home.

The casino uses streaming technologies so that you can see all of the action unfold at the table, but you are making all of your bets on your computer screen. Basically, you bet on the screen with your mouse, but the spin of the ball that determines whether you win or not takes place in a live casino. A real dealer spins the ball, and where that ball lands determines whether you win your bet or not.

You get to interact with the dealer and chat with other players at the table. You never have to worry if “things are rigged,” because whether you win or lose is determined by an actual spin of the wheel.

The only online perks that you don’t get with live dealer roulette are the ones that have to do with wait times and getting a seat at the table. Because these games use a real dealer, they have limited seating. On peak nights, it’s possible that there will be no seats available.

Unlike the digital tables, the online casino can’t just push a button and create a new table. The good news is that most online casinos know their traffic patterns and do a good job of staffing enough tables to handle the demand. Be aware, though, that on peak nights it is still possible that you may have to wait a few minutes for a seat at one of the live dealer tables.

If you’re now convinced that you want to give online roulette a spin, awesome! To help you have the absolute best time possible, we want to give you a few basic tips to help enhance your experience.

These tips will ensure that you’re getting the most out of your money.

American vs. European

It’s scary how often people select American or European roulette based on where they are from. Americans think that because they live in the States, they should play American roulette. European players do the same, but with European roulette. This is one of the silliest things you can do.

Let’s look at the difference between the two games. Notice that the word “difference” is singular and not plural. While people think these games are totally different, they have only one difference.

What does this mean for you? Well, let’s look at the house edge for a popular bet. So we’re all on the same page, the house edge is how the casino makes money.

They will always have a long-term edge over the players. While this can’t be fixed, you can certainly try to lower their edge as much as possible.

If you bet on red or black on an American roulette wheel, the house edge is 5.26%. If you bet on red or black on the European roulette wheel, the house edge is 2.7%.

This means that by just choosing to play on the European wheel, you are cutting the house edge almost in half! You would be INSANE not to play European roulette over American if given the opportunity.

Here’s a spoiler about online casinos: they usually offer both games. Why anyone would ever play American roulette in this situation is beyond us. You are essentially setting money on fire if you choose to play American roulette when European is an option.

We could hammer on this for hours with more stats, but just trust us here. Play European roulette instead of American any chance you get.

Be a Coupon Clipper

We all know that person who goes to multiple stores to cash in on coupons. At first, we think they’re silly until we start to realize just how much money they are saving by doing it. There’s nothing unethical about it; it just requires some additional effort, but it has a great pay-off. The same is true about bonuses and promotions when it comes to online casinos and roulette.

Online casinos run special roulette and casino promotions all the time. Because there are so many different casino options to choose from, the casinos are forced to compete for your business heavily. What does this mean for you?

This means you should take full advantage of every awesome promotion that comes up. There is nothing wrong with playing at multiple casinos or jumping back and forth to get some free money.

This does require you to be aware of the different promotions. The best strategy here is to join several online casinos (it’s free to do so) and then join their email mailing list. They’ll send you emails anytime they have a new or interesting promotion running.

You don’t have to deposit on all of these casinos right away; just create an account in case you ever want to deposit. When you see something you want to take advantage of, you can move some money onto the site and get to playing.

As a close to this guide and a specific follow-up to the last tip in the section above, we want to point out that you shouldn’t chase every promotion that you see. While most of the online casino industry can be trusted, there are some bad apples out there that you need to be careful to avoid.

The problem is that it can be hard to spot these bad apples just by going to the site. They may cloak themselves in beautiful graphics and nice software.

The old adage that you can’t judge a book by its cover could not be truer than it is in the online gambling world.

• Trust the experts
• Trust those with the ability and means to look under the hood of these sites
• Trust the people who know who the companies are and can properly vet them

Our team of experts has been in the industry for years, and we know who the big players are and who to watch out for. We can look past the pretty pictures and flashy software to make sure that a site can be trusted.

For this reason, we suggest using the sites we’ve reviewed and recommended on our site. You can rest assured that when you play with any of them, your money and information are safe and secure.

Gambling brings enough of a risk and adrenaline rush on its own. You don’t need to add worrying about the site you are playing at.