Inside Roulette Bets
The game of roulette offers two distinct types of bets: those on the inside of the layout, placed specifically on individual numbers: and those on the outside of the layout, placed on groups of numbers such as odd or even and red or black.
Betting the inside numbers is sometimes restricted to players who purchase their own color chips at the game. Most wheels, whether of the American variety, with 36 numbers and a 0 and 00, or the European wheel, with 36 numbers and just a single 0, are equipped with a large spinning wheel, an even larger bet layout for all wagers, and a dealer who handles the action. In addition, the dealer keeps track of a series of colored chips, most often eight individual colors, which may only be used at that one specific roulette table.
The chips also carry the table number, if the casino has more than one roulette game. Players are required to choose an available color as well as a denomination. Small casinos set a house minimum of 25-cents per chip. Larger casinos may have a minimum of $1 or higher per chip. In addition, there are minimums for the number of chips wagered each spin, usually 3, although color-players may also wager their chips on outside bets to reach that number.
A standard buy-in with a color is $100 for 100 chips. Smaller buy-ins is discouraged. Larger buy-ins are encouraged. Although the total number of chips in any color is limited, when a player has most (or all) of a color, payoffs will be made with regular casino chips for winning bets. Bets win when a chip placed on an individual or group of numbers is spun. The wagers lose anytime the number or numbers the chip covers does not spin.
CASINO | BONUS | RTP | RATING | REVIEW | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | T&C APPLY | PAYOUT | 10 | READ REVIEW | PLAY NOW |
2 | T&C APPLY | PAYOUT | 9.6 | READ REVIEW | PLAY NOW |
3 | T&C APPLY | PAYOUT | 9.3 | READ REVIEW | PLAY NOW |
4 | T&C APPLY | PAYOUT | 9 | READ REVIEW | PLAY NOW |
5 | T&C APPLY | PAYOUT | 9.4 | READ REVIEW | PLAY NOW |
Roulette is a drain on your wallet simply because the game doesn’t pay what the bets are worth. With 38 numbers (1 to 36, plus 0 and 00), the true odds of hitting a single number on a straight-up bet are 37 to 1, but the house pays only 35 to 1 if you win!
The Inside Bets
- In roulette, bets on the number spots are known as “inside” bets. The red-black, odd-even and high-low are considered “outside” bets. If you only bet the outside spots, you have to bet at least the minimum for that table. For example, if the placard says $5 minimum that is the minimum bet you have to make on those outside spots.
- How Bets Work in Roulette. Divide the bets into two groups: Inside bets; Outside bets; Inside bets are based on individual numbers or small groups of numbers. When you see players betting on the lines, corners, and individual numbers on the table they are making inside bets. Outside bets are based on pre-selected groups of numbers on the wheel.
- HOME Roulette Guide Roulette Inside Bet System As we already discussed, inside bets are those made directly on the main area of numbers. This bet category features straight-up bets (one number) paying 35 to 1 through line bets (six numbers) paying 5 to 1.
On a European wheel, every inside wager has the same house edge of 2.70%. Players often use scorecards provided by the casino to record previous numbers, although some casinos offer a reader board that lists the previous 20 spins. System players who enjoy using a mathematical progression such as the Labouchere roulette system will find the reader board very helpful.
Other players tend to place their chips on individual numbers, such as birthdates, anniversary dates, and favorite numbers. A single chip placed on an inside bet can cover from 1 to 6 numbers. The payout will include keeping the remaining wager intact for the next spin.
Bet Type | Description | Pays |
---|---|---|
Straight Up | A chip covering a single number; such as 18 | 35 to 1 |
Split | A chip covering two numbers; such as 10/11 | 17 to 1 |
Street | A chip covering three numbers; such as 1-2-3 | 11 to 1 |
Corner | A chip covering four numbers; such as 28-29-31-32 | 8 to 1 |
Six Line | A chip covering six numbers; such as 7-8-9-10-11-12 | 6 to 1 |
Trio | A chip covering three numbers 0-1-2 or 0-2-3 | 11 to 1 |
Basket | A chip covering the four numbers 0-1-2-3 | 8 to 1 |
On an American wheel, every inside wager has the same house edge of 5.26%. All individual payouts are the same, but one additional wager is available on a 0, 00 roulette wheel: the top line.
Top Line – a chip covering 0, 00, 1, 2, 3: pays 6 to 1 and has a house edge of 7.90%
What are sometimes referred to as French bets, such as Zero Game: 12, 35, 3, 26, 0, 32, 15 and Neighbors of Zero: 22,18,29,7,28,12,35,3,26,0,32,15,19,4,21,2,25 are also inside bets; however, the dealer will place the wagers for the player. On American wheels, these bets are not typical, and the only wagers a dealer will place regularly are ones that a player is unable to reach from their spot at the table, such as the Trio or Basket.
Many systems for inside bets have been devised to try and improve a player’s success at roulette, although betting systems don’t actually change the house edge. Playing a section of the wheel such as 4 to 6 consecutive numbers (especially if a bias is detected) is quite popular, as is keying bets around a specific number. The 32-Logic system plays the number 32 every spin, and includes a progression of splits and corners around 32. When it is successful, the player gains a substantial number of chips, even if the number hasn’t come-up for a long time, although the system does requires a more substantial bankroll than some systems.
Roulette is one of the most popular table games in modern casinos. Although variations on the game have been around for several hundred years, there are now only 3 variations in American casinos.
You’re likely already familiar with American roulette and European roulette. The most recent addition to the table game inventory is Sands Roulette.
Which of these games should you play?
How should you bet on them?
What’s the smartest strategy for roulette betting?
I’ll explain all that in this post:
What Are the Differences between American, European, and Sands Roulette?
Although these games have a few other differences, the most significant distinction between the 3 versions of roulette are the number of green slots the wheels contain.
Every roulette wheel has at least 37 slots.
36 of those slots are always numbered 1 to 36, and they’re alternately colored RED or BLACK.
The additional slots are green.
In European roulette there is only one green slot, the “0”.
In American roulette there are two green slots: “0” and “00”.
In Sands roulette a third green slot, “S”, has been added to the wheel.
The green slots are there for one reason:
They make the game’s statistical probabilities uneven.
This is because of the way roulette bets are paid off. You can win anywhere from 35-to-1 (for betting on a single number) down to 1-to-1 (for betting on 18 slots at a time).
The payoffs, called “odds”, are not as fair to you as the actual estimated probabilities of the roulette ball landing on any given slot. This is how the casino makes its money.
In a game of roulette the house should keep at least 2.70% of all the bets players make over time. The casino has no need to cheat the players. In fact, the players often make really bad bets that improve the “house edge”, as that casino profit is called.
One of the other differences between European roulette and both American and Sands roulette is that the European roulette table has an additional betting area. This secondary betting area is used to place specially designed bets. They are more complicated than the normal bets made in American and Sands roulette. I’m going to ignore this section of the table, because I’m going to show you how to place bets that have the best chances of paying off.
Is There a Winning System for Roulette?
Everyone who gets into roulette sooner or later starts to think about how they can “beat the system”.
I’m going to be honest here:
There is no way to do that.
The green slots on the wheel make it impossible for anyone, anywhere, to ever design a betting system that is guaranteed to win. If you really want to guarantee yourself a win every time, then put a chip on each of the 2-to-1 outside bets and on each of the green number bets.
That’s the only way you’ll be paid money every time the wheel spins.
You’ll also go broke.
You may have heard about a system called the Martingale System. It’s a popular betting system with new roulette players.
Experienced roulette players just turn their heads and roll their eyes when someone mentions the Martingale System. The only way you can make money with the Martingale System is to write a book about it and get people to buy your book.
Even that’s a gamble, though, because most people now know that the Martingale System promises more than it delivers.
Here’s how this system works:
You start out betting the minimum. If you lose, you double your bet. If you win on your doubled bet, you go back to betting the table minimum. If you lose again, you double the size of your bet again.
This sounds great to inexperienced bettors but the problem is that you’ll either run out of money or hit the table limit before you can recoup your losses as they add up.
Best Inside Bets Roulette
The Martingale System is a sucker bet, plain and simple.
Every betting system in every form of gambling tries to leverage probability theory. The Martingale System and other roulette betting strategies also rely on probability estimates.
But there’s a flaw in the thinking behind these systems. If you account for the flaw you’ll be okay. You won’t always win but your expectations will be more reasonable.
The secret to not going broke when you gamble is to set reasonable expectations and maintain your self-discipline. You should never drink or take drugs when you gamble. They lower your inhibitions and impair your judgment.
You might as well just hand your money over to the casino at the cashier window and say “keep it” if you’re going to drink or do drugs when you gamble.
How Do Probabilities Work in Roulette?
Probability theory came out of statistics. It tries to give us rules by which to guess what happens next in any situation. The guesses are seldom accurate predictions. Sometimes the guesses work out, and sometimes they don’t. Gamblers love probability theory because they think it helps them pick the best betting strategies.
You’re actually more likely to double your money during a roulette session if you put all your money on a single bet. The more bets you place, the less likely it becomes to double your money.
That’s because every bet brings you close to the long term expectations. The closer you are to the short term, the more likely you are to get better than expected results.
In roulette, the probabilities are simple. The dealer spins the wheel and releases a ball that whirls around the outside of the wheel and finally settles in a slot. With only 37 slots on a European roulette wheel you have a 1-in-37 probability of the ball landing on a specific slot.
This probability never changes.
This probability is calculated on the basis of all the known possibilities.
What probability theory cannot do, however, is predict where the ball will stop.
Nor can it predict whether the ball will land on red, black, or green any number of times over the next 100 spins.
Nonetheless, a lot of gambling guides tell you that you have the best chances of winning if you do this because of such-and-such probabilities. And many of these guides warn you that there is no way to predict the future, but by setting the expectation that the ball will land on red about 47% of the time, these guides are making predictions and promises they cannot keep.
They’ll even back up their claims by talking about how to run computer simulations for 1 million spins of the wheel so that you see how often the ball lands on red, black, or green.
In the real world the Probability Fairy is always on vacation. She’ll never be there to wave her magic wand to make things happen the way experts say they should. The ball could land on red over the next 20 spins. Or it could land on black or green or some random mix of color combinations.
You have no way of knowing how many of the next [X] spins will turn out a certain way. Talking about probabilities in this way is just dishonest.
What you can do is look at the wheel and ask yourself how much it costs to bet on the largest possible set of numbers. The idea here is to get as much coverage as you can without losing money too fast.
But even if you cover every number on the wheel you’ll lose money.
So the only way to win in roulette–and this is completely random, never guaranteed–is to bet on less than all the numbers on the wheel.
You also want to play bets that pay better than even money. You can place a variety of bets, but most of them aren’t worthwhile.
Betting on single numbers is a bad idea. You can place bets on the lines between the numbers (these are called “street bets”) and on lines at the corners of numbers (these are called “corner bets”).
But even though you get pretty good odds (payoff) you’re still covering too few numbers.
How Bets Work in Roulette
Divide the bets into two groups:
- Inside bets
- Outside bets
Inside bets are based on individual numbers or small groups of numbers. When you see players betting on the lines, corners, and individual numbers on the table they are making inside bets.
Outside bets are based on pre-selected groups of numbers on the wheel. The “2-to-1” bets cover 12 numbers each: 1 to 12, 13 to 24, and 25 to 36. The “1-to-1” or “even money” bets cover 18 numbers each:
- Odd
- Even
- Black
- Red
- 1 to 18
- 19 to 36
The bets more likely to pay are the even money bets.
But unless you can win 5 times out of 9 on even money bets you’ll lose your stake. That’s the problem with roulette. You always have to win at least 1 more time than you lose no matter how you place your bets.
The “2 to 1” bets pay better than the “1 to 1” bets because they cover fewer numbers. You have less of a chance of winning.
There are 6 types of “2 to 1” bets:
- 3 kinds of dozens bets: (1 to 12, 13 to 24, and 25 to 36)
- 3 kinds of columns bets: ([1, 4, 7, 10, 13, 16, 19, 22, 25, 28, 31, 34], [2, 5, 8, 11, 14, 17, 20, 23, 26, 29, 32, 35], [3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21, 24, 27, 30, 33, 36]).
You can make a bet by betting on any two of the “2 to 1” groups. That means that instead of covering only 18 numbers you’ll be covering 24 numbers.
This type of bet is often called the “double dozen” bet. It’s popular among gamblers who like to hedge their bets. They have a better chance (all other things considered) of scoring a win with a “double dozen” than with one of the standard even money bets. If you’re playing it safe and going for even money odds, you should always play a double dozen bet.
If you want to bet more aggressively, then instead of betting more money on your double dozen, you can cover all 36 of the red and black numbers. Leave the green numbers alone. Yes, they’ll come in every now and then, and you’ll lose money.
But there’s a way to keep your losses low.
How to Bet on Columns or Dozens Aggressively
Take 6 chips and distribute them across EITHER the three dozen bets or the three column bets.
Place 3 chips on 1, 2 chips on the 2nd, and 1 chip on the 3rd. If the ball lands on a green number you’ll lose your entire bet, so always play the table minimum with this aggressive style.
Inside Bets Roulette
If the ball lands on any number with your single chip bet, you’ll win 2 chips and lose 5–for a net loss of 3 chips (half your bet).
That’s the safest way to bet aggressively on the table.
If the ball lands on any number in your 2 chip bet you’ll win 4 chips and lose 4 for no loss. This keeps you in the game.
If the ball lands on any number in your 3chip bet, you’ll win 6 chips and lose 3 for a net gain of 3 chips. This will offset 1 single chip win.
The way this betting strategy works out, your money can grow substantially and still take some big hits. Where the strategy will fail you is when the ball lands on green or if the ball lands on the single chip bet more often than it lands on the 3 chip bet.
Sorry, but there’s no way to prevent that from happening.
Inside Roulette Bets Game
There Is No Guaranteed Way to Win in Roulette
I can’t say this often enough:
You can’t win at roulette in the long run.
I think roulette is a fun game to play. It’s exciting because you don’t know where the ball will land. You take an active role in making your wagers.
And you’ll find there are a lot of different betting systems to experiment with. The only thing that is guaranteed in roulette is that the casino will make a profit. What you hope for is that they make their profit at someone else’s expense.
Players who try to improve their luck by making big bets do sometimes win, but most often the people who come out ahead are the patient players who use conservative betting strategies and take money off the table. If you only walk away with your beginning stake you’ll be luckier than most gamblers.
And you can take that to the bank.