Online casinos spend a large percentage of their marketing spend on customer aquisition and customer retention. That means bonuses targeted at players and other forms of promotions. Since casino games have a baked in house edge for the casino, that cannot be beaten in most cases, the best way to beat them is to utilize bonuses and other promotions.
It’s not enough to use bonuses. We must also know the best strategy to maximise the value of bonuses. In many cases we can retain about 50-80% of the value of the bonus, which becomes our Expected Value. If we have 100% match deposit bonus up to £100 we can make between £50-£80 in profit on average.
Understanding Online Casino Bonuses
These are the four main types of bonuses that exist.
- Cashable Bonuses
- Post Wager Bonuses
- Cashback Bonuses
- Sticky Bonuses
Cashable bonuses are when players are given the designated bonus as soon as they deposit. Sometimes cash is used first meaning that if there is for example 40x wagering of bonus, that wagering does not start until the player loses their deposit. Other cashable bonuses start wagering right away. A common strategy now a days is also to limit the conversion rate of the bonus. For example you might only be able to convert a £100 bonus 5x times or a max of £500. All these factors need to be accounted for and then we use an optimal strategy for each. If you use own cash first you want to try to double it in one big bet or a few large bets and withdraw if you for example double your deposit and forfeit the bonus. In case you lose the deposit you can use the bonus. If the casino limits the conversion rate of the bonus it is better to play a lower variance game or use lower bet sizes as you don’t want to for example win £5000 with a bonus where you can only win £500. The general formula for a cashable bonus is as follows Bonus-(Average Wagering*House Edge).
Post wager bonuses are bonuses are not credited instantly but are credited to players after a certain amount of wagering. For example deposit and wager £4000 get £100 cash. The math of those is very straightforward. We wager £4000 and play a 4% house edge game meaning we expect to lose £160 but we only get £100 from the casino. So this particular strategy has a negative Expected Value of £-60. It’s easy to work out the value for these bonuses but we need favourable conditions to make this a plus EV offer. The formula is Bonus-(Wagering*House edge).
Cashback Bonuses are given as a percentage of winning, losing or both. For example an offer might be get 20% of your losses up to £20. That means if we start with £100 and lose it all the casino will give us a rebate of £20. This type of offer can be plus EV with a good strategy. For example if we are playing European Roulette we have 37 squares in total with 18 red and 18 black and 1 green. If we bet £100 on red we will win £100 18 out of 37 times or 48.65% of the time. In 19 out of 37 times or 51.35% of the time we will lose £100 but get a £20 rebate from the casino. The formula we use for this is EV = (Bonus*Chance of Busting)-(Average Wagering*House Edge). If we use the numbers in this example we get EV = (£20*51.35%)-(£100*2.7%)=£7.57.
Sticky Bonuses are bonuses that belong to the casino and is are only there for wagering purposes. For example it might be deposit £150 get £150 with 30x wagering of bonus. So you need to wager £4500 to finish wagering but if you manage to do that the £150 bonus will be removed. With this type of offer you want to increase your variance because if you clear the wagering with for example £300 the bonus will be removed and you will end up with excatly the same amount you started with. In case you end with £150 it will be the bonus from the casino that gets removed once wagering is complete so in that case you would end up with £0 which sucks. The EV for this bonus is (Bonus-Chance of Busting)-(Average Wagering*House Edge).
Strategies for Bonus Hunting
When it comes to finding the best welcome bonuses you can use both paid and free websites.
For beginners I recommend the starting with paid services.
£97 + VAT per year. They have sign up offers from all reputable UK licenced casinos and sportsbook and a very detailed guide on how to beat them. It’s affordable and includes a strategy guides and a facebook group that is pretty active. It might seem to come accross as too good to be true but this product will pay for it self many times over if you follow the instruction, stay disciplined and put in the work. There are other similar providers but they are 4 to 5 times more expensive but not 4 to 5 times better.
£49.99 + VAT. This product is also a must for exploiting casino bonuses. You can input different kinds of bonuses and play simulate with numbers to find an ideal strategy that maximises EV and fits your risk profile.
If you are not intrested in paid services I have found the following websites to be useful.
They are an affiliate so they make money from you when you sign up for one of their casinos. The nice thing is that users can submit complaints and they will look into it. They have managed 7500 complaints over 10+ years and have recovered $7.9+ back to players from online casinos that overstepped their mark. They explain the type of offers of each casino and give them a review.
Plenty of good reading material for an advantage player. He recommends some crypto casinos that give out crazy bonuses. Please be careful with unregulated online casinos.
Another affiliate site but it includes plenty of calculators and gambling strategy content that is useful for an advantage player.
Once you find a bonus you need to find out the expected value. Like I said I recommend buying the EV maximiser to simulate the expected value or Profit Maximser to find the offers and be handed a good strategy. If you do neither of those always make sure to find a game which can be played with bonus funds and has a reasonably low house edge. When you use bigger bets your EV will be higher but you will bust more before completing wagering. If cash is used first make a withdrawal if you hit a big win before touching bonus funds.
When it comes to bankroll I recommend about 50-100 buyins. What that means is that if you are doing 100% deposit offers up to £100 you should have £5-10k you are ok to lose and still be in a healthy financial position. It’s normal to lose 9 times in a row and then make £2k profit on the 10th offer. You need to learn to lose and play the long term game. The goal is to make plus EV offers. The more plus EV offers you do the more profits you will make in the long term. Below on the chart the red line is the EV line which consistently goes up as we make plus EV offers and the blue line is the profit which is more volatile.
Advanced Tactics
The people running the online casinos are not idiots and they have tools to spot advantage players. Eventually since we are making plus EV offers consistently we can expect offers to dry up or even have our accounts closed. We are not doing anything illegal so as long as you play with reputable and licenced casino your funds are safe. Here are some things I recommend to avoid becoming to obvious to the casino surveillance.
- Read T&C carefully for every offer you do and make sure you are not breaking them. This could include things like max bet or certain games you can’t play.
- Some companies own many casinos under the same name. For example Entain own Ladbrokes, Coral and partycasino. It is not a good idea to create an account for all of them in a very short time period.
- Multiple accounts are very beneficial but very risky. If you sign up everyone you know and play for them you can increase your EV substantially but that is illegal and the casino has the right to confiscate your funds for fraud if you do that. You might even face legal rammification in some cases.
- Consider playing like a normal punter from time to time. You can bet on your favorite team if they have a sportsbook, play some poker or make some roulette bets. Jackpots can be plus EV at certain times but don’t effect the casinos bottomline in the same way as bonus costs do. Some online casino games can be beaten without bonuses but I will not reveal how here.
Conclusion
The world of online gambling is rich with opportunities for those who approach it with the right mindset and strategies. As we’ve seen, leveraging casino bonuses is not just about grabbing whatever offer comes your way; it’s about understanding the nuances behind each type of bonus and employing strategies that maximize your expected value over the long term. While the path of an advantage player is fraught with challenges, from navigating the complex terms and conditions set forth by casinos to managing the inherent variance in gambling, the rewards can be substantial for those who are disciplined and informed.
Remember, the journey to becoming a successful advantage player is a marathon, not a sprint. It requires patience, diligence, and continuous learning. By making informed decisions and being disciplined, using tools and resources wisely, and always staying ahead of the game, you can turn the tables on online casinos and carve out a profitable niche for yourself.
As the online gambling landscape continues to evolve, so too will the strategies and tactics of advantage players. Stay curious, stay disciplined, and let the pursuit of plus EV decisions guide your path to success.
Happy hunting, and may the odds always be in your favor.