Casino games guide: house edge, odds and the law for every game

What every casino game costs

The house edge is the share of each dollar bet that a game keeps on average. It is fixed by the rules and the payouts, so you can compare games before you play. Here they are, cheapest first, with where each figure comes from.

The spread is enormous. The same $100 put through a tie bet or a keno game costs thirty to fifty times as much on average as basic strategy blackjack.

Where the cost really comes from

The house edge is only half of what a session costs. The other half is how much you put through. Expected loss is always:

house edge x total amount bet

A low-edge game played fast can cost more than a high-edge game played slowly. Pokies and crash games are the fast ones: each round is settled in seconds and the next one starts straight away. Table games are slower, and blackjack and baccarat give you the lowest edges in the building. The best single move for most players is choosing the game and the bet; after that, it is bet size and time.

Roulette

Every bet on a single zero wheel carries the same 2.70% edge, so the wheel you choose matters more than the bet you pick.

• Roulette odds: each bet's payout, true odds and house edge on single and double zero wheels.
• Roulette bets: the table layout, where each inside and outside bet goes, and the racetrack call bets.
• European roulette: the 37-pocket single zero wheel, its number order and its sector bets.
• French roulette: how La Partage halves the edge on even-money bets to 1.35%, and how En Prison works.
• American roulette: what the double zero costs you, bet by bet.
• Roulette strategy: why no system beats the wheel, with the Martingale worked through.
• Online roulette: why it cannot legally be offered here, and where roulette is legal in person.

Blackjack

The only common casino game where your decisions change the edge. Start with the blackjack strategy guide, which covers the rules, the chart and why a 6 to 5 table costs four times as much.

• Blackjack odds: the chance of being dealt blackjack, of winning a hand and of busting, calculated.
• Card counting: how the Hi-Lo count and the true count work, and what a count is really worth.
• Blackjack side bets: Perfect Pairs, 21+3 and the rest, ranked by house edge.
• Variations from Australian casino rule books: Free Bet Blackjack with its free doubles and splits, Blackjack Switch where you swap the second cards of two hands, Spanish 21 with no tens in the deck, and pontoon.
• Online blackjack: why it cannot legally be offered here, and the house edge of every blackjack version, calculated.

Baccarat and dice

One decision, three bets, and two of them among the cheapest in the casino. Dice games have a far wider spread of prices.

• How to play baccarat: the drawing rules, the payouts and the house edge on each bet.
• Baccarat strategy: why banker is the best bet, no-commission tables and what each side bet costs.
• Dragon tiger: one card each, king high, and why the tie rule decides the price.
• Craps: the come-out roll, the point and the bets that matter. Craps odds works out the house edge on every bet, from 0% to 16.67%.
• Sic bo: big and small, totals, doubles and triples, with the house edge on every bet on the layout.
• Two more quick card games: casino war and its go to war decision, and red dog with its spread table.

Poker and video poker

Against other players, the house takes a fee instead of an edge. In casino poker and video poker you play the house, and the edge can be calculated exactly.

• Online poker in Australia: the law, and what tournament fees and rake really cost.
• Rules and maths for player-against-player games: Texas holdem, Omaha poker, poker hand rankings and poker odds, from outs to pot odds.
• Poker against the house: three card poker, Caribbean stud, casino holdem, ultimate texas holdem and pai gow poker, each with its strategy and house edge.
• Video poker: how the deal and draw work and how to judge a paytable in seconds. Two paytables have their own pages: jacks or better at 9/6 and full pay deuces wild.

Live casino and game shows

A live table is a real dealer streamed from a studio, and still an online casino game in law. Our live dealer casinos guide covers what an hour at one costs.

• Live roulette, live blackjack and live baccarat: how each streamed table works, and what the speed and lightning formats change.
• Live casino game shows: the wheels, bonus rounds and multipliers in Crazy Time, MONOPOLY Live and Dream Catcher.
• Money wheel: the big wheel layouts in Australian rule books and what each symbol pays.
• Evolution Gaming: the live casino maker, by its own annual report.

Instant win games

Fast, repetitive formats with a published return and rounds settled in seconds.

• Crash games: how Aviator works and why every cash-out target costs the same.
• Plinko: rows, risk levels and the RTP the maker chooses.
• Mines: the chance of surviving each pick and how the RTP sets the multipliers.
• Scratch cards: why licensed scratchies are sold in shops, not online, and what they pay back.
• Keno, bingo and two-up have very different legal status. Keno is the one you can play legally online from a licensed provider, until a federal ban on online keno starts on 1 January 2027; our online keno australia guide explains why. Online bingo has no Australian licence we could find, and two-up, the Anzac Day game, is legal only on set days, with no house edge in a social game.

Betting systems

No staking plan changes the house edge. Each guide works a $5 sequence through with the real odds.

• Martingale: the doubling ladder and what each bankroll buys. Run your own numbers in the Martingale calculator.
• Fibonacci, D'Alembert and Labouchere: other loss-chasing systems with the same maths underneath.
• Paroli and Oscars Grind: systems that raise the bet after a win instead of a loss.
• Gamblers fallacy: why no number is ever due, with the odds after a streak.

House edge and maths

• House edge: what it is, how to calculate it and how it differs from RTP and hold.
• Best odds casino games: every game ranked by house edge, cheapest first, with what each costs per $100 bet.
• Random number generator: how RNG results are made, and the tests Australian standards demand.

Online casino games in Australia: what is legal

Online casino games cannot legally be offered to people in Australia. The Interactive Gambling Act 2001 prohibits them, and ACMA lists slots and pokies, "casino-style games (like poker, blackjack and roulette)", scratchies and unlicensed betting and lottery services as illegal online services.

The offence is the provider's, not the player's. But playing at an offshore casino means no Australian licence, no Australian testing and no Australian body to complain to. Read are online pokies legal in Australia before you deposit anywhere, and our gambling laws Australia guide for the federal and state rules. For the pokies themselves, start with our pokies guide.

In this section

Casino games American roulette American roulette adds a second zero and keeps the same payouts, nearly doubling the house edge. Here is what that pocket costs, the one bet worse than the rest, and the triple zero wheel now approved in Victoria. Read more Casino games Baccarat strategy Baccarat strategy is short: bet banker, skip the tie and most side bets, and control how many hands you play. Here is the house edge on every bet we could find in an Australian rule book, worked out exactly. Read more Casino games Baccarat Baccarat looks formal, but you only make one choice: banker, player or tie. Here is how a hand plays out, the third card rules nobody explains, and the exact odds we calculated for the 8 deck game. Read more Casino games Best odds games No casino game pays you to play it, but some charge a lot less than others. Here is every game we have calculated, ranked from the lowest house edge to the highest, with what it takes to get the low number. Read more Casino games Blackjack odds You lose more blackjack hands than you win, yet the house edge is under 1%. Here are the odds behind that, from the chance of a natural to the chance of losing five in a row, all calculated. Read more Casino games Side bets The main blackjack bet costs about half a cent per dollar. Most side bets cost between 4 and 16 cents. Here is each one we could find in Australian rule books, with its odds and its price. Read more Casino games Blackjack strategy How to play blackjack, what it pays and the complete basic strategy chart for the most common shoe game, computed with our own solver. Plus what each mistake costs and which table rules quietly raise the house edge. Read more Casino games Blackjack Switch Blackjack Switch deals you two hands and lets you swap their second cards. That swap is worth about 9% of your bet, and the casino takes it back with 1 to 1 blackjacks and a dealer 22 push. Here is how the trade adds up. Read more Casino games Card counting Card counting is real maths, not a movie trick, but the edge it gives is tiny and the swings are huge. Here is how the Hi-Lo count works, what it is worth on Australian rules, and what casinos are allowed to do about it. Read more Casino games Caribbean stud Caribbean stud poker pays up to 250 to 1 on a royal flush in Queensland, yet that barely moves the maths. We solved every hand against every dealer upcard: here is the cost and the raises that matter. Read more Casino games Casino holdem Casino holdem gives you one decision after the flop: call twice your ante or fold. Call far more often than feels natural and the game costs just over 2% of your ante. Rules, maths and hard hands inside. Read more Casino games Casino war Casino war is the childhood card game with a house edge bolted on. There is one decision in the whole game, and getting it right cuts your cost by more than a third. Read more Casino games Craps odds Craps has the widest spread of prices in the casino: one bet with no house edge at all and another that keeps one dollar in six. Here is every bet, priced with Australian pay tables. Read more Casino games Craps Craps looks like chaos, but the core game is two rolls of logic: a come-out roll, then a point. Learn the line bets first, add odds, and leave the centre of the table alone. Read more Casino games Crash games A multiplier climbs, and you cash out before it crashes. Crash games feel like a test of nerve, but the maths decides the result long before you press the button. Here is how they work and what each strategy costs. Read more Casino games D'Alembert system Add a unit after a loss, take one off after a win. The d'Alembert looks gentle and balanced, and an even split of wins and losses really does leave you ahead. The trouble is what happens when the split is not even. Read more Casino games Deuces wild Full pay deuces wild returns more than you bet with perfect strategy: 100.76% in our exact calculation. Change one line and it falls to about 94%. The table to look for and how to play each deuce count. Read more Casino games Dragon Tiger Dragon tiger is baccarat cut down to one card per side. The whole price of the main bet sits in one rule: what happens to your bet when the two cards tie. Here are the rules and the numbers. Read more Casino games European roulette European roulette is the single zero game, and it is the standard wheel in Australian casinos. Here is the wheel itself, the sector bets that follow its number order, and what the odds mean over a real session. Read more Casino games Evolution Gaming Evolution makes many of the live dealer tables and game shows streamed online. Here is the company from its own 2025 annual report: its size, how it earns, where the money comes from and its licences. Read more Casino games Fibonacci system The Fibonacci betting system climbs more gently than the Martingale, which makes it feel safer. The maths shows something odd: most completed sequences only get you back to level, and the losses still arrive. Read more Casino games Free Bet Blackjack Free doubles and free splits sound like the casino is giving money away. It is not: a dealer total of 22 becomes a push. Here is what that trade costs, and how the strategy changes when some of your money is free. Read more Casino games French roulette French roulette is the single zero game with French terms and, at some tables, a rule that returns half your even-money bet on zero. That halves the edge. Here is how it works, and why an Australian table may lack it. Read more Casino games Gambler's fallacy Nine blacks in a row and red feels certain. It is not: the next spin is 18 in 37, exactly as it always was. Here is the maths of streaks, hot and cold numbers, and why the wheel never owes you anything. Read more Casino games House edge The house edge is the price tag on every bet in a casino: the share of each dollar the game keeps on average. Here is how it works, how to work it out yourself, and the figure for every game and bet we have calculated. Read more Casino games Jacks or better Jacks or better is the video poker game others are measured against. We calculated every deal and hold: 9/6 returns 99.54% with perfect play, and one unit off the flush or full house costs over 1%. Read more Casino games Labouchere system Write down a line of numbers, bet the two ends, cross them off when you win. The Labouchere finishes most lines even when you lose more spins than you win. Here is what that costs on the lines that do not finish. Read more Casino games Live baccarat Live baccarat streams a real dealer and a real shoe, but the format you pick changes the price. Speed rounds double the hands per hour, and Lightning tables add a 20% fee to every bet. Read more Casino games Live blackjack Live dealer blackjack streams real cards from a studio overseas. It is still an online casino game, so it cannot legally be offered to people in Australia. Here is how the formats work and which change your odds. Read more Casino games Live game shows Live game shows are money wheels with a studio, a host and bonus rounds. The maker publishes the rules but, on the pages we read, not the return. Here is what the rules do tell you about the odds. Read more Casino games Live roulette Live roulette streams a real wheel to your screen, and some formats spin twice as fast as a casino table. Here is how live dealer roulette works, what speed does to your hourly cost, and Lightning Roulette. Read more Casino games Mines In mines you uncover tiles, dodging hidden mines, and cash out whenever you like. It feels like a skill game. The maths says every cash-out point costs you the same 3% on average. Read more Casino games Martingale strategy Double after every loss and one win gets it all back. That part is true. What the Martingale never tells you is how often the ladder runs out, and what it costs when it does. Here are the numbers at $5 a bet. Read more Casino games Money wheel The money wheel is the simplest bet in the casino: pick a symbol, watch the wheel. The price is printed in the segment count, and one Australian pay table costs twice as much as the others. Read more Casino games Omaha poker Omaha looks like hold'em with two extra cards, but you must use exactly two of your four. Here are the rule book rules, how a pot limit raise is sized and the numbers that make Omaha a game of draws. Read more Casino games Online bingo Bingo is legal in clubs and community halls under state law, but real money bingo online is a different matter. Here is how the law treats it, what we could and could not find, and how your odds really work. Read more Casino games Online blackjack Online blackjack cannot legally be offered to people in Australia, but blackjack itself is everywhere in our casinos. Here is how the Australian rules work, and what each version of the game really costs you. Read more Casino games Online keno Licensed online keno is legal in Australia until 31 December 2026 because the law treats it as a lottery. A new federal law bans it from 1 January 2027. Who is licensed, what is missing and what keno pays back. Read more Casino games Online poker Real money online poker cannot legally be offered to people in Australia. The law counts any game of mixed chance and skill. Here is what that means for players, where poker is legal, and what the house takes. Read more Casino games Online roulette Online roulette cannot legally be offered to people in Australia, though playing is not an offence. Here is the law, where roulette is legal in person, what each wheel costs and our tests of every popular system. Read more Casino games Oscar's Grind Oscar's Grind aims for one unit of profit per series and only raises the bet after a win. It is the most patient system on the table; our exact maths shows how often it works and what the rare long series cost. Read more Casino games Pai gow poker Pai gow poker gives you seven cards to split into two hands that must both beat the dealer. Here are a regulator's rules, how to set your hands, what the commission and joker do, and a side bet costing about 8%. Read more Casino games Paroli system The Paroli doubles after wins instead of losses, so the big bets only ever risk winnings. It is the gentlest system on your bankroll, yet it still loses 2.70% per dollar. Here is how the streaks really fall. Read more Casino games Plinko Plinko drops a ball through rows of pegs into a row of multipliers. The board looks random and fun; the real number to find is the RTP, which can range from 99% down to 88.20% for the same game. Read more Casino games Poker hand rankings The ten poker hands from royal flush down to high card, why they rank in that order, how ties are broken and the games where the order changes. Every probability on this page we counted ourselves. Read more Casino games Poker odds Poker odds come down to two numbers: your chance of making the hand, and the price the pot is offering. Here are both, calculated exactly for hold'em, with an outs table that shows where the rule of 4 goes wrong. Read more Casino games Pontoon Casino pontoon in Australia is blackjack with the tens taken out and a pay table bolted on. Played well it is one of the cheapest games on the floor. Here are the approved rules, how a round runs, and the numbers. Read more Casino games Random number generators Pokies, electronic roulette and online table games all get results from a random number generator. Here is how an RNG works, the tests Australian and UK standards require, and how a careless one would cheat you. Read more Casino games Red dog Red dog asks whether a third card will fall between two others. The payout table rewards narrow gaps, but the money is made on wide ones, and that is where you should raise. Read more Casino games Roulette bets Every roulette bet is a set of numbers and a chip position on the layout. Here is the table mapped out, where each inside, outside and call bet goes, the house rules for placing chips, and how much each bet swings. Read more Casino games Roulette odds A straight-up number pays 35 to 1, but the true odds are 36 to 1 against. That single missing unit is the casino's edge. Here is the full roulette odds and payouts table, worked out for both wheels. Read more Casino games Roulette strategy Every roulette system promises to turn a losing game into a winning one. None can, and the maths shows exactly why. Here is what Martingale and the others really do to your money, and the choices that do matter. Read more Casino games Scratch cards Australia's licensed scratchies are sold over the counter, not online, and the game bulletins show they pay back 60% of sales. Online scratch cards on offshore sites are a different product with different risks. Read more Casino games Sic bo Sic bo is three dice and a table full of bets. Two or three of them cost under 3%. Most cost more than 10%. The Australian pay table has one quirk worth knowing about. Read more Casino games Spanish 21 Spanish 21 takes the four tens out of every deck, which would wreck an ordinary blackjack game, then hands the value back with rules that let 21 always win. Here is the arithmetic of that trade, and how to play it. Read more Casino games Texas holdem Texas hold'em takes a minute to learn: two cards each, five shared, four betting rounds. We follow the casino rule books, show how the rake is worked out and give exact odds for famous starting hands. Read more Casino games Three card poker Three card poker asks one question per hand: play or fold. Answer it with Q-6-4 and the ante game costs about 3.4% of your ante. The pair plus bet costs anywhere from 3.5% to 7.3%, depending on the state. Read more Casino games Two-up Two pennies, one kip, a ring and a lot of noise. Here are the rules of two-up as NSW sets them out, the real odds of heads, tails and odds, and the days each state allows the game. Read more Casino games Ultimate texas holdem Ultimate texas holdem lets you bet big early or small late, and that choice is the game. We solved it exactly: 2.19% house edge on the ante with perfect play, and the preflop chart matters most. Read more Casino games Video poker Video poker is the one machine game where the paytable tells you the return and your choices change it. How to read the table, the odds before and after the draw, and what strategy is worth. Read more

Our partner sites

Terms checked 8 to 9 October 2026

We earn a commission if you join through these links; it pays for the site and does not change the facts we show. Listed in no particular order. Every detail comes from the casino's own terms, except ACMA notes, which come from ACMA's blocked list. These are offshore casinos without an Australian licence, so BetStop and Australian dispute services do not cover them: read whether online pokies are legal in Australia and our affiliate disclosure.Commission links. Offshore sites with no Australian licence or BetStop cover: is it legal?

LuckyOnes

Partner · termsTerms checked 9 Oct 2026

Visit LuckyOnesVisit 18+ Affiliate link · T&Cs apply

Withdrawals

AUD 6,000 a day

Max bet (bonus)

AUD 8

Min deposit

AUD 30

• Names no licence or operating company in its terms or footer
• luckyones.com, luckyones1.com and luckyones7.com are on ACMA's blocked list (8 Oct 2026)Main domain on ACMA's blocked list

Wild Tokyo

Partner · termsTerms checked 8 Oct 2026

Visit Wild TokyoVisit 18+ Affiliate link · T&Cs apply

Withdrawals (entry)

AUD 800 a day

Max bet (bonus)

AUD 8

Monthly cap (entry)

AUD 13,000

• States a Curacao eGaming licence (no number shown)

18+ Offers and terms change often; the casino's own terms always apply. Never gamble money you need. Free help: Gambling Help 1800 858 858, 24/7.