Pursuant to the Tier 3 Resurgence Mitigation Plan announced by Governor Pritzker on November 17, 2020, all licensed Illinois casino gambling and video gaming operations of all kind are suspended until further notice effective at the conclusion of the gaming day at 11:01pm on Thursday, November 19, 2020. But keep in mind that casinos are designing slot machines to go faster and faster between spins. Some are even doing away with the handles and tokens by using digital readouts on gaming cards that you put into the machines. The faster machines can play up to 25 spins per hour, and 972 spins divided by 25 spins per minute is 38.88 minutes. When it comes to online gambling and demographic statistics, a UK study concludes that 17% of the population gamble online, resulting in £5.3 billion revenue for the online market alone.

No, the odds are the same regardless of the time of day.

Most slot machines usually offer an incentive to play the maximum coins. For example two coins may pay 2,000 on the jackpot but three coins will pay 5,000. So if there an economy of scale incentive, then the return is higher with a max-coin bet. However, I should mention that most casinos tend to increase the theoretical return on their slots as they go up in denomination. So, you may be better off betting one coin on a $1 machine than four coins on a quarter machine.
My advice on slot selection is to play a simple smaller game. Nothing with fancy signage or a huge screen. Ultimately, it is the players that pay for that in the form of a lower return.

Interesting question. I'm sure that didn't refer to the payback percentage, 37% would be way too low. The 'hit frequency' is the probability that the player wins anything.

I'm pretty sure that the odds on Megabucks are the same everywhere. It is a 'proprietary game,' meaning the casino and slot maker (IGT) share in the profits. As I understand it, such propriety games are generally set to a return of about 88% by the slot maker, and the casinos do not have the option for a looser or tighter version.
The Wheel of Fortune game, with the big jackpot, I believe is also a proprietary game. Video poker odds are dictated by the pay table. For example, a 9-6 Jacks or Better game will pay 99.54%, assuming optimal strategy and an infinite amount of play, regardless of where the machine is or number of number of hands the player gets on the draw.

You're right, it is impossible for me to know without Microgaming giving me the details on how their reels are weighted. I have asked some of the major software companies for such information, but thus far nobody has volunteered anything. However, I can tell you that the average payback for all slots at the Golden Palace for the month of March 2000 was 95.67%. This information is available at the Golden Palace web site, click on the Price Waterhouse Coopers monthly payout review.

I would assume that the odds are the same at all Microgaming casinos. All casinos probably contribute money to the same account from which the jackpot is paid. This way, the individual casino from which the jackpot was hit does not have to reach into their own pocket when somebody wins. Mid-level payouts are probably paid by the casino itself.

The minimum applies to every machine. Someone with the Gaming Control Board in Carson City, Nevada, told me that every machine in the state must meet minimum payback percentages. The only exception, he said, are on some antique machines in Virginia City.

Unlike most slots, this game has different types of wins according to the number of coins bet. The first coin enables the player to win the small frequent 'bar' wins, from 2 to 60. The second coin enables larger 'seven' wins from 100 to 500. The third coin doubles the wins for sevens, except it also qualified the player for the progressive jackpot for three sizzling sevens.
The ways these games are programmed is to give the player a slightly higher return on each additional coin bet. For example, the first coin might have a return of 92%, the second 93%, and the third 94%. You seem to think the return for one coin would be very low, due to the small wins, but those wins happen more often than the wins for sevens.
In Nevada, regulations require slots to theoretically pay at least 75%. Even the games at the airport, which are very tight, still pay at least 85% or so. I'm quite sure that the return for any number of coins bet in Blazing Sevens conforms to industry norms.

In general Indian casinos are self-regulated. There is generally a tribal commission that will hear disputes, but ultimately the members of the commission know which side of their bread gets buttered.
Don't assume any kind of minimum return on the slot machines. However, ultimately economics would dictate that a return too low would be sensed by players, who would be unlikely to return if they consistently lost too much money too quickly. It would also be bad business, and time consuming, to loosen and tighten the slots like a yo-yo.
Your sound level hypothesis sounds interesting, I never thought of that.

The casinos don't actually program the casinos to pay a certain percentage, but determine the weighting of the reels so that the theoretical return is whatever they wish. In the short run, the actual return can be either much higher or lower than the theoretical return. However, the laws of mathematics dictate that the actual return will get closer to the theoretical return the greater the number of trials.

Each frame in these video slots is weighted equally. Any given line is equally likely to produce any given combination. Thus, the return is the same regardless of the number of coins played.

Royal flush - 840
Four deuces - 200
Wild Royal - 20
Five of a kind - 12
Straight flush - 9
Four of a kind - 5
Full house - 3
Flush - 2
Straight - 2
Three of a kind - 1
I would do this myself, but I am unable to use the necessary software, as I am not a windows user.

Physically all you have to do to change the return of the slot machine is change the EPROM chip inside. Assuming the casino manager had all the EPROM chips, which I think they sometimes do, they could make the change themselves. However in a major jurisdiction the change would have to be reported to the gaming authorities, not to mention internal paperwork. The random number generator is constant, it is what the program does with the random numbers that determines the return.

In general the higher the coinage the better the rate of return is. However in my own research I have seen plenty of exceptions, notably dollar machines that paid less than quarters.

I don’t know whether the chances of winning were better or not. They worked the same way as they do now except each stop on each reel had an equal chance. The very early ones didn’t pay money but chewing gum, which explains the bar symbols (sticks of gum) and fruits (flavors) on some modern slot machines.

I’ve been asked about these North Carolina slot machines so many times I’m tempted to fly there just to see them for myself. Yes, if they did give the probability of each symbol for each reel then an optimal strategy and a return could be fairly easily calculated. However I have never actually seen such a table and have never worked out the odds.

I just had an eye-opening experience at Casino Windsor. No where do they publish their percent payback on slots. However, that aside, I was going to play quarter (my comfort level) video poker. I was really taken aback when I put up the paytable. They were 5/4 machines. I am talking Jacks or better was only 5 coins on a full house and 4 coins on a flush. I looked at about 20 machines and only found one that paid any better and that was a 6/4 machine.

As I stated, I am not a mathematician but I think that payback percentage must be in the very low 70s. Needless to say I didn’t play video poker there because I know that the longer I would have played the greater the loss I could have expected with the house taking approximately $30.00 from every $100.00 put through the machine. That is not a gamble with some expectation of winning, it is a sure loss for players. On the Detroit side of the river, MGM Grand has their machines at 7/5. Not really great but a whole lot better than 5/4.

Could you please tell me the exact percentage payback on the 5/4 and 7/5 machines. Since none of the area casinos post their average payback on slots I am (and this is dangerous) assuming that their reel slots payback the same percentages. Best regards.

Slot Machine Project Statistics 3 Bars Using

Actually with perfect play the 5/4 pay table return 92.78%. Still one of the worst pay tables I have ever heard of. Have you tried the Greektown casino in Detroit? I don't know what games they have but I do know they have had security remove several winning video poker players from the building, including a old lady who hit a royal on a machine with a 97% pay table. They must have something good enough to warrant throwing winners out for.

First lets clear up what the term 'hold' means. For purposes of electronic games it is the theoretical return the game is set to. In both video poker and slots each play is random and independent of all past plays. The laws of mathematics dictate that even with independent trials the as the sample size gets larger the actual return will tend to get closer to the theoretical mean, or the hold. So contrary to popular belief a machine never goes hot or cold to get back in balance. Never mind the term 'cycle.' It is a poorly named industry term for the number of possible outcomes of the random number generators inside the machine. Unfortunately the term has trickled down only to confuse low level employees and players alike. Contrary to popular myth there are no cycles and again each play is equally random and independent of all other plays.

Not often. Contrary to popular myth the casinos don’t tighten the machines on weekends or whenever it is busy. Here in Las Vegas the casinos have to fill out a form every time they change the percentage on each game. Most slot managers I have spoken with have a policy on what coinage is set to what return. I tend to think the most likely reason to change the percentage would a change in ownership and/or management, which do not happen often.

The 96.7% applies to total money bet and transaction fees generally only apply to deposits and/or withdrawals. Players generally circulate through the same money and thus bet much more than they deposit. As I discussed in the September 18, 2005, column a player could bet through about 1.5 million dollars with a $10,000 bankroll and betting $5 at a time in blackjack. In this case the casino would make their profit based on 1.5 million in bets but pay expenses based only on $10,000.

From what I hear anything you can configure at the machine you can configure remotely through the server. This would include the theoretical return percentage. However most casinos report that changing the theoretical return of a slot machine necessitates a lot of paperwork.

Even if it were effortless to move the slot machine return up and down, it strikes me as a conspiracy theory to think the casinos would do that on a player by player basis. Living here in Vegas, I hear all kinds of theories about the lengths the casinos go to in order to win, like pumping in oxygen and playing a subsonic mantra that says 'lose lose lose.' These are just urban legends. Most casinos correctly believe that if you give the player a good experience and a fair gamble then he will keep coming back. As they say, you can only slaughter a sheep only once, but you can shear it many times. (My webmaster, Michael Bluejay, who is a vegetarian, tried to get me to use this analogy instead: 'You can seize all of a sheep’s money only once, but you can force it to take you bowling many times.')

According to the Nevada Gaming Control Boards that means that every slot machine in that bank must be set to a theoretical return of at least 97.4%. Popular opinion has it that only one machine must be set to 97.4%, or that the overall average must be 97.4%. However, I am taking a firm stand that both notions are wrong, at least here in Nevada.

It depends. If the slot play may be used in any machine in the casino, including video poker, then it can be worth 99 cents on the dollar or more, depending on the video poker offerings. For example, the MGM Mirage casinos award $1 in free slot play for every one point earned. It can be used in any machine in any casino connected to the MGM Mirage player card. Most MGM Mirage properties offer 9/6 Jacks or better, so the value of $1 in free slot play is worth 99.54 cents, with correct strategy.

However, sometimes free slot play must be done on particular promotional machines that don’t accept money. The value of this kind of free play is hard to estimate closely, but generally very little. For example, the Las Vegas World used to sell “$1000” vacation packages for $400. Of the alleged $1000 value $600 was in promotional slot machine play. In his book “Million Dollar Video Poker,” Bob Dancer writes that he did this deal numerous times over, and estimates the value of the free slot play to be about ten cents on the dollar.

It will show the specific return of the game you played.

Let’s assume 10.8 for the standard deviation, which I get from the Red, White, and Blue game described in my slot machine page. The standard deviation of the mean over n spins is standard deviation per bet divided by the square root of n. In this case, 10.8/10,000^0.5 = 0.108. The difference between 93% and 91% over 10,000 spins is just 18.5% of one standard deviation. To get the standard deviation of the mean to just 2% you would need a sample size of 291,600 spins. The standard deviation in slots will vary substantially, so take these figures with a grain of salt.

No, there isn’t. I don’t like it any more than you do. I think the player should be allowed to know the rules and/or the odds about what he is gambling on. Others have asked me if invoking the state Freedom of Information Act. I tend to doubt it would help or apply. As far as I know, the only place with such a right to know might be Holland. I’m told in Amsterdam information about the virtual reel stripping is indicated in little cards on the machines. You could in theory calculate the odds with that information and the pay table.

'Anonymous' .

No. To get an estimate of how loose a casino's slots are you would want to know the ratio of money returned to money bet. This ratio would typically be about 92%. Telling you only the amount paid out is not useful at all. Consider the Circus Circus claim of paying out $26 million a month. They don't disclose how much players bet to get that $26 million. What if they bet $35 million? That would be a return of 71.43%, which would be awful.
In conclusion, I don't know whether to be angry over what I consider to be deceptive advertising or depressed that people fall for it.

• Appendices
• Slots Analysis
• Miscellaneous

Introduction

The following table ranks the Las Vegas casinos according to the looseness of their video display reeled nickel slot machines. The returns are based on a sampling of five different types of machines. The data collected goes back as far as October 2001 so the information is a bit dated.

Las Vegas 5 Cent Slot Survey

Excluded Casinos

Bar Top Slot Machine

The Suncoast and Rampart Casino in Summerlin do not allow playing slots and taking notes at the same time. I can not include any casino that prohibits the method in which I gather data.

Location Averages

The next table shows the average return by location.

Returns by Region

The above sign can be found across the street from the Palms. Although I did the study Anthony Curtis published it in the LasVegas Advisor, which is how it become well known. The'...' in the sign encompases quite a bit of information,which was conveniently left off the sign. Actually the study only says that the Palms had the lowest nickel video slotsof the casinos surveyed in Las Vegas. The small print at thebottom says, 'Independent study conducted between November2001-February 2002 on Austin Powers, Fortune Cookie, Reel'em In, and Wheel of Fortune games. They left off LeopardSpots, and the study began in October.

Observations

There seemed to be no truth behind slot placement myths. Machines on the end of a bank did no better on average than those in the middle. There was also no correlation between return and proximity to such things as the main door, table game pit, high traffic areas, and low traffic areas.

Most casinos were very consistent in their slot returns.If one nickel machine had a return of x% then all others like it also returned x%. However some casinos did mix up loose and tight machines, most notably Treasure Island and the California casinos.

Methodology

A kind and anonymous source provided me with par sheets for the games in question. The EPROM (Erasable Programmable Read Only Memory) chip is what tells the machine the order of the symbols on the reel, in some cases how the stops are weighted, how much each winning combination pays, and any other pertinent information about how much the machine pays.It is up to the slot manager to select which EPROM chip to order according to the return percentage desired. On atypical game there might be about 8 different possible return percentages, ranging from about 85% to 98%.

Each of the different par sheets has five sets of distinct reels. On video display slots the stops are not weighted; in other words all stops are equally likely. The distribution of each symbol on each reel is what determines the theoretical return of the machine. For example a higher paying machine may have more of the higher paying symbols.

On the machine itself three consecutive symbols arevisible on five different reels. By comparing actualobservations of results to the par sheets it is possible todetermine which reels the machine uses, and thus which par sheet and which return. There are various three-symbol combinations that appear in at least one but not all par sheets. So if one of these combinations occurs on an actualmachine it narrows down the possible par sheets. By playingenough the player can narrow down the possible par sheets tojust one.

To help identify the unique combinations I wrote a computer program for each game, which had the exact reel order of all 5 reels of all the par sheets. The program then counted the number of par sheets with each possible three-symbol combination. If the number was greater than 0 and less than the maximum then that combination was identified along with the associated par sheets it belonged to.

It is then a matter of simply playing the game and comparing the outcomes to the list of partially unique combinations. It only takes about 5-10 plays per machine to narrow down the possibilities to just one par sheet.

The averages in the table are actually an average of averages. For each kind of machine at each casino I took an average return. Then I took the average of these averages over the five kinds of machines I tested for.

Slot Machine Definition

There is some confusion about what constitutes a 'slot machine' or 'slot.' My definition, and that of most gamblers, is a gambling machine with either actual spinning reels or video representations of the them.

People in the gaming business and regulators generally refer to a slot machine as any gambling machine, including reeled slots, video poker, video keno, video blackjack,etc.. For purposes of statistics both casino managers and regulators combine all the electronic gambling machines together. For example, the Slot Chart in Casino Player magazine and reports by the Nevada Gaming Control Board do not isolate just reeled slots but consider all electronic games a 'slot.' Therefore my return percentages should not be expected to agree with those reported by the casinos or regulators. As far as I know mine is the only source to isolate just the return of reeled slots.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Rob Feldheim for helping with the slot play and record keeping. Rob helped me with most of the casinos on the east side of town and part of downtown. I would also like to thank par Sheet Pete (not his real name)for providing the par sheets, without which this project would not have been possible.

Internal Links

Go to slot machine appendix3B (Jean/Primm slot returns).
Go to slot machine appendix 3D(Henderson slot returns).
Go to slot machine appendix 3E(Las Vegas quarter and dollar slot returns).
Go to slot machine appendix 3F(Montreal slot return).
Go back to slot machines.

External Links

The main-stream media has covered this study in depth. Here are links to some articles.

• Turning'em loose, an article that appeared in the Las VegasReview Journal on May 19, 2002, about the possible effectsof this study.
• One-Armed Bandit or Robin Hood?, an article by myself for Contingencies Magazine explaining the methodology, results, and weaknesses of the study.
• Play by the rules and the one-armed bandits will still win. Boston Globe article about slot machines, in which my Las Vegas survey is mentioned and my advice quoted. (cache)