Ever Wonder if Slots Are Rigged? Here’s Why They Aren’t

Are slot machines rigged? That’s something that gamblers often tend to wonder, specifically after they just went broke playing one.

Don’t get me wrong, this is not a question that you should be embarrassed about. Even experienced gamblers will claim that a slot machine is rigged when they don’t win.

It’s mostly because they are salty that they just spent their hard-earned money on a game with nothing to show for it, but that’s the reality of it all.

If you’ve always wondered, “Are online slot machines rigged?”, then you’ve come to the right place. I’ll be explaining the reasons why they aren’t below, so let’s get right into it!

Before we dive in, here are some trustworthy casinos where you know your slots aren’t rigged.

Are slot machines rigged? I’m going to be very direct here to make sure we are all on the same page.

No, slot machines are not rigged. It may seem like that from time to time, but that simply isn’t the case.

The thing is, we all think that every time we play, we are going to win a ton of cash. Sadly, we can’t all be winners. If that were the case, the casinos would go out of business insanely fast.

As a counterpoint to that, casinos would also go out of business if they only offered rigged games. Why would anybody play if they were just constantly losing? There has to be some kind of balance for casinos to exist, so rigging their slot machines simply doesn’t make any sense.

That said, of course, there have been some bad apples. Shady people exist in any market, especially if there is a lot of money involved. Refer to our online casino blacklist if you have questions about a certain site.

Rigged slot machines have been around for a long time, and we will likely hear stories about them for years.

The good news is though, it’s impossible for a rigged slot machine to last very long. Some people might get scammed, but that’s a good reason why you shouldn’t be putting your life savings on a slot machine.

If you’re too scared to play slot machines because you think they might be rigged, I’m sorry to say that gambling simply isn’t for you.

For those of you who are still on the fence, simply stick to safe online casinos so there isn’t any doubt.

If you don’t even want to think about the question, “Are online slots rigged?” you should probably play at one of the safest online casinos for slot machines.

One site I highly recommend is Ignition Casino.

Ignition Casino has a great reputation and about 8 years’ worth of proof. You won’t have to worry about rigged slot machines when you play on their site.

The best part is they also give you a 300% welcome bonus (worth up to $3,000). This means that you can play with the casino’s money rather than your own. It’s a good way to establish trust between you and the casino.

Not only that, but Ignition Casino also has one of the best selections of slot machines. They even have some
of my favorite slots, which happen to be hot drop jackpots.

Are slots rigged? That might be a question you might find yourself asking if you don’t understand what volatility is.

Volatility has many different definitions, depending on the context. In the gambling world, it’s an indication of how often a game pays out and to what degree.

That means that a slot with high volatility would pay out less regularly but in higher amounts.

Some people prefer to win often, even though they know they’re still slowly losing money. Others prefer periods of losing wagers that suddenly culminate in large jackpots. This machine is considered a high volatility machine.

Few casinos publish volatility figures, but you can make an educated guess by balancing the highest payout amount with the number of combinations on the reels that result in payouts.

For instance, a five-reel slot that pays out on virtually anything on any of three pay lines would be considered a low or even very low volatility slot machine. Incidentally, the presence of micro-wins on the pay table (wins that are less than the wagered amount) virtually guarantees the machine is low volatility.

It’s possible to calculate RTP even for progressive slot machines like hot drops slots. Well, maybe I couldn’t calculate it, but then, I’m in awe of the facility with which my wife calculates a 15% tip at restaurants.

One last point of clarification. Slot volatility is sometimes referred to as slot variance, but the term “variance” is also used to describe an entirely different phenomenon.

So, to ensure there is no room for misunderstanding in this blog, I will only use the term slot volatility.

Before you ask, “Are slot machines rigged?” make sure you know that some slots have low volatility, meaning you don’t win as frequently. The reason why you would play those slots at all is because the wins are supposed to be more significant.

If you’re looking for some high volatility slots, try the ones below.

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Actual variance in any slot game is the ratio at which a win diverges from the statistical prediction.

For instance, say a slot machine will hit a particular winning combination once every 100 spins.

You—the discerning player that you are—just watched as someone else played that machine for 97 spins before getting frustrated and moving to a different machine.

You smile at your own cleverness as you slide into the still-warm chair at the machine. You drop a dollar in and hit the play button. Nothing. You do it again. Still nothing. Okay, maybe you miscounted, so you try it again. And again.

Soon, you’ve pumped fifty bucks into the machine and still no payout. WTF?

Okay, let’s calm down. Just like flipping a coin won’t come up heads every other flip, a slot machine’s payouts will vary in frequency over a given time period. They may even vary greatly. Over the lifetime of the machine, sure, it’ll pay off once every 100 plays.

But for the hour or two you’re sitting there, observing and playing, it may pay off five times during the first hundred sins, and then not pay off at all for the next 300.

This is a big reason why slot vultures are incredibly annoying. Not only are they irritating, but their method isn’t even proven to work. It’s best to just mind your own business when playing slot machines.

Luckily you won’t have to deal with these people when you play online. Follow the guide below if you want to know how to find good slots.

Are slot machines honest, you ask? One thing they might do to convince you that they are is publishing their RTP (Return to Player) percentage of their games.

An RTP of 99.75% is very encouraging, indeed. But does this mean you can drop a hundred bucks into a dollar slot machine and at the end of that hundred, have $99.75 remaining?

Truth be told, that’s very unlikely to happen.

Of course, you won’t have $99.75 left. You could have $3,865 left, provided you hit some of the bigger jackpots on the machine, or you could have nothing, simply because the machine never paid off, or paid off so poorly that you questioned not only your own luck but that of the people five or six branch back on your family tree.

And it might have been because you won $99.75 but played it all back in. It used to be that every win resulted in coins or tokens clanging into a metallic bowl affixed to the lower front of the machine.

This made it very easy to measure your actual winnings once your initial $100 was gone. What was in the metallic bucket was your RTP (or at least, a reasonable facsimile thereof).

It represents how much of the money wagered on the machine across its lifetime.

As you may already have surmised, RTP has nothing to do with volatility. A machine with very high volatility may have an RTP of 95%–but so may a machine with a low volatility rating.

Remember that volatility is the ratio of how often wins occur over time, while RTP is the ratio of the size of total wins to total losses.

RTP slot data can tell you how much you are expected to win back, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you will.

The pay table on a slot machine is like the fine print on that 20-page purchase agreement for that condo in Boca Raton you signed yesterday. Sure, that fine print is probably important, and you’ll get around to reading it real soon.

Back to the topic at hand, are slots rigged? Well, it’s important to understand pay tables before you come to that conclusion.

Look at the lowest payout amount in the pay table. This is most likely the most frequent amount the machine will be paying. Now, look at the highest amount it will pay. That is, of course, your goal.

Between those two numbers are a series of increasing numbers that roughly approximate the degree of difficulty at hitting that combination.

Here’s the thing: while the payouts for any combination reflect the odds of hitting that combo, the payout is always less than the true odds would dictate.

Take Taylor Swift’s fans suing Ticketmaster, for example.

They are upset that the company is charging too much, but that doesn’t make them scammers. Sure, it’s distasteful and just overall not cool. However, people will still buy the tickets, even at their crazy price.

That’s kind of like how slot machines work. You don’t have the advantage over the casino, but you do have the opportunity to win big. Of course, we’d like to have better odds, or better ticket prices, but that’s just not really possible in this day and age.

Note that while the RNG algorithm is not accessible to the casino operators, the pay table usually is. But differences in pay tables for the same game on different sites or at different casinos simply reflects the house adjusting its edge.

It’s not like they’re hiding it from you—the numbers are there for all to see. Just like that footnote on page 17 of your time-share purchase agreement. To coin a phrase, read it or weep.

Instead of declaring that the games are rigged, consider using slot machine strategy to improve your chances of winning.

Best Online Slot Machine Strategies

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Are slot machines rigged? It’s a question we’ve all wondered throughout our gambling careers. Slots are incredibly popular because they are easy to play, and you can win a ton of money if you’re lucky.

Another reason why is because they are not rigged. As we’ve discussed, it doesn’t make any sense for a casino to rig their slot machines.

Not only that, but they don’t need to. Casinos make millions of dollars off slot players already, even when they are fair and square.

They don’t need to leech off their players more than they already do. Gamblers would also stop playing if they never won, so somebody has to. We just need to realize that when we play slot machines, we are not always going to win.

People think that other casino games like blackjack are rigged as well. If you’re playing at the safest online casino, you won’t have to worry about either.

Footnotes:

• NPR provided the story about Taylor Swift fans suing Ticketmaster.