Is Blackjack Beatable

Not many casino games give you an opportunity to win profits. Poker games like Texas Hold’em, blackjack (card counting), and certain progressive slots (jackpots that offer +EV) are among the select few games that provide a long-term advantage.

Blackjack is considered a beatable game because it is possible to put the odds in your favor and give yourself a positive expected return. However, this is not easy to do. It requires the use of a skill called card counting, which involves keeping track of the cards dealt in order to determine when the remaining cards create a situation that is favorable to the player. Review of What is the only mathematically beatable game in a casino. Blackjack is the only mathematically winnable casino card world's best online casino game. Mathematics Game.

  • It perpetuates the myth that blackjack is beatable,' says Ma, explaining that amateur counters will try it and 'fall apart at the table.' Few people are prepared for the chaos of a real casino.
  • In the 1960s mathematicians began to advance the theory that blackjack was a beatable game. Led by a scholar named Edward O. Thorp, the theorists claimed that it was possible to determine the ratio of “good” cards to “bad” cards in the deck used to deal the game in casinos. Good cards would be those of benefit to the player.
  • While hundreds of thousands of players now knew that blackjack was beatable and flocked to the tables, only a few hundred had the savvy, discipline, knowledge.

Video poker also carries the reputation for being a beatable game. It offers over 100% return to player (RTP) on certain variations.

Of course, these variations are hard to find and not accessible to most gamblers. So, is video poker actually beatable?

This guide discusses how you can beat video poker over the long run. It also covers if the methods covered below are actually realistic.

Video Poker Is Beatable in Some Cases

Most real money video poker variations are favorable when compared to the average casino game. For example, the common 9/6 Jacks or Better variation offers 99.54% RTP with perfect strategy.

The “9/6” refers to how this Jacks or Better game pays nine coins for a full house and six for a flush. 8/6 Jacks or Better, by comparison, only offers 98.39% payback.

When looking for the highest paying video poker game machines, you need to take both the game and pay table into account. The 9/6 pay table described above may offer the most among Jacks or Better variations, but you can find games that pay even better than this.

Here are the highest paying video poker game machines that exist today:

  • Full-pay Deuces Wild = 100.76% Return To Player
  • Full-pay Joker Wild = 100.65%
  • 10/7 Double Bonus = 100.17%
  • 10/6 Double Double Bonus = 100.07%

The house rarely gives you an opportunity to win long-term profits. Therefore, the games listed above are quite unique.

You’re not going to get rich by playing these machines. This is especially true when you consider that the coin sizes are only worth a quarter ($1.25 per five-coin hand).

However, you can win decent money on full-pay Deuces Wild. Here’s an example on how much you can look forward to winning under ideal circumstances:

  • You bet $1.25 per hand and use perfect strategy
  • You play 800 hands per hour
  • 25 x 800 x 0.76 = $7.60 in hourly profits
  • The casino offers a 0.1% comp rate
  • 800 x 0.001 = $0.80 in hourly rewards
  • 6 + 0.8 = $8.40 in total hourly winnings

Most jobs today pay well over $8 an hour. But if you want to make guaranteed money from your gambling hobby, then Deuces Wild offers this chance.

Games With +EV Are Rare

You can see that multiple types of video poker offer positive expected value (+EV). But you’ll have trouble finding these machines anywhere outside of Las Vegas.

Sin City is home to the large majority of beatable video poker games. Assuming you try playing anywhere else, such as Atlantic City or Macau, you’re not going to find +EV machines.

Even when you visit Vegas, though, you’ll mostly be dealing with 10/7 Double Bonus and 10/6 Double Double Bonus games. As covered before, these variations only pay 100.17% and 100.07% RTP, respectively.

Sam’s Town is the only Las Vegas casino that currently offers full-pay Deuces Wild. As you can imagine, its Deuces Wild machines are crowded with gamblers who want to make profits. Therefore, you may not even find an open seat for the best games.

Profits Are Theoretical

Video poker isn’t like blackjack, where it offers a fairly even payout distribution. Instead, it features a wide range of payouts.

Therefore, video poker can be volatile over the short term. You may not earn a straight flush or royal flush until after playing tens of thousands of hands.

In fact, you’ll only get a royal flush on around 1 out of every 40,000 hands on average. Theoretically, you need to play at least 40k hands before receiving a royal.

Maybe you’ll find an open full-pay Deuces Wild machine and play a large amount of hands. Even so, you might need to play for many hours before actually realizing the 100.76% RTP and making profits.

What You Must Do to Win Profits

You can see that the road towards video poker winnings is difficult. But if you’re still interested in the matter, you can follow the tips below.

Travel to Las Vegas

Some +EV video poker machines are sprinkled around Nevada. If you truly want a real chance at winning, though, then you should take a trip to Las Vegas.

Sin City is the only place in the world with full-pay Deuces Wild and Joker Wild. It also offers a fair number of Double Bonus and Double Double Bonus games.

You can also look forward to some of the best rewards programs in Vegas. These VIP benefits will add to your bottom line.

Look for the Limited +EV Machines

Once in Las Vegas, you need to start searching for the small percentage of beatable video poker games. After all, you can’t just sit down to any machine and expect to win.

Most of these games are located in downtown casinos or on the Boulder Strip. Meanwhile, you won’t find any of these machines on the Vegas Strip.

Keep in mind that open seats for the most desirable games aren’t always available. You may have better luck hitting up casinos during non-peak hours, such as the morning and late evening.

Play Countless Hands to Overcome Volatility

A royal flush only makes up around 2% of the total payback for any video poker game. Considering this fact, many gamblers put too much emphasis on getting a royal.

Nevertheless, you still need to get the best hand at some point to earn over 100% payback. You’ll likely have to log countless hands to make it happen.

On average, you’ll need 40,000 hands to get a royal. You should consider yourself blessed if you’re able to land one within the first 10,000 or 20,000 hands.

Target Days With Double Rewards

Las Vegas casinos commonly feature promotions involving double or even triple points through their loyalty programs. Assuming you visit the casino on these days, you can look forward to a lot more rewards.

These extra rewards won’t line your pockets with riches. But they’re definitely worth taking advantage of when available.

The Average Player Isn’t Going to Beat Video Poker

Unless you live in Las Vegas or can afford to frequently visit, you’re not going to win guaranteed profits. You instead need to rely on some luck to be most games.

Anything can happen with video poker. It does, after all, offer some of the best payout percentages in the casino. Realistically speaking, though, you have a low chance to beat this game. Everything relies upon the machines you play.

You should treat beating video poker as more of a hobby than a legitimate way to profit from gambling. If you’re already going to be visiting Las Vegas, you might as well take advantage of the +EV machines.

But you won’t make a career out of beating video poker. The travel costs and hotel bookings will eat up your profits. Even if you live in Las Vegas, you won’t be able to make any more than $8 to $10 an hour with perfect and rapid play.

Should You Still Consider Playing Video Poker?

Video poker may not be beatable from a realistic standpoint. But that doesn’t mean you should completely avoid it.

It’s still a fine game that has lots of entertainment value to offer. You can play for big payouts while still enjoying some of the best payback in the casino.

Honestly, you have a better shot at winning with video poker than almost any of the other casino games. You can stick with the aforementioned tips to boost your odds.

9/6 Jacks or Better is never a bad game to play in terms of odds. Its 99.54% RTP is right in line with the world’s most-favorable blackjack games.

You can even opt for 8/5 Bonus Poker if 9/6 Jacks or Better isn’t available. It gives you a solid chance to win with its 99.17% RTP.

Conclusion

Theoretically, video poker is a beatable game. Full-pay Deuces Wild, Joker Wild, Double Bonus, and Double Double Bonus all exist in Las Vegas. You can find Double Bonus and Double Double Bonus machines in other parts of Nevada too.

However, the days where you could bet $1 coins ($5 hand with five coins) on full-pay Deuces Wild are long gone. The latter is only available in one Vegas casino through quarter machines.

You can still win profits from video poker if you’re willing to visit Sin City. But you aren’t going to make a living from doing so.

Like many casino games, video poker is most entertaining when you treat it as a hobby. Assuming you get a little luck on your side, you could land a royal flush and earn a large profit.

Is Blackjack Still Beatable

One of the most appealing aspects of blackjack is that there’s some element of skill involved. With many casino games, you are entirely reliant on luck, but with blackjack your actions affect the outcomes of hands.

Blackjack is still a game of chance; it’s just that luck isn’t the only factor that determines whether or not you win or lose.

Is Video Blackjack Beatable

What this means in practice is that you can actually improve your chances of winning. More accurately, in fact, it means that you can decrease your chances of losing.

Every decision you make, such as whether to hit or to stand, will have a direct impact on the result of a hand.

If you consistently make the correct decisions, you can reduce the house edge to a level where the casino’s advantage is almost obsolete.

On this page we explain how basic blackjack strategy can help you make correct decisions each and every time you play.

We explain how it works, how to use it, and we provide a sample strategy chart. We also look at a few blackjack strategies that don’t work.

How Blackjack Strategy Works

You have some information to work with every time you have a decision to make at the blackjack table. You know what cards you have, and you can see one of the dealer’s cards. Based on this information, it’s possible to work out the probabilities of what could happen next.

This is because there’s a fixed number of cards in the decks, and a fixed probability for each of those cards being dealt.

Blackjack strategy is about using probabilities to determine how any action you take will affect your chances of winning a hand.

This is done by comparing the probabilities of all the possible combinations of cards that could be dealt, and determining how these combinations would impact the final outcome of the hand.

Once you know how the different actions you can take will affect your chances of winning, you can then choose the optimal one. There’s always a correct mathematical decision to make, and taking it enables you to keep the house edge to the absolute minimum.

That is essentially the whole point of blackjack strategy.

The problem with basic blackjack strategy is that it’s not always easy to establish the correct decision accurately. There are some complicated mathematical calculations required.

Unless you’re a genius, there’s a very small chance of you being able to make those calculations every time you play a hand. Thankfully, you don’t have to make any calculations.

Blackjack strategy has effectively been solved, and turned into a defined set of rules.

These rules tell you exactly what action you should take in any given situation, based on the cards in your hand and the exposed dealer card.

By following them, you can apply basic blackjack strategy without using any math at all. All you have to do is learn the rules.

Given that there are hundreds of different situations you can find yourself in at the blackjack table, learning the rules for what to do in each one isn’t necessarily easy.

It might be pretty obvious that you should stand if you have 20 and the dealer is showing an eight, but situations such as having 12 when the dealer is showing a three are perhaps not so clear.

If you want to apply basic blackjack strategy perfectly, then you need to know what to do in every possible situation. This is where the use of strategy charts comes in handy.

A blackjack strategy chart is a matrix that shows all the possible combinations of your hand and the dealer’s exposed card. It shows the action you should take when facing each combination.

These charts are based on the correct rules for employing basic strategy, so if you do what the chart says, you’ll be making the right decision every time.

The following is an example of how a strategy chart looks. Along the top you have the dealer’s card, and down the side is your hand. Each individual cell shows what action you should take for the relevant combination.

The chart includes a key for the action each symbol in the cells represents.

Is Blackjack Beatable

You’ll notice that some of the actions are dependent on certain rules. For example, splitting is the right decision in some situations only if you are allowed to double after a split. This is because there are variants of blackjack where some of the rules are different.

The perfect strategy will vary depending on the exact rules of the blackjack variant you are playing. The chart shown above is the correct strategy for playing an eight deck game where the dealer stands on soft 17.

A few decisions would be slightly different if you were playing another game. These differences are, however, very marginal. If you follow the above chart for any variant, you will still play close to perfect hand.

Please be aware that even applying perfect blackjack strategy doesn’t mean that you can beat the game in the long run. The odds are still against you; it’s just that you’ll have reduced the advantage of the house to a minimal level.

Therefore, you stand a much better chance of winning more hands than you lose during a single session.

There are a few blackjack strategies that, for some reason, are popular among players even though they don’t work. These are as follows:

  • Mimic the Dealer
  • Never Bust
  • Assume a Ten
  • Progressive Betting

Mimic the dealer is a simple strategy where you simply act in the same way as a dealer would in any situation. You would never split, double, or surrender, because these options aren’t available to the dealer.

Basically, you would just hit on less than 17 and stand on 17 or higher, regardless of the dealer’s exposed card. This isn’t a good strategy at all, because splitting and doubling can be very advantageous to the player in the right situations.

Never bust is an equally simple strategy.

You just never hit if there’s a risk of going bust, so you always stand on 12 or higher. While this might seem like a safe approach, it actually increases the house edge.

A ten strategy works on the basis that you assume the next card will always be a ten, and that the dealer’s unexposed is a ten. Players often work on this assumption due to the fact that cards valued at ten make up around 30% of the deck (remember jacks, queens, and kings are all valued at ten).

However, 70% of the cards aren’t valued at ten, so you are still more likely not to get a ten. As such, this strategy doesn’t really work and increases the house edge.

Is Blackjack Beatable

Progressive betting is increasing or decreasing your bet size based on the result of your previous bet. This is a strategy that can be used in any form of betting, and there are several different progressive betting systems in existence.

Is Blackjack Beatable Without Card Counting

They don’t have any effect on the house edge, because your chances of winning or losing a hand don’t change based on how much you bet.

Is Double Deck Blackjack Beatable

They can also be very dangerous, particularly when aligned with systems such as the Martingale where you keep increasing your stake after a loss. One bad run can result in the loss of your entire bankroll.