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Online Roulette Guide - ROULETTE17

Welcome to Roulette17.com: helping players since 2006.
With free roulette systems, bonuses, information on bets, live games, stories from the tables plus facts and tips.

Welcome to Roulette17.com: we’ve been helping players since 2006.
With free roulette systems, bonuses, info on bets, live games, stories from the tables plus facts and tips.

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This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is roulette.png

Online Roulette is a game that’s easy and fun to play making it one of the most popular casino games around. We’ll show you how to play the game.

The variations that are available today are similar to the game that was played in Monte Carlo in the early days.

This game used to be considered a VIP’s pastime as it was only available to play in Monaco, but the game gradually spread across Europe, the US (gaining an extra zero pocket) and the rest of the world.

What is Roulette?

This casino game involves a wheel with either 37 or 38 pockets. European and French wheels have 37 pockets with one green zero and numbers ranging from 1 to 36. American variants are similar but the wheel contains 2 zero pockets: a “0” and a “00”.

The wheel is spun, and a ball is launched around the outer rim in the opposite direction. Once it begins to lose momentum, it drops towards the centre of the wheel where there is an inner track of numbered pockets. Various bumps and diamond-shaped obstacles inject some chaos to the ball’s trajectory. Eventually, the ball will come to rest in a numbered pocket.

Players are allowed to make various bets, either that the ball will land on a specific number or within a zone on the wheel or betting table. Betting continues until the croupier in charge of the wheel calls “No More Bets”. Winning bets are paid out at the end of this process according to the fixed pay-out or rules of the game, and the whole process starts again in the following round.


Online Roulette – Pros and Cons

  • It’s easy to understand the game.
  • There are layers of complexity, on the bets for example.
  • The game has a rich history.
  • It’s a good game to test systems as it is fast.
  • Each spin is a new game with the same odds. Beware of the gambler’s fallacy!
  • Novelty games have a higher house edge.

Online Roulette Variants

There are many variations of the game including American, French and European. The number of zero pockets on the wheel and the distribution of numbers around the wheel will indicate which type of game you are playing.

American Roulette has two zero pockets on the wheel and betting table: a 0 and a 00. The extra zero was added to the game to increase the house edge. This is the only game with the 5 Number bet.

European wheels are similar to American, except that they only have one zero increasing your odds.

French wheels (the original design from Monte Carlo), have one zero. The other difference is the table layout which features a different betting design.

Progressive Roulette

Some wheels have an extra well for entry into a progressive jackpot. Age of the Gods Roulette is a good example.

French Rules

There are different rules on even money bets in many French variants that are advantageous to players. For example, La Partage Rule returns half of your bet if the ball lands in the zero pocket on an even money bet (like red or black).

En Prison is similar, except that your even money bet “rides” for another spin. You can find some of these rules on single zero tables with a standard European betting layout: these are so-called “hybrid” wheels.

Vive la différence!

FAQs

Frequently Asked Questions

  • Who invented the game?
    Probably Blaise Pascal when he was developing his Perpetual Motion machine
  • How many variants are there?
    Literally hundreds, but the main games are European (one zero on the wheel), American (2 zeros) and French (different betting layout, follows La Partage rule). There are many “novelty” games with extra pockets, particularly online. Be careful though, the more pockets, the higher the house edge generally.
  • Which number comes in most frequently on the wheel?
    All the numbers in roulette, including the zero, have an equal chance of hitting on a wheel with no imperfections. That is to say, given a large enough sample of spins, the distribution graph across the numbers will tend to flatten. With shorter sample sizes, there will be peaks (hot numbers) and troughs (cold numbers). Many people are superstitious about the number 17 but in reality, the chance of it dropping in are the same as they are for 11, 8, 13, 7 or 0 for that matter. If you can find a biased wheel, you might experience hot zones. The hard thing is finding them however.
  • What is the Best System?
    No system will alter the fundamental odds you will get at the table. That is a function of the design of the game. The Martingale is the most famous. Browse through all of our roulette systems if you are interested in hearing more. There’s the 1326 system, for example and the Fibonacci. Some systems are riskier than others.
  • Should I play games with side bets?
    Variants with additional side bets are becoming more common. Usually they come with another pocket on the wheel with the chance to win a progressive jackpot, for example. This can be a good way of playing for bigger pots of money, but just be aware that the extra pocket reduces your odds on the standard bets like red/black. It’s effectively another zero pocket. If you just want to play standard bets, stick to a traditional European wheel.
  • Which is better? Live or Virtual Roulette?
    On a live casino game, the action take place on a physical wheel while you watch and bet on a live video stream. A virtual roulette game is more like a video slot. The odds are the same as long as we are talking the same variants (eg 2 European Games). Live is more authentic with more atmosphere. Virtual games are fast. There are pros and cons to both. Some live games are pretty fast too (eg Automatic games and Speed Roulette which has one spin every 30 seconds.
  • If 9 reds land in a row, is it more likely that a black will land on the next spin?
    No- this is the “gambler’s fallacy”. Each roulette spin is a separate event and the wheel has no memory, the odds remain the fame, just under 50/50 (to account for the zero pocket). Remember that you are only betting on the outcome of one spin, not a sequence of ten.

There are many online variations, some of which we’d categorise as novelty games, and others we’d put in a “roulette plus” group. Many games come with side bets with a progressive jackpot for a large pay out. In other variants, you can bet on multiple wheels at once.

Live Games

There are 2 ways to play online roulette. The first is to play a virtual (video) game.

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is live_roulette_croupier.png

The second option is to play live roulette which is becoming increasingly popular. In these games, you watch the action through a webcam on a real casino wheel that is in a studio or casino and you bet over the Internet.

We’d recommend sites like Monkey Casino for this style of game- they are a live games specialist (with Evolution Games for example) where you’ll find a big choice of tables.

The one disadvantage of playing live over virtual games is speed. Because there is a dealer and other players involved, the pace of the game can be slower.

If you want to play fast but you still want a live set-up, you can opt for an automatic game. You play on a real wheel, but the game is operated automatically and is faster. There are also live dealer variants like Speed Roulette that promise 2 spins per minute. They must hire fast-talking croupiers!

If you want to play a higher variance game, you could try something like XXXtreme Lightning Roulette from Evolution which has “Lightning Strike” payout boosters on single-number bets that supercharge the multiples up to 2000x your stake. Careful, thought! These games are volatile.

Tip

Online Roulette Tip

If you are playing on an American wheel, avoid the “Five Number Bet”. It has the worst odds on the table. This is not the same as the number 5 bet, by the way, betting on a single number: five.

More Tips

Roulette Games

If you would like to test out a range of free games from different game developers, you will need to register at one of our recommended casinos. There are games for high rollers like Switch Roulette, games for novices and fun variants like 9 Pots of Gold Roulette which has a maximum pay-out of 500x your bet on the special random leprechaun numbers..

Demos and this site in general are strictly for players aged 18 and over.

Our games section includes reviews on games from Microgaming, Evolution, Playtech, IGT, Inspired, Gamevy, Realistic Games and Net Ent, all of which have their pros and cons.

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Examples of Games

Game NameTypeSoftware
Lightning RouletteLive EuropeanEvolution Gaming
French GoldVirtual EuropeanMicrogaming
Double BallLive NoveltyEvolution
Immersive RouletteImpressive production (live game)Evolution
Age of the GodsVirtual with Side BetPlaytech
3D EuropeanVirtual EuropeanIrondog Studios

News

If you are looking for the latest bonus offers, promotions, online roulette tournaments and games, you’ll find it in our News section, where we post the best stories of what is happening in the market.

Guides

The basic guide
Roulette is a simple game to learn: the best way is to play and learn as you go making small low-risk bets or practising on a free game.

online roulette

Let’s Talk More About Betting
Before or while the wheel spins, you make a bet that the ball will land in a certain numbered pocket or within a group of numbers. The layout or betting surface is where you will place your chips.

The felt-lined table features a design which varies depending on the version containing all of the numbers and betting options. To bet you simply place a chip or several chips on the desired area.

There is a wide variety of bets that you can place when playing, so to help you understand as many of them as possible we have created a betting guide below.

Types of bets
There are many types of roulette bets. We go into all of them in detail: they can be split into 3 types: Inside Bets, Outside Bets and the more exotic Call Bets.

Betting on the inside bets has a lower probability of winning compared to the outside, but the pay-out is much larger (there’s a higher variance). The outside bets are the opposite and have a high probability, but a much lower pay-out.

The difference between the 2 types of bets is known as bet volatility. Highly volatile (or high variance) bets don’t pay out as often, but when you do win the pay-off is larger. These kinds of bets are riskier if you have a smaller bankroll and cannot afford to stay at the table too long without winning. The opposite can be said for low volatility (low variance) bets.

Inside Bets
– a Straight Up bet is placed on an individual number, a Split Bet is when you split the wager over two numbers that are next to each other, a Corner or Square Bet is where you place a chip on a corner which spreads the bet over four numbers, a Street Bet allows you to place a stake on all three numbers in a single line, a Trio Bet would allow you to place a split bet on either 0,1 and 2 or 0, 2 and 3 and finally we have the Six Line bet which is a bet on two adjacent horizontal lines.

There’s also the infamous Five Number bet which you can only play on an American wheel with 2 zero pockets. Avoid it, as it has the worst odds on the table. An equivalent of a European game would be a Four Number Bet. You can’t bet on the Double Zero on a European wheel because there isn’t one!

We explain all of these bets in detail in our roulette bets section.

Outside Bets
There are also 6 types of outside bets including Red or Black, Even or Odd, the numbers 1 to 18, the numbers 1 to 36, a Dozens Bet in which you bet on a one-third section of the numbers and column bets that allow you to bet on an entire vertical column of numbers.

Dozens and Columns bets cover the same amount of table but with different groups of numbers.

Roulette Systems

We have over 30 free systems on the site (just head to the strategy section) including the famous Martingale and other popular systems like D’Alembert and Fibonacci, as well as lesser-known strategies such as the Piquemouche and Oscar’s Grind.

All of these have one thing in common- there are advantages and disadvantages to playing each one. The thing that we like most about playing systems is that they force you to think of a game plan before you hit the table. That’s a good thing!

At the very least you should have a fixed idea about when you will stop playing, ie a Take Profit target, a Stop Loss limit or simply set yourself a time limit.

Keeping track of the time is always a good idea- most decent online casinos will feature a prominent clock so that you know how long you have been playing at the tables, unlike many of the casinos in Las Vegas! (The Encore is the exception here, but you can always wear a watch.)

Another Tip

Plan your bets and bet your plan! A system can be as simple as having a plan of how long you will stay at the table. Set your watch and stick to it, it’s always better to have a plan before you start playing

Bet your Plan at All British Casino

The one thing that we would stress about any system, is that it will never change the odds of the table. Those are determined by the design of the game and the only way that you can influence that is through game choice- so whether you play on an American or European wheel for example.

Famous Stories

The great thing about roulette is its rich history. We have been building up a section with all of the best legends and stories that have been built up over the years.

– Have you heard about the French cigarette pack scam?
– Or the time Sean Connery won on the number 17 three times in a row?
– Or when Philip Green won over 2 million pounds on the table at the Les Ambassadeurs Club in London?
– You might be interested in the record number of reds or blacks in a row…
– Check out a clip of Pedro Grendene Bartelle winning a $35,000 Complete Bet on the number 32.
– Or take a look at how the Roulette Clockers got away with a £1.3m win at the Ritz.

All these are in our stories section!

Please Play Responsibly

Online roulette is a modern twist on a game that is rich in history that has few equals when it comes to getting the adrenaline going. Good luck on the tables, and please play responsibly!

18+ only, please.