If you’re new to casino gambling, it might seem like a world that has its own language. Stepping into a brick-and-mortar casino or logging into your online casino account often makes newbies feel like they need dictionaries or translators.
Fear about being left in the dark no longer as we’ve created a comprehensive casino glossary. You’ll find the most common lingo and buzzwords among gamblers right here, allowing you to better communicate with fellow players and understand the games you’re playing.
Casino Terms & Glossary
Without further ado, let’s get into the ultimate casino glossary:
Advantage Player
The advantage player uses a combination of battle-tested strategies to beat the house. Advantage players overcome the house edge built into every casino game and optimize the RTP to increase their chances of winning.
Some advantage players might also resort to questionable means such as card counting at the blackjack table, which casino employees do not support. To gain an advantage, some craps players might hold and roll the dice in an unnatural manner to hit a winning number. In baccarat, an advantage player might resort to finding issues with the cards to either end the hand or get a new deck for a possible better hand.
Ante
The ante is a poker stake that the player pays to receive their cards. If you’re playing a popular poker game like Caribbean Stud Poker, the rules call for players to make a small bet before wagering on the first poker hand. In most cases, the ante goes towards covering the game’s pot. After making the ante bet, most regular playing hands and wagers begin.
Banker
The banker shuffles and deals the cards, accepts the casino chips for wagers, and enforces the rules. In baccarat, players can bet on the banker to win. The banker’s bets’ have a house advantage for variants like Punto Banco, which is 1.06%.
Bankroll
Bankroll is the amount of money players have available to make wagers on slot games, casino games, and sports betting. If you’re a high roller, you might have more freedom to make more risky bets, including side ones, to maximize the payout percentage. However, for most players, managing smaller budgets is essential for the current bet and beyond to help minimize and offset losing bets.
Real money online casinos often feature daily, weekly, and monthly casino bonuses to help members increase their bankroll. Online powerhouses like BetMGM and Borgata have no-deposit bonuses that give new players free play that they can use to win real money at the roulette table and more. Free spins and the new member bonus usually apply to slot machines.
Blind Bet
In a poker game like Omaha and Texas Hold ’em, after the ante bet, players must make a bet before they even have a chance to view their cards. The big and small blinds are essential gambling terms that successful poker players must master.
The small blind refers to the wager that the first player from the dealer’s left must make before the cards are dealt. Usually, the player bets roughly half of the game’s minimum wager with the small blind, which can be a few dollars.
With the big blind, the same player who made the small blind must make this wager before players receive their cards. For the most part, the player tasked with paying the big blind has to make one equal to the game’s smallest bet. The player making the big blind in the first playing round provided that no other players have made raises, calls, or folds, can view and check flops freely.
Bluff
Tried by many but mastered by few, the bluff is the ultimate equalizer. Done right, it’s a game-ender where the player wins by getting other players to fold their hands. Players bluff when they don’t have a strong hand and make a significant raise to lure other players into taking the bait to fold their hands. This move can prevent the bluffer from going broke or taking a massive hit, but it can also lead them to make a bet that they won’t win if others call them on their bluff.
Bluffs are why serious poker players spend countless hours on their body posture and mannerisms. They also pay close attention to how other players maneuver and react so they can execute the bluff with expert timing.
Board
For many poker games, especially Omaha and Texas Hold ’em, the board ties in the community cards that are dealt face up. All the players have access to the board cards. The board gives players a final opportunity to form the strongest hand possible.
Bonus
Bonuses are casino incentives that attract new players and inspire established players to continue making wagers. Promotions often include a deposit bonus, which is a percentage of a first deposit, or in the case of reloads, a daily or weekly deposit. Bonuses can also come in the form of no deposit free spins or recouped losses after the first 24 hours of betting.
Burn Card
Sometimes, when you play a card game, the dealer throws out certain cards from the deck. This is known as the burn card. Besides throwing out cards like the Joker that aren’t used in poker games outside of video poker, burning cards is a way to prevent tampered or marked cards from entering play.
If the dealer misdeals or accidentally deals a card face up when it wasn’t supposed to be, they can throw these cards out of the game. Every casino expects fair play, no matter who wins or loses, so a highly knowledgeable dealer must understand when to burn certain cards.
Cage
Every brick-and-mortar casino has a cash cage where players cash in their tokens from a slot machine or casino chips to get paper money. If you’re playing at an online casino, you can usually opt to make deposits and withdrawals with a casino cash cage instead of using online options.
Card Counting
Card counting is one of the more dubious terms in our casino glossary. In a table game like blackjack, players make mental notes or receive cues about which cards have been dealt and the likelihood of which players will receive upcoming cards. Blackjack players might use card counting to decide whether to hit or stand. If they feel that hitting in the count can result in blackjack, they might increase their bets to boost the potential amount of money that can be won.
Card counting is technically legal, but as private businesses, casinos can ask you to leave if they catch you doing it.
Cash Out
Cashing out is every player’s dream. In brick-and-mortar casinos, you take your chips and slot machine tokens to the cash cage to receive money. When playing online, the cash-out process begins by heading to the cashier section to begin the process. After entering the withdrawal amount, you choose one of the available withdrawal methods such as an online banking transfer or eWallet. Depending on the amount and operator, you might receive online withdrawal payouts as fast as you would in person.
Casino Game
Casino games include real money slots, table games, bingo, and keno. Some iGaming sites offer Slingo and scratch cards. With a casino game, you make a bet using chips that you buy with real money.
Chasing
No matter how successful your gambling strategy is, you’re not going to win every time. Sometimes, to quickly recover from casino or sports betting losses, you might chase to try to win everything back in a single bet. However, chasing is futile as wins and losses are ultimately random.
Chips
For table games, the player bets using small and specialized chips that can only be used at that particular casino to play games. The chips come in different colors to note values like $50 and $100. Players place chips on certain parts of the table to let the dealer or croupier know the specific bet and the amount. If you win, cash out your chips at the casino cage.
Cold Streak
A cold streak is every gambler’s worst fear—a series of losing bets. If you haven’t had a winning streak in sports betting or standard casino play, you might make reckless wagers to get back on the winning path instead of betting your usual amount.
Community Cards
Community cards are specific cards in poker games that the dealer deals them face up. Cards from the community help players put together the strongest hand possible with hole cards. Five cards go towards community play. The flop consists of three cards, the turn is the fourth card, and the last is the river card, which is also dealt face-up for all players to see and use.
Corner Bet
Corners bets are exclusive to roulette, including the American, French, and European variants. For the corner wager, players place their chips at the point where the four numbers they wish to bet on cross. The benefit of this wager is all it takes to win money is for one number to hit.
Croupier
The croupier is the casino employee in charge of spinning the wheel and accepting wagers for roulette games.
Dealer
The dealer passes the cards for poker, blackjack, and baccarat to the players at the table. They also accept the chips for the wagers and make sure the players follow the rules.
Dirty Money
Similar to how the term is used by the mob to point out illegal money activities, dirty money for casinos suggests illegal money operations like money laundering. Because of the sheer volume of money that comes in and out of casinos, regulatory agencies pay special attention to their financial activities, especially how they transfer funds.
Dirty money is also associated with players who might use stolen or counterfeit money to buy chips or slot machine tokens. They play a little bit with these chips and turn them back into the cash cage for clean money. Some people go as far as making counterfeit chips to cash in for real money.
Down Card
For standard card games like poker and blackjack, the down card is dealt face down to players. For poker, the down card is a hole card. Unlike cards that are dealt up for all players to use and see, the down card keeps the other players guessing.
Draw Poker
Draw Poker is extremely popular at online casino apps and usually comes in three- and five-card variants. Unlike other games that require an ante or a blind bet, the draw variant deals players the entire hand. Before they make their wagers, they can ditch weak cards and draw others until the showdown.
Even Money Bet
For many casino games, making an even money bet is a calculated wager where winning is equal to the wager amount. In other words, these bets have a 1:1 payout ratio. Even money wagers are ideal for new players or players who aren’t high rollers.
Expected Value
During a hot or cold steak, the expected value is a ballpark figure of how much will likely be won or lost after betting for a certain period. Expected value takes into account common odds, payout percentages, and ratios.
Face Card
The face cards, also known as royalty, are kings, queens, and jacks in all suits. In blackjack, the face cards are worth ten points. In baccarat, face cards are zero.
Flat Betting
Flat betting is when players stake the exact amount of money on their bets. Flat wagering defies the trend of using strategies like the Paroli and Martingale, which calls for doubling or going back to the original bet based on wins and losses.
Forced Bet
A forced bet refers to poker games where a player or players must make an ante or a blind wager before the dealing starts.
Gambler’s Fallacy
The gambler’s fallacy is a psychological notion that convinces gamblers to believe that independent events in the past will influence independent events in the future. For instance, a gambler might think that 10 reds in a row in roulette means that the next spin is more likely to be black, but the truth is that the odds of black are still 50/50.
Hand
A hand consists of the cards that the player has. Based on their hand, players use strategy to draw, hit, or stand to strengthen their hand. They may use a combination of hole and community cards to create their final hand. The term “hand” may also refer to an entire betting round.
High Roller
Better known as the player with deep pockets, a high roller is a bettor that can make significantly higher bets. Brick-and-mortar casinos often have special betting tables with high or no-limit tables just for high rollers. At real money casino apps, some live dealer casino games have games that support small stakes or high rollers who spend $50 or more per betting hand.
Hold Percentage
More commonly referred to as the house edge, the hold percentage is the amount the casino holds onto from the money wagered. In simpler terms, the hold percentage is the amount that the player won’t get back over many bets.
Hole Card
In poker games like Texas Hold ’em, hole cards are the two cards that the dealer deals face down to players after the big blind is paid. Players work to combine their hole cards with community cards to win the hand.
Horn Bet
For craps players, the horn wager pays off when the dice roll hits a two, three, eleven, or twelve. Most craps tables have a special spot for players to gamble on the horn.
Hop Bet
The hop wager is a specialized proposition craps wager that involves betting on which specific numbers the dice rolls on rather than the result of the numbers.
House Edge
Keeping gamblers up with many sleepless nights, the house edge is the built-in advantage that casinos have over players. All casino games favor the house, but some more than others. For instance, American roulette has a house edge of 5.26% thanks to the double zero.
Initial Bet
The initial bet is the first wager made during play. Games like poker require wagers like the ante and blind wagers before the initial bet for the first hand begins.
Jackpot
Some games (usually slots) have a fixed or many fixed pot sizes. These elusive jackpots can be worth tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars. Jackpots either hit randomly, during a certain timeframe, or through certain symbols coming together.
Losing Bet
A losing bet is a wager that doesn’t hit its mark or number. For example, if you play craps or roulette and gamble on a specific number and another number lands, you have a losing wager. For sports betting, a losing wager occurs if you bet on the spread or moneyline that doesn’t pan out.
Marker
For players that suffer losses that they can’t cover in games like backroom poker and craps, they may take a marker from another player or a loan shark. Markers are debts that must be paid back at some point. Casinos may allow you to apply for markers and use them like credit cards.
Martingale
The Martingale is normally associated with roulette variants, but the strategy also applies to other games like baccarat. After making an even money wager, should it lose, the Martingale calls for doubling the next bet. Should the next bet win, you go back to the first even-money wager.
Match Play
Retail casinos often offer match play as a special bonus for playing table games. Match play can also be a perk for VIP members.
Usually, you’ll receive a coupon that allows the casino to match your original bet. For instance, if you make a $10 blackjack bet, a match play coupon would double your bet so that it’s worth $20. Any winnings you get would be based on the new $20 bet even though you only shelled out $10 of your own money.
Maximum Bet
The maximum wager is the most you can stake playing slots or table games. Bonuses may also have maximum bets, meaning the bonus offer will only apply up to a certain amount.
One Roll Bet
A one-roll bet usually works for craps where the outcome, win or lose, finishes that betting round. Craps takes the one-roll concept further by having win or else wagers like field bets or gambling whether the dice will add up to two, three, or twelve.
Online Casino
A virtual casino offers traditional casino titles like you would see at a physical location, but you can play from the comfort of your own home or on-the-go. Virtual casinos usually offer more games and lucrative promotions to draw in new members. They also tend to have better RTPs, which is possible thanks to lower overhead costs.
Original Bet
Otherwise known as the initial placed bet, the original bet is the first money wagered while playing. The original wager influences the potential payouts.
Payout Percentage
If you play at casinos, you might better know payout percentages as the payout rate or simply RTP. The return-to-player describes how much a player can expect to get back for every $100 they gamble.
Pit
The pit is where the table game action takes place. The pit manager, or pit boss, is a special casino employee who oversees the dealers and closely watches for cheaters.
Poker
Poker has perhaps the most variants compared to other casino options. Many casino tournaments, especially the World Series of Poker, use variants like Omaha and Texas Hold ’em to attract professional players who compete for multi-million jackpots. Most games involve community and hole cards that you can use to form a winner.
Progressive Jackpot
Unlike fixed jackpot games, progressive jackpots increase as wagers come in. Many online progressive games are part of a network where all the players, regardless of where they are playing, contribute to pots that sometimes exceed a million bucks.
Push
Sometimes, bets result in a tie where nobody wins. This is known as the push. In baccarat, players can bet on the push, otherwise known as the tie bet. In sports betting, if the point spread is a tie, the original player wager is pushed and returned to the player.
Random Number Generator
Licensed casinos, including virtual ones like BetRivers and BetMGM, must ensure fair and random game results as a licensing mandate. Independent companies certify casinos for a random number generator certificate and audit the results.
Roulette Wheel
In all roulette variants, the croupier spins the wheel so that the little white ball lands on a color and number. The zeros are highlighted in green on the reels. The roulette wheel consists of the track the ball rotates on and the spindle that helps the wheel freely rotate.
Royal Flush
The royal flush is the highest-paying poker hand and involves a playing hand of the highest cards in the same suit. The royal flush consists of a ten, a jack, a queen, a king, and an ace, all of the same suit.
Same Suit
In playing cards, you have the same card values in clubs, diamonds, hearts, and spades. The same suit is the basis for poker flushes and would consist of a hand of, for instance, all hearts.
Seven Card Stud
Seven-card stud deals players two face-down cards and one face-up card to start. After getting three more face-up cards and one face-down card, the player can put together the strongest five cards to play their hand.
Side Bet
Many table games offer additional bets beyond the basic bets. While side bets promise higher payouts, they carry more risk because the house’s edge is higher. Because of the higher potential to lose, side bets are best left for higher rollers.
Slot Machine
Slot machines feature various reels that you spin in hopes of landing on certain paylines. Virtual slots can pack bonus rounds like free spins, multiple jackpots, and even a progressive pot. Slots come in many themes and are ideal for those with small budgets. They contain different icons that carry different values or are used as bonus triggers, like the scatter for free slots.
Soft 17
In most blackjack variants, the dealer must stand if the initial two cards equal seventeen through an ace and a six. Aces count as eleven or one point, depending on the other cards. The soft 17 is meant to prevent the dealer from going bust.
Straight Flush
Next to the almighty royal winning flush, the straight flush is a highly coveted winning hand in poker. To get a straight flush, you must get five cards from an identical suit in ascending order.
Table Game
Table games are mostly baccarat, craps, roulette, poker, and blackjack. These table games have a dealer or croupier to manage gameplay.
Tapping Out
Tapping out occurs when a player runs out of money to continue making wagers. Sometimes, players choose to take markers. Otherwise, they are forced to leave or, in the case of baccarat, pass the shoe.
Trigger Free Spins
Some slot machines have bonus spins besides re-spins. The bonus spins let you win free money without a further wager. Typically, a trio of the scatter symbol like a bell or a seven starts the free spins round.
Video Poker
Video poker carries many of the same principles as mainstream poker and popular winning hands like the royal flush. Unlike most poker variants, games like Joker Poker use the jokers. Players have the option to draw to get a better hand.
Wagering Requirement
Unfortunately, you can’t just cash out if you have the fortune of winning money from a bonus. First, the wagering requirements, or playthrough requirements, must be bet before the casino honors withdrawal requests. All wagering requirements are listed under the terms and conditions page. It’s best to understand them before opting in because the requirements might be too high for you to reasonably make a withdrawal.
Wild Card
Some card games feature a specific card that can replace another card. The most common wild card is the Joker.