There are several kinds of slot machines, and they all work a bit differently. Below we’ll tell you about the most common types of slots you might find at online casinos.
A classic slot typically has three reels that show three symbols each. The paylines go from left to right, and there will usually be five lines. Often, you can choose how many of the paylines you want to bet on.
To win on a classic slot you’ll need to have three of the same symbols on a payline. However, there might be some symbols that only require two in order to give you a win. Typically, classic slots do not have bonus rounds, although they might have a super meter or a gamble feature.
Like the classic fruit machines, these slots used to have symbols like cherries, other fruits or BARs. Nowadays, in new slots based on the classics, you might find a variety of symbols. Although simple, the best classic online slots provide hours of fun.
Most modern online slot machine games are video slots. These online slot machines are much more immersive than the classic online slot, and they have multiple different bonus functionalities.
Some years ago, a video slot typically had five reels showing three symbols each. There would most often be between 20 and 25 paylines. That is not the case anymore. Now, the best video slot games can have hundreds, even thousands of paylines.
What often defines a video slot is that it is filled to the brim with bonus features. These can be bonus games, as well as a range of special symbols. Multipliers, re-spins, wild symbols, and free spins are just some of the in-game bonuses you might encounter.
With a progressive slot machine, you’re not only winning from each spin because you can win more if you play more, but also, you’ll be collecting something, like certain slot symbols that will fill up a progress bar. Once the bar is filled, it will trigger a bonus.
What kind of bonus you trigger varies. It can be a bonus game triggered organically by the machine, or it can be a special bonus. Sometimes, you’ll even get a random prize instead of triggering a bonus round.
How long the memory is in progressive slots depends on the game. Some online slot machine games will save your progress for 24 hours, while others will save your progress for several years. Just note that the progress for a standalone jackpot is only saved for the game in a particular online casino. So, you can’t pick up where you left off in the game at a different online casino.
There are many in-game bonuses in most modern online slots. Here we’ll explain how the most common online slots work.
A pick-and-click bonus is a type of bonus where you a player gets to impact the slot game. You’ll have a set number of symbols to choose between, and once you click on a symbol, it will reveal a prize.
Often, you’ll get to keep on picking new symbols until you get to an empty one or one marked ‘collect.’ Once this happens, the bonus game is over.
Free spins are the most common in-game bonus rounds you get in an online slot. This bonus allows you to play a set number of spins for free, but often you can retrigger more free spins.
In addition to spinning for free, there are also other bonuses in a free spins’ bonus game. You might get multipliers, special symbols, stacked symbols, expanding symbols, or even expanding reels. Game providers constantly come up with new bonus features, so there’s no limit to what kind of “extras” they offer.
A gamble feature can be found in both modern video slots and classic slot machines. The way it works is that when you get a win, you can choose to collect the winnings or gamble for them.
In the gamble feature, you will typically have to choose the heads or tails of a coin or a suite of cards. You’ll have a 50/50 winning chance or ¼ chance respectively. If you win, you double or quadruple your winnings. If you lose, you lose the win you got from the spin that triggered the gamble feature.
Some online slots will let you gamble the winnings over and over, as long as you’re winning. Other slots will only let you gamble about three times. You can always choose to not gamble anymore and rather collect your winnings.
A super meter is a bit like the gamble feature. You choose to gamble with the winnings you got in a slot game round by betting more on some special spins. Sometimes, the super meter is played on the same reels as the main game. In other online slots, there are separate reels for this bonus feature.
While playing in a super meter you bet more than in the base game, and the wins you can get are also bigger. You can end the play on a super meter when you like by collecting the winnings and returning to the base slot game.
Slot mechanics determine how you can win when playing online slot games. Here we’ll explain how the most common mechanics of the game operate.
Paylines are the classic way for you to win in a slot game. Typically, the paylines go from left to right, and you need to line up the same symbols to win. Alternatively, some symbols can be replaced with wild symbols.
How many paylines a slot machine has will vary greatly. Some can have as little as one or five paylines, but the average is between 20 and 40. Then, there are slot games that have hundreds of lines you can win on.
Megaways mechanics were first created by the game provider Big Time Gaming. However, they have now licensed the mechanics of this trademarked game out to other providers.
In Megaways slots, the reels will show any number of symbols, and anywhere from two to eight slot symbols are considered normal. The more reels you get with lots of slot symbols, the more ways you can win.
There are no paylines, so it’s enough that you have the same symbols on adjacent reels from left to right. In some slot games, you can get several hundred thousand winning combinations on each spin.
Cascading or avalanche mechanics are where there are no reels in the online slot. Instead, there are columns, and the symbols fall down from the top. When you win, the symbols disappear, and new symbols will fall down from the top to fill up the columns.
When new symbols replace the ones you won from, you get a new chance to create a winning combination. This way, you can win over and over again on the same spin. Some of these slots even give you a multiplier or another bonus feature when you win on an avalanche.
Win anywhere mechanics allow you to win no matter where the symbols land. Typically, these slot games are played on a grid instead of on reels. When you get a certain number of the same symbols, you win no matter what the placement of the symbol.
In many of the win anywhere slots, an avalanche feature is also included. So, when you win, the symbols will disappear and be replaced with new symbols from the top. This gives you the opportunity to win multiple times in the same game round.
Cluster pays is a bit like win anywhere mechanics. There are no paylines, so it’s the number of the same symbols that count. However, the difference is that the winning symbols have to be connected in a cluster.
How many of the same symbols you need in order to win will differ. Anything from five to eight is considered normal. An avalanche feature can also be found in many of the cluster pays slots.
Playing slot games online is easy. All you have to do is follow these simple steps:
An alternative would be to choose auto-play if you don’t want to press the spin button for each spin. Many slots will also allow you to choose the speed of the spin. Quick spins or turbo spins are what the faster options are usually called.
When playing online slots, it is wise to check out the paytable so you get an overview of how you can win when playing slots. Not least, you might want to see what kind of bonus games and features the online slot offers. For more help and advice, read our online slots guide before getting started.
Most symbols in a slot will be the standard high or low-valued ones. These are symbols that pay according to the paytable. Then, you might also find a lot of special symbols, and these ones are what we’ll tell you about now.
A scatter symbol is a symbol that pays anywhere it lands. These will never be bound by any paylines or other patterns that are usually required to win in a slot game. They will pay anywhere, no matter which reels they land on, as long as you have the required number of scatter symbols.
Quite typically, a scatter symbol is also what triggers a bonus game. You’ll most often need three or four of them. Sometimes, this symbol also has a prize, which increases the more of symbols you get. This will then be a high-valued symbol.
Many of the best real-money slots have a bonus symbol that triggers a bonus round. In many slot machines, this is a scatter symbol, but this will not always be the case. In some slot games, you have to land bonus symbols in a given pattern, like on a payline, to win.
Which bonus game this symbol triggers will differ from slot to slot. Most commonly, it will be free spins, but it might also be a pick-and-click or another bonus feature.
Wild symbols can replace other symbols in the slot game to create a winning combination. Most often wild symbols will replace all standard symbols, meaning all that are not special symbols. However, there are slots where a wild symbol can substitute for a scatter or bonus symbol as well.
Quite often a wild symbol has more features than just being able to help you create more wins. Wild symbols can come as walking, stacked, or big symbols, and they may also expand or give multipliers. This all depends on the features the game has given the wild symbols.
A symbol that’s walking or falling will most often be a wild symbol. When you have these kinds of symbols, the slot game will give you re-spins. Once you get this symbol, you’ll get more spins, and the walking symbol will move to a new position.
You will keep on getting re-spins until the moving symbol has fallen off the reels or grid. There are some exceptions where these symbols won’t give you free re-spins, but they are not many.
An expanding symbol is also typically a wild symbol, but it can also be any other kind of symbol in a slot. What this one does is that when you get it, it will expand to cover the whole reel. This allows for bigger wins, as it triggers winning combinations on multiple paylines.
In some online slot machines, an expanding symbol will extend to cover the whole reel every time you get it. In other slot machines, there has to be some other combination present for this to happen. It could be that you need the expanding symbols on multiple reels, or that the feature triggers randomly.
A multiplier symbol is a form of in-game bonus where your normal payout is increased. This can be triggered by re-spins, consecutive wins, or randomly, but it can also be connected to a symbol. Frequently, it is connected to a wild symbol.
How large of a multiplier you’ll get varies; anything from 2x to 500x can be found on various online slot machines. Sometimes, the multiplier is only applied to the winning combination it’s a part of creating. Other times, it will be applied to the total win on that game round.
A big or mega symbol is a symbol that covers more than the space a standard symbol occupies. The big symbols will often cover multiple reels or columns in a grid. A 2×2 or even a 3×3 or 4×4 can be found in some online slot machines.
The purpose of these symbols is to give you bigger wins when they are part of a winning combination. On some slot machines, these are wild symbols, while on other slot machines they can be any of the game’s symbols.
Some online slot machines have what are called sticky symbols. These are symbols that, when creating a winning combination, stay for a re-spin. Often, they stay as long as you keep on building on to the win. This allows you to get massive wins if you get a great many of them.
Even though sticky symbols can be any symbol, they are quite often wild symbols. If they are, you can expect huge wins when you get them across the reels.
If you’re looking to hit a big win, jackpot slots would be your best bet. These are online slot games where you can win prizes over and above the normal payouts in slots. There are many different kinds of jackpots, and we’ll now explain how they all work.
If an online slot machine has a fixed prize jackpot, this amount only changes according to your bet. It will be something like 100x your bet, 1,000x your bet, or something like that. The higher the bet the more you win, and this will win the biggest prize possible on the slot.
Most often, you’ll need to get a certain combination of symbols to trigger the jackpot. In some slot games, however, the jackpot is triggered randomly, giving you a chance to win it on every spin.
If a slot game has a progressive jackpot, the amount you can win when you trigger it is constantly changing. The jackpot grows with each bet that is placed on the slot, and this is accumulated from all players. Every bet placed by any player contributes to the jackpot until one player wins the jackpot. The best progressive jackpot slots often spit our five- or six-figure prizes.
Once a progressive jackpot is won by someone, it will go down to the minimum amount for the jackpot. Then, as slot players bet, it will start growing again and keep on growing until the next time the jackpot win is triggered by a player.
Some jackpot slots will allocate a tiny percentage of the bets into the prize pool for the next jackpot. If this is the case, a jackpot can start above the minimum amount.
Local progressive jackpots are different for different casinos. A local jackpot is only contributed to by players at one casino or at casinos in the same casino company. When this is the case, you might find that the same slot has different-sized jackpots at different casinos.
Typically, a local jackpot is never very big. This is because there are not many players contributing to it. On the upside, you’re not competing with too many players for the chance to win the jackpot.
A network progressive jackpot is a jackpot that’s common to multiple casinos and sometimes multiple slots. This means that players from several casinos are contributing to the same pot, making it grow faster.
If the jackpot is available on multiple slots, you can choose which slot games to play to win it. This makes it possible to win a jackpot in one game, even though contributions to it come from other games.
The biggest online slot jackpots available are global progressive jackpots. These are jackpots where all players around the world who play the slot contribute to the same prize pool. Because of this, the jackpots are often worth millions of dollars.
Unfortunately, these kinds of jackpots are not often found at US offshore casinos. These casinos will more often offer local or network jackpots.
When playing online casino slot games, you want to know that you have a fair chance of winning. This can only be ensured by a random number generator (RNG). This RNG is certified by an independent third-party, such as eCOGRA or iTechLabs.
Certified RNGs ensure that all players have the same chance of winning. The game providers, online casino sites, or even other players, will not be able to impact who wins and not. With this, your own luck or lack thereof is the only thing determining if you win – or not.
When you choose a slot machine to play, you should consider the return to player (RTP) percentage. The RTP says something about how large of a percentage of all bets are paid out as winnings – in theory.
The standard RTP is usually somewhere between 95% and 96%, but you can find lower or higher RTP slots. This information is found in the game information for each slot machine.
What’s important to know about RTP is that this is a theoretical percentage based on millions of spins. Thus, it will not be correct for all spins for all players. If you bet $100 in a slot with a 96% RTP, you won’t necessarily win $96.
The RTP is not only calculated over millions upon millions of spins, but also across all players. Some players will win, and for them to win, others have to lose.
So, consider the RTP when choosing a slot machine: it’s useful as a guideline to the winning chances, but do not put too much emphasis on it because it may not be correct for you and your game session.
In many ways, the volatility of a slot machine will have a greater impact on your winning chances than the RTP. A low-volatility slot machine will pay out often, but your wins will be small. A high-volatility slot will give you bigger wins but not very often.
By playing a low volatility slot machine, you’re likely to be able to play for a long time with your bankroll. With frequent small wins, your account balance will not change very rapidly. The downside to low volatility slot machines is that you’re unlikely to win a big enough prize to make it worth cashing out.
If you play a high-volatility online slots, you can get lucky and win a huge prize. You can then cash out and walk away with a substantial amount. However, you’re just as likely, or maybe even more likely, to lose your balance before that big win happens. When your balance changes rapidly, your bankroll can be depleted quickly, making for short gambling sessions.
There can be a huge difference between playing slot machines online vs. playing physical slots at land-based casinos. The most obvious difference is that online you often get to choose from hundreds of different slot games.
For example, BetOnline and Wild Casino each offer almost 400 online slot machines. Many land-based casinos have a far smaller selection of games, while some US state have not legalized slot machines at all. In these cases, online slots are clearly the preferred way to play. Besides, online slots can be played by many players simultaneously, so your favorite slot will never be occupied by others.
Another not-so-obvious difference is the RTP. Typically, online slots have an RTP of around 95%, while land-based casino slots can have RTPs of around 60%. This is a huge difference, meaning you’ll win more if you play slot games online.
Land-based casino slots cost more to operate, so they can’t pay out as much as online slots do. Online casinos do not have the same rent and electricity bills as land-based casinos, so their operational costs are lower. Long story short, an online casino slot costs less to offer, so they can afford to pay out more in winnings.
No, as a general answer, online slots are not scams. That is, as long as you play at an online casino that uses certified RNGs. If a casino does not use an RNG, the slots can be rigged to not pay out as much as they should.
To be sure that you’re only playing at safe casinos, you can find recommended casinos here at LetsGambleUSA. All US real-money casinos we’ve listed have fair slot games that give all players the same chance to win.
Yes, generally, all online casinos available to US gamblers offer bonuses, and typically, the bonuses are made for slots. You can start off by claiming a welcome bonus, and after that, you’ll get regular bonus offers. You might get match deposit bonuses or free spins bonuses on a certain slot machine.
Most online slots are video slots, but you might also find traditional or classic slots at some casinos. Then, there are progressive slots and even jackpot slots. Most casinos will sort their slots into different categories so that it’s easy to find the type you prefer.
The slots that pay out the most are slot machines with a high return-to-player. The RTP tells what percentage of all bets are paid back out as winnings. The higher the RTP, the more the slot pays out.
However, the RTP is theoretical and an average for millions of spins. So, you should also consider the volatility in the game because this says something about the frequency of wins. Low-volatility slot games pay out small wins often, while high-volatility games pay bigger wins less often.
No, as long as the slot uses a certified RNG that’s audited by a third party, you can’t. The security of casinos, game providers, and RNGs are very high. You will not be able to change any algorithms to make the slot pay out more than it should.
To increase your chances of winning slots, you should pick a slot with the highest RTP and the volatility you prefer. Also, make sure you use casino bonuses to boost your bankroll. Other than this, there are no strategies that can help you win long-term on a slot.
The volatility in a slot determines how often you win and how large the wins you can expect to get. A slot with low volatility will typically give you plenty of wins, but the wins will be small. A slot with high volatility will not let you win often, but when you do win, you can expect to win big.
Basically, low, medium, or high volatility will tell you how volatile your account balance is likely to be. Casual players tend to prefer low-volatility slot games, while high rollers tend to prefer high-volatility slots.
A free spins casino bonus is a bonus given to you by the casino. You’ll get to play a certain number of spins for free, and your winnings from the spins are your bonus.
An in-game free spins bonus is a bonus game within the slot itself. You get spins for free, and often there’s also some extra bonus features that can give you larger-than-usual wins. So, this is not a bonus given by the casino, but rather, a bonus feature within the slot itself.
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