Playing online casino games can be both fun and rewarding, but doing so without a plan is a recipe for disaster. If you intend to bet on real money casino sites, there are some fundamental tips and tricks you should know before you start. This page lists top tips for online casino players, regardless of their bankroll or level of experience.
The team behind CasinosOnline has spent a lot of time playing casino games and writing about them. We’ve accumulated a lot of experience over the years, and the whole point of our site is to share that experience with you. The tips you’ll find below were collected based on what the year taught us about finding the best casinos and making the most of your time there.
Tips & Tricks for Online Casino Players
All of the tips listed here are short, actionable, and beginner-friendly. We’ll start by listing them below, and then we’ll dive into the nitty-gritty of what each piece of advice actually means.
Note that these tips are not listed in any particular order. They’re all quite important, but some may be more useful than others based on your priorities and level of experience.
- Choose a casino based on your needs and interests
- Carefully read terms and conditions
- Pick the right payment methods
- Understand different casino games
- Play casino games with the best odds
- Research game strategies
- Play games for free before risking any money
- Stick to your budget
- Cash out while you’re ahead
- Make use of promotions and special offers
- Take additional steps to ensure your safety
- Play responsibly
1. Choose a Casino Based on Your Needs and Interests
Picking the right online casino has never been easy. You have to consider a lot of factors, ranging from licenses to bonuses and software. However, you should always keep in mind that not every site is the right fit for every player. Everyone has different priorities and needs, so the best casinos are all about matching your specific goals as a player.
Our advice is to figure out what those needs are. Start by asking questions like:
- Which games do you want to play?
- How important are bonuses to you? Would you prefer a matched bonus, cashback, or something else entirely?
- What is your preferred payment method?
- Are you looking to play live or not?
- Do you play on a desktop, mobile, or tablet?
Figuring out what you need will allow you to identify and find the best casinos to play your favourite games. Referring to our casino reviews also helps.
Of course, you should only ever consider legit, licensed sites. Don’t trust your money to shady rogue casinos.
2. Carefully Read Terms and Conditions
Anyone registering at a gambling site must agree to a set of terms of use. These terms outline many important details about your rights and limitations as a player. That’s why it pays to note the “fine print” – a single detail can derail your entire online gambling experience.
A common example is casino bonus terms and conditions. Most bonus offers come with a set of wagering requirements that severely limit what you can do with your money if you opt into a promotion. Many beginners fail to notice this fact. This results in unpleasant situations in which players don’t have access to their deposited money, and all the casino operator has to do is remind them that they agreed to it.
If we also consider predatory terms and practices that still unfortunately exist, it should be obvious why you need to pay attention to these things. Reading these documents that use the infamous “legalese” language can be annoying, but you need to understand what you’re agreeing to or you might regret it.
3. Pick the Right Payment Methods
A staggering number of players never really consider the method they use to deposit to casinos. Most just decide to go with their debit card or whatever else is readily available without considering that they intend to use the payments for gambling. Others don’t believe it really matters.
Well, deciding which payment method to use in online casinos matters because it impacts several key aspects of the player’s experience. For example, your banking option influences:
- Maximum and minimum deposit and withdrawal limits
- Withdrawal processing times
- Availability of bonuses and promotions
- Availability of currencies
- Fees
- Safety features
Moreover, more exotic options such as cryptocurrencies can fundamentally alter how payments work in the first place.
Our advice is to learn which online payment methods exist, what they offer, and how they might be beneficial to your casino career. Then, you can set about finding a casino that accepts your method of choice.
4. Understand Different Casino Games
So which games can be played in an online casino?
Most players would either shrug or give an incomplete answer to this question. That’s because most people are perfectly content just sticking with their usual favourites.
However, if you want to experience the magic of modern online casinos in all their glory, you’ll want to look beyond that. The truth is that the industry has been advancing, improving, and growing at an incredible rate for decades. There have been more innovations in casino games in the past ten years than in the century before that.
Nowadays, we have a lot more choices than the classics like slots, roulette, and blackjack. While these games are classics for a reason, today’s casinos also offer game shows, crash games, and a million other niche products that are difficult to explain quickly.
Our point is that you should know what’s out there before deciding what to play. Who knows – maybe the next game you play will be noticeably more fun and profitable than your current favourite. If you need a place to start, check out our casino game reviews to find in-depth information on all sorts of betting games.
5. Play Casino Games With the Best Odds
You probably understand by now that gambling is a losing game in the long run. The house always has an advantage, and it always wins.
However, it’s less likely to win if you play the right games. Some games in casinos are less favourable to the house, which makes them more favourable to us as players.
By now, many of you are probably asking – so which casino games have the best odds?
The answer? The ones with the highest RTP. The return-to-player rate is a statistical representation of how much you can expect to win or lose, on average, while gambling. The higher it is, the bigger the average payout.
Card games such as blackjack and baccarat typically have the highest RTP with 99.5% and 98.9%, respectively. However, some (rare) slots and speciality games have been known to match that.
Just remember that not every bet in a game has the same RTP. For example, in baccarat, every main bet has its own separate RTP rate. 98.9% is just the best option.
6. Research Game Strategies
Every game you can play at a casino has a right smart way to play and a not-so-smart way. Obviously, you want to try the former.
Learning to play casino games and win can take years of practice. Thankfully, we live in the internet's existing times. All you have to do before trying out a new game is make an effort.
Find information about the statistics, odds, and rules of any game you play. Research strategies that can tell you the best way to play the game. Try to understand why a particular strategy works, too, because you might be able to improve it later.
We also recommend going through tutorials and guides for game categories before you sign up and play for real money. Here are some of our best tips for creating strategies with different casino games.
- 7 strategy tips for online slots
- 7 strategy tips for baccarat
- 7 strategy tips for blackjack
- 7 strategy tips for roulette
- 7 strategy tips for craps
- 7 strategy tips for live dealer games
- 7 strategy tips for Casino Hold'em
- 7 strategy tips for keno
- 7 strategy tips for video poker
- 7 strategy tips for progressive jackpots
- 7 strategy tips for Sic Bo
- 7 strategy tips for scratch cards
7. Play Games for Free Before Risking Any Money
If you want to try a new kind of betting game, don’t just launch it and start throwing money at it. Instead, you should try a free version and get a feel for things before risking any actual cash.
This begs the question – how do you play casino games for free?
Many online slots and RNG-based games are readily available online in demo mode. Most software providers make these demos available right on their websites. All it takes is a quick internet search for “game name + demo” to find what you’re looking for.
However, if you prefer live casino games, things might be a bit trickier. Most live dealer titles cannot be played for free. You should instead try to find an RNG equivalent to practice with, such as classic online blackjack instead of live blackjack.
Free casino games can help you prepare for playing the “real thing”. You can ensure you fully understand the rules and features of the title, and you can also practice and create strategies without exposing your bankroll.
8. Stick to Your Budget
This is probably the most repeated piece of advice given to anyone who even wants to try gambling. That just goes to show how important it is.
When gambling online, it’s crucial to set a fixed playing budget and to never spend more than this budget allows. Basically, you should only bet what you can afford to lose.
A good approach is to split this budget into a number of equal parts or “units”. You can then measure every bet and every stake in terms of how many units you’ve spent. This allows you to keep track of your spending and it’s also a useful tool for many strategies and betting systems.
9. Cash Out While You’re Ahead
“Quite while you’re ahead” is another common piece of casino advice, but let’s analyse it for a bit.
The reason the house always wins is because the casino has a statistical advantage in every game. This doesn’t mean you’ll lose every round. It just means that, on average, you’ll lose more than you win.
The more you repeat an action, the more it will eventually approach its most probable outcome. This is called the law of averages. In other words, the more you play, the more you’ll approach this losing average result.
However, deviations from the average are quite possible in the short term. This means that you can, in fact, win in the short term.
If you do, it’s a good idea to cash out while you can. It’s as simple as that.
10. Use Promotions and Special Offers to You Advantage
While we said bonuses are not always all that great, that doesn't mean that such offers should be ignored. Bonuses can be a valuable tool in swinging the odds in your favour as a player.
However, most players just collect their welcome bonus and call it a day. Alternatively, they use only standing offers such as reload bonuses or cashback.
However, promotional offers can actually be much better for you and your bottom line. By promotions, we're referring to typically short-term offers that allow you to collect freebies, enhance winnings, or otherwise boost specific games or actions at the casino.
While most bonuses are designed to be hard to collect and walk away from with a profit, this may not be the case for promotions. Many casinos are happy to take a short-term loss on promos in exchange for good marketing.
Keep an eye on the casino's promotions page to see what's available. Alternatively, stay on top of the best offers from around the world with our promotions page.
11. Take Additional Steps to Ensure Your Safety
Safety is paramount when gambling online. However, picking a legit casino and playing responsibly are not the only things you can do to improve it.
For example, you can keep a lookout for eCOGRA certificates and other third-party organizations. eCOGRA is the online gambling industry’s independent regulator, tasked with testing sites and games to ensure fairness and security.
Speaking of security, you should also take care to keep your payments to and from the casino private and safe. Use three-step authentication, e-wallets, and other measures to prevent fraud, theft, or other unfortunate side effects of the shadier side of gambling.
12. Play Responsibly
We saved the arguably most important tip for last. Always practice safe gambling, and never lose sight of the fact that gambling can be dangerous and addictive if you don’t do it properly.
Here are some of the things responsible gaming entails:
- Set a realistic budget – Don’t take funds out of other aspects of your life just to fund your casino time. The budget you set should not only be set in stone but also appropriate for your financial means.
- Schedule breaks – it’s easy to lose track of time while being wrapped up in all of the excitement. Keep track of both your spending and your time.
- Never chase losses – Don’t attempt to recover lost money by gambling even more. It never works, and it’s always a bad idea.
- Track your spending – Keep a detailed account of how much you spend on casino games, and adjust your budget accordingly.
- Don’t gamble with your judgement impaired – Don’t drink (or use other substances) while wagering with real money, and avoid playing under physical or emotional duress.
- Consider self-exclusion if necessary – If you notice yourself shirking these rules or your budget, consider taking steps to curtail possible addiction.
Conclusion
That’s all we had for you in this guide to online casinos. These tips and advice should help you have a more exciting, more profitable, and safer experience while playing online casino games.
To get the most out of online casinos, all you have to do is basic research about the games you want to play and the site you want to play them on. A little extra time and effort can go a long way.
Oh, and always practice responsible gambling. Remember that it’s a form of entertainment, not a way to earn money. Good luck and stay safe!
