How To Win At Blackjack In Vegas

• If the dealer actually has a blackjack (Ace + 10), you win the bet and it pays 2-to-1. If the dealer does not have blackjack, you lose your side bet. Up to 50% of your original wager can be made on insurance.
• Set a Hard Limit on Earnings. Although card counting doesn’t perform the magic people expect, as.

It’s often the go-to game for beginner Las Vegas gamblers because basic blackjack strategies are easy to learn. In blackjack, players attempt to reach a score of 21—without exceeding it—before the dealer hits 17. You can win if you don’t bust and your total is higher than the dealer cards. Hitting exactly 21 can mean even bigger winnings.

Most casino gamblers who’ve done any reading at all about Las Vegas casinos already know that blackjack offers the best odds in the house to the smart player. The house edge, which is how one measures such things, is less than 1%. Sometimes, it’s much less than 1%.

Of course, in the long run, no number of tips about how to win at blackjack will help you overcome the house edge. If you play any negative expectation game long enough, including blackjack, you’re sure to lose money.

But you can increase your odds of winning in the short run, and these seven tips on how to win at blackjack in Las Vegas explain exactly how to do that.

1 – Learn the Rules of the Game

Most people already know that if you get a total of 22 or higher, you go bust. They also know that if your total is higher than the dealer’s without going over 21, you win. They even know that the cards are worth 10 points for face cards, 1 or 11 points for aces, and the face value for the rest of the cards.

But other, more obscure rules apply to most games, and these seemingly minor rules can have a big effect on your odds of winning.

Some blackjack games pay 6 to 5 for a blackjack instead of 3 to 2. This might not seem like a big deal. In fact, for some gamblers, it might seem that 6 to 5 is better – 6 is more than 3, after all.

But it’s a huge deal.

The house edge increases by over 2% based on that one rule change.

What does that mean?

If you’re playing in a game with a 0.5% house edge, you expect to lose 50 cents every time you wager $100 on average, in the long run.

Change the rules for that game, and now you’re losing $2.50 (on average, in the long run) for every $100 you bet.

If you’re playing at a table by yourself, you can easily get in 200 hands per hour. Even if you’re playing for just $5 per hand, that’s $1000 per hour in action.

How To Win At Blackjack In Vegas Casinos

Would you rather lose $5 on that action, or $25?

Because that’s the difference you’re looking at.

Other rules matter, too, like whether the dealer hits or stands on soft 17.

You should know all the rules, variations, and their effects on your odds.

2 – ALWAYS Use Basic Strategy

In blackjack, basic strategy is just the mathematically correct move in every possible situation. It’s the move that has the greatest expected value.

Sometimes, if you have a bad total against a good up-card for the dealer, basic strategy just gives you the move that loses the least amount of money.

Other times, if you have good cards and the dealer doesn’t, basic strategy gives you the option that wins you the most money.

And, of course, it should go without saying that this is the expectation over the long run.
In the short run, blackjack is a random game. Anything can happen.

But to increase your probability of walking away as a winner, try to bet with the math instead of against it.

You can find any number of articles explaining basic strategy and various printable basic strategy tables online that you can use. You can even print one up to take to the table with you. As long as you’re not holding up the game, the dealer doesn’t care.

3 – Join the Players’ Club

Casinos want to encourage you to gamble more. That’s why they offer you free stuff like rebates, meals, and lodging based on how much action you bring them.

But to be eligible to get those freebies, you must first sign up for the players’ club. That’s easy to do. You just fill out a form at the membership desk and give them the usual information – your name, address, phone number, email address, etc.

In return, they give you a plastic card to insert into the slot machines while you play. You can also present this card to the blackjack dealer, who will work with his pit boss to rate you and credit your account for your approximate action accordingly.

What’s this worth to you?

At most casinos, the players’ club entitles you to 0.2% back in the form of rebates and other perks.

If you’re playing perfect basic strategy at a casino with a good set of rules where the house edge is something like 0.5%, this effectively reduces the house edge to 0.2%.

That’s about as close to an even money game as you’ll find in any casino.

4 – Don’t Mess With Betting Systems

A betting system is a systematized means of sizing your bets based on what’s happened on previous bets. For example, a betting system might try to take advantage of a winning streak by raising the size of your bet after every win. Or the system might want you to double your bet size after every loss to recoup your losses.

Changing the size of your bet in blackjack CAN make sense, but only if you’re counting cards or using some other advantage technique.

Other betting systems are exercises in futility.

5 – Learn to Count Cards

Counting cards is easier than most people think, but it’s also harder than some other people think. I can explain the concept in 200 words or less, in fact.

That doesn’t make it “easy,” though – it’s just simple.

Since you get a 3 to 2 payout for a blackjack (a 10 and an ace), it makes sense to have more money in action when there are a disproportionately high number of 10s and aces in the deck.

You can keep a general idea of that ratio by counting low cards as +1 as they come out of the deck and high cards (10s and aces) as -1 when they come out of the deck. (The low cards are 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6.)

• Anytime the count is positive, you raise the size of your bets.
• Anytime the count is 0 or negative, you bet the minimum.
• The higher the count, the more you should bet.

Just be careful not to draw too much attention to yourself. Card counting isn’t cheating in the usual sense, but casino management thinks it is. They’ll “back you off” or even “bar” you from their casino if they figure out that you’re a card counter.

Also, don’t spend too much time at the same table at the same casino if you’re counting cards. Get in and get out.

6 – Manage Your Bankroll

You can take one of two approaches to managing your bankroll in blackjack.

You can bet as little as possible to still enjoy yourself. This is one way to make sure you can stay in action longer. Find the $5 tables and stick with the $5 bets. Or raise and lower your bets based on the count.

You’ll earn lots of comps, get lots of action in, and – if you’re counting – you might even win. Heck, you might win even if you’re not counting.

And in the long run, the casino has a mathematical edge over the player.

The other approach takes advantage of being in the short run. You bet big, but you don’t play many hands. Your goal is to make a big score and call it a day.

In fact, the ultimate way to take that approach is to bet your entire bankroll on a single hand.

As a general rule, I’m opposed to the second approach because you’re liable to deviate from basic strategy when you have your entire bankroll on the line, which increases the house’s edge.

However, I do like that approach for a game where you’re not making decisions, like roulette.

Either way, you should have goals for how much you want to win and how much you’re willing to lose. You should also only be gambling with money you can afford to lose.

7 – Take Care of Your Well-Being

How To Win At Blackjack In Vegas

If you want to do well at blackjack, you need to play when you’re well-rested and clear-headed. Drunk blackjack players lose more money. So do tired blackjack players.

This is a hard tip for a lot of gamblers to follow, but it’s probably the most important tip on how to win at blackjack on the list.

Conclusion

Those are my best seven tips for how to win at blackjack in Las Vegas. Some of them are common sense, but others are less intuitive.

You can find more details about each point elsewhere on this site.

Do you have any tips you would have included in this post?

If so, let me know in the comments.

Best Blackjack In Vegas