Most casinos offer a free version of their real money software. Ultimately it depends on your preferences. If you like the bright lights, crowds and sightseeing, then live blackjack will probably suit you better.
In the case of Macs, most online casinos have a no download flash version of their software. Some casinos have downloads, too.
It will depend on the casino and the type of device that you have. However, there are bad sites out there, just as there are bad websites and online stores.
The trick to avoiding them is to read reviews and do your due diligence. We only recommend sites we play at ourselves.
We would never recommend a blackjack casino that would cheat you out of your money. For more information we recommend you visit our reviews page.
You know the rules of the game and the best casinos to play at. This is the number one question we are asked all the time.
And the answer is that yes, it is. Computer dealt online blackjack decks use random number generators RNGs to shuffle the cards. Independent third party statisticians test and certify these RNGs to ensure that the shuffles are fully random and fair.
That said, there are thousands of online casinos offering various games of blackjack, all eager to take your money. These are often termed rogue casinos and boy, have we come across a few of these over the past 20 years.
So you can believe us when we say that our pain can be your gain. We regularly test all of the casinos that we recommend here at OnlineBlackjack.
They play with real money to verify that the casino offers fair games and pays out in a timely manner. We always stick to casinos that have proven to be trustworthy over multiple years of operation.
And we refuse to endorse fly-by-night or brand new casinos with no track record. Hole card games are sometimes played on tables with a small mirror or electronic sensor that is used to peek securely at the hole card.
On their turn, players must choose whether to "hit" take a card , "stand" end their turn , "double" double wager, take a single card and finish , "split" if the two cards have the same value, separate them to make two hands or "surrender" give up a half-bet and retire from the game.
If the hand value exceeds 21 points, it busts, and all bets on it are immediately forfeit. The dealer never doubles, splits, or surrenders.
If the dealer busts, all remaining player hands win. If a player receives 21 on the 1st and 2nd card it is considered a "natural" or "blackjack" and the player is paid out immediately unless dealer also has a natural, in which case the hand ties.
In the case of a tied score, known as "push" or "standoff", bets are normally returned without adjustment; however, a blackjack beats any hand that is not a blackjack, even one with a value of Wins are paid out at 1: Many casinos today pay blackjacks at less than 3: After receiving an initial two cards, the player has up to four standard options: Each option has a corresponding hand signal.
Some games give the player a fifth option, "surrender". Hand signals are used to assist the " eye in the sky ", a person or video camera located above the table and sometimes concealed behind one-way glass.
The eye in the sky usually makes a video recording of the table, which helps in resolving disputes and identifying dealer mistakes, and is also used to protect the casino against dealers who steal chips or players who cheat.
The recording can further be used to identify advantage players whose activities, while legal, make them undesirable customers. Each hand may normally "hit" as many times as desired so long as the total is not above hard After a bust or a stand, play proceeds to the next hand clockwise around the table.
When the last hand has finished being played, the dealer reveals the hole card, and stands or draws further cards according to the rules of the game for dealer drawing.
Insurance is a side bet that the dealer has blackjack and is treated independently of the main wager. It is attractive although not necessarily wise for the player to insure against the possibility of a dealer blackjack by making a maximum "insurance" bet, in which case the "insurance proceeds" will make up for the concomitant loss on the original bet.
The player may add up to half the value of their original bet to the insurance and these extra chips are placed on a portion of the table usually marked "Insurance pays 2 to 1".
Insurance bets are expected to lose money in the long run, because the dealer is likely to have blackjack less than one-third of the time.
Furthermore, the insurance bet is susceptible to advantage play. It is advantageous to make an insurance bet whenever the hole card has more than a chance of one in three of being a ten.
Advantage play techniques can sometimes identify such situations. In a multi-hand, face-up, single deck game, it is possible to establish whether insurance is a good bet simply by observing the other cards on the table after the deal; even if there are just 2 player hands exposed, and neither of their two initial cards is a ten, then 16 in 47 of the remaining cards are tens, which is larger than 1 in 3, so insurance is a profitable bet.
This is an elementary example of the family of advantage play techniques known as card counting. The rules of casino blackjack are generally determined by law or regulation, which establishes certain rule variations allowed at the discretion of the casino.
The rules of any particular game are generally posted on or near the table, failing which there is an expectation that casino staff will provide them on request.
Over variations of blackjack have been documented. As with all casino games, blackjack incorporates a "house edge", a statistical advantage for the casino that is built into the game.
The loss rate of players who deviate from basic strategy through ignorance is generally expected to be greater. This rule protocol is consequently known as "late" surrender.
The alternative, "early" surrender, gives player the option to surrender before the dealer checks for blackjack, or in a no-hole-card game. Early surrender is much more favorable to the player than late surrender.
Most medium-strength hands should be surrendered against a dealer Ace if the hole card has not been checked. For late surrender, however, while it is tempting to opt for surrender on any hand which will probably lose, the correct strategy is to only surrender on the very worst hands, because having even a one in four chance of winning the full bet is better than losing half the bet and pushing the other half, as entailed by surrendering.
With no hole card, it is almost never correct basic strategy to double or split against a dealer ten or ace, since a dealer blackjack will result in the loss of the split and double bets; the only exception is with a pair of aces against a dealer 10, where it is still correct to split.
In all other cases, a stand, hit or surrender is called for. The no hole card rule adds approximately 0. An example of basic strategy is shown in the table below, and includes the following parameters: The bulk of basic strategy is common to all blackjack games, with most rule variations calling for changes in only a few situations.
For example, if the above game used the hit on soft 17 rule, common in Las Vegas Strip casinos, only 6 cells of the table would need to be changed: A, surrender 15 or 17 vs.
A, double on A,7 vs. Also when playing basic strategy never take insurance or "even money. Estimates of the house edge for blackjack games quoted by casinos and gaming regulators are generally based on the assumption that the players follow basic strategy and do not systematically change their bet size.
Most blackjack games have a house edge of between 0. Casino promotions such as complimentary matchplay vouchers or 2: Players may be able to improve on this decision by considering the precise composition of their hand, not just the point total.
For example, players should ordinarily stand when holding 12 against a dealer 4. However, in a single deck game, players should hit if their 12 consists of a 10 and a 2.
However, even when basic and composition-dependent strategy lead to different actions, the difference in expected reward is small, and it becomes even smaller with more decks.
Using a composition-dependent strategy rather than basic strategy in a single deck game reduces the house edge by 4 in 10,, which falls to 3 in , for a six-deck game.
Blackjack has been a high-profile target for advantage players since the s. Advantage play is the attempt to win more using skills such as memory, computation, and observation.
These techniques, while generally legal, can be powerful enough to give the player a long-term edge in the game, making them an undesirable customer for the casino and potentially leading to ejection or blacklisting if they are detected.
