Slot Play…Best Play

When you enter a casino, you will notice the majority of the players are sitting at slot machines. If you are one of the thousands who enjoy slot play, which machine is your best bet? Which offers you the best opportunity to win? The answer to this varies from one location to another, even from one casino to another. For this article I will use slot machine payouts from the Las Vegas Strip.

When you see a sign that advertises 96% payback on slots, does this mean every slot machine in the casino? Certainly not. For instance, on average, a quarter slot machine will have a payback of 93.27% on the Strip, while a one dollar slot will payback 95.12%. Compare this to a payback of 96.02% on a five dollar machine, or an 89.83% payback on a nickel machine. The worst? that would be the one dollar megabucks machine , with a payback of 87.08%. As you can see, if you play long enough at any of these, the odds are you will eventually lose all of your money. So, how do you improve your chances of being successful? The trick is to make your money last until you hit a jackpot, then you tuck away your winnings and leave happy. Here are a few tips on how to do that.

If you are playing at a 3-coin machine, and you play three coins each time, as you should, and you began with $100, here is how your session could go. On a quarter machine you would put in $100, and get back $93.27 (Approximately). You then put in the $93.70, and you will be returned $86.99. You continue in this manner until all of your money is gone, having put your money through the machine a total of 71 times. During this time, you would have played the machine a total of 1967 times, and had total wagers of $1,475 to put toward your slot club card. This is assuming the machine pays off at its average of 93.27%

On a one dollar machine you would also be able to put your money through the machine 71 times, but you would only receive a total of 663 plays. You would increase your total wager amount to $1,990. On the five dollar machine you would receive 142 plays, with a total wager of $2,140. On the nickel machine you would get 6545 plays, with a total wager amount of $981. On the one dollar megabucks machine you would get only 250 plays, with a total wager amount of $752. So which would you pick? Remember, the object is to make your money last until you hit a jackpot of some reasonable size. Let us say that such a jackpot would pay you 400 coins. A nice jackpot, and not totally unreasonable.

For your $100 on the quarter machine, you would get 1967 chances to win $100 (400 coins at 25 cents). At the one dollar machine you would receive 663 chances to win $400. At the five dollar machine you would have 142 chances to win $2,000, and on the nickel machine you would have 6,545 chances to win $20. At the Megabucks machine you would receive 250 tries at a jackpot of $400. Which you choose is strictly up to you, these are just a few numbers for you to consider. Of course, you must also consider the fact you may not hit a jackpot at all, or you may hit a much larger jackpot. Hey, maybe that is why they call it gambling? Each machine has its advantages and dis-advantages, but please, know which are which, before you play. Take care.