situs slot online machines are the most popular form of gambling in casinos. Slot machines have three basic components: a spinning wheel that determines which number will come up; a display that shows what the spinning wheel has selected; and a payout device (often called a jackpot) that pays out if the player wins.
The spinning wheel is the heart of the machine. It’s comprised of several rows of numbered slots. The slot on top will always be “0”, but as you spin the wheel down to the bottom, each row becomes more valuable than the one above it. The most common slot machine pay table can be found here.
But there are other ways to calculate your chances of winning. How do you know if your money will be returned? There are three methods for figuring out what percentage return you’ll get from a particular game. We’ll start with the easiest way.
- The paytable says “percentage”
If the table is labeled “Payout Percentage” or “Return Percentage”, then you’re looking at the percentage of bets placed by players who win. This is also known as the house edge.
For example, let’s say you play a $5 machine and bet $5 every time you spin. If you win 75% of the time, then your average profit would be $3.75 per spin, or $7.50 per hour. In this case, the house edge is 7.5%. That means that any bet made by the player loses 1/8th of its value.
- Calculate your expected payoff using the formula
In order to figure out the amount of money you stand to make per hour playing a specific slot machine, you need to use a mathematical equation. To begin, you should find the total bet, which you can do simply by multiplying the coin denomination by the number of coins in play. For example, a quarter-dollar machine might have 10 quarters in play. So let’s say you put $10 into the slot.
Now divide the total bet by the odds of winning, using the following formula:
This gives you the probability of winning (P), expressed as a percentage. You can see that P = 1.00 / 8.33 = 0.917 or 92.7%.
- Divide by 100 and round down
If the pay table only uses percentages instead of decimals, you can easily convert between the two by dividing by 100 and rounding down. For instance, the pay table above says “Percentage Return”. Let’s assume you play a quarter-dollar ($0.25) machine. Your average bet is $4, so you’d like to know how much money you stand to lose per hour. First, we’ll multiply 4 times $0.25, which equals $1.00. Now we divide by 0.9217 (=100 divided by 8.333). Since P = 92.7%, you would expect to lose 92.7% of your money. So you’d want to keep an eye on the dollar sign on your ticket.
Once you’ve calculated your expected payoff, you can compare it to the maximum possible payout listed on the machine. If the maximum payout is less than your expected payoff, then you’ll earn less money than you thought. Conversely, if the maximum payout is greater than your expected payoff, then you’ll earn more money than you thought!
In general, the higher the maximum payout, the lower your expected payoff. But not all games have payout tables with maximum payouts. Some have payout tables where the maximum payout is either fixed or very close to the minimum payout, resulting in a very low expected payoff.
To determine the best strategy for playing a particular slot machine, you need to consider both the expected payoff as well as the maximum payout. And when you do, you’ll be able to decide whether the game offers good odds or not.
Let’s take a look at some examples.
Example 1. A quarter-dollar ($0.25) machine has a maximum payout of $3.00. What is the expected payoff?
Your first step is to calculate the probability of winning using the equation above. You’ll find the odds of winning on the pay table. Then you’ll use the same formula to calculate your expected payoff.
The odds of winning are 5/16, which translates to a probability of 0.31125. Using our formula, we find that P = 0.31125 / 3.00 = 0.09375 or 9.37%. That means that if you place $10 into the machine, you could expect to lose $9.37 per hour.
That sounds pretty bad. But wait, there’s more!
Example 2. A quarter-dollar ($0.25) machine has a maximum payout of $12.00. What is the expected payoff?
Using the same method, we find that the odds of winning are 12/16, which translates to a probability of 0.78125. Using our formula again, we find that P = 0.78125 / 12.00 = 0.06250 or 6.25%. That means that if you place $10 into the machine, you could expect to lose $6.25 per hour.
Still not good enough. However, remember that the maximum payout is higher in this example, so it’s better for you to play the game.
Example 3. A quarter-dollar ($0.25) machine has a maximum payout of $30.00. What is the expected payoff?
Using the same method, we find that the odds of winning are 30/16, which translates to a probability of 0.18750. Using our formula again, we find that P = 0.18750 / 30.00 = 0.05833 or 5.83%. That means that if you place $10 into the machine, you could expect to lose $5.83 per hour.
Better luck next time!
You may be wondering why the paytables are so different for various denominations. Here’s why: Each denomination has different odds of winning, and therefore different payoffs.
For example, a dime-sized slot machine has a lower payout than a nickel-sized slot because the probabilities of winning are lower. If a player were to bet $1, they’d have a smaller chance of winning $20 than if they were to bet $1.25. As a result, a dime-sized slot machine will typically have a higher maximum payout than a nickel-sized slot machine.
A penny-sized slot machine has the lowest payout. Because the probabilities of winning are so small, a player needs to bet a lot more money to reach the payout. With a penny-sized slot machine, the odds of winning are so low that even a $1 bet won’t hit the jackpot.
