Roulette is one of the most popular games of chance in the casino. Place your bets and watch the small ball go round and round the wheel until it stops. Have you ever considered using a calculator for playing roulette to attempt to get an edge?
Roulette calculators are not commonly used in land-based casinos. You will rarely be at a roulette table with someone using a roulette calculator. There are a couple of good reasons why you may have never seen them used in a casino.
Casinos are not open to gamblers using devices at the table. It is fine to text occasionally, check scores, or whatever have you. However, if it is clear that you are using the device to help play the table game, your phone is going to attract attention from the pit boss.
Note that a roulette calculator is not specifically banned, but management has no way of knowing for sure what players are doing on their phones. As a result, players at the table are asked to keep their phones in their pockets while the game is in process. A blackjack strategy chart is not banned, either, but using it on a phone is questionable.
If you want to use a roulette calculator, we recommend playing live dealer online roulette. You will not generate any heat or attention from management at an online casino for using a roulette calculator. Online casinos are not aware that you are using a calculator for roulette, to begin with anyway.
What’s your roulette number?! pic.twitter.com/IL5SkCu8tP
— Erin Kate Dolan (@erinkatedolan) January 15, 2023
via@erinkatedolan
Most casino gamblers do not know what a roulette calculator is. That is the other big reason why you never see a roulette calculator being used to play the game. Should more people utilize a calculator for playing roulette?
TheSportsGeek is looking at if a roulette calculator can help you win. Is using a roulette calculator even worth your time? We will reveal whether you should consider downloading a roulette calculator app or forget about it altogether.
How Does Roulette Work?
Before answering our question, it is important to understand the basics of roulette. Understanding how roulette works can help us answer this question regarding whether a roulette calculator can help you win.
Roulette is one of the most basic table games in the casino. Its simplicity is a big draw to novices and veterans alike. In short, gamblers are betting on where the roulette ball, or pill, is going to land on the wheel.
The felt of a roulette table might look intimidating, but it is easy to read examining the options. The most common roulette bets are on black or red, odd or even, or simply betting on a number to win. Selecting the correct number on a European roulette wheel pays 36 to 1.
The dealer will spin the roulette ball around the table, and wherever the ball lands determine the winning and losing bets. Winners are paid, while the casino collects the losing chips. Note that there is no influence from the dealer or casino on where the ball ends up.
Everything is completely random on a roulette wheel in a modern casino. The days of biased roulette wheels are a thing of the past. There are three different variations of roulette.
Roulette Variations and House Edge
- European Roulette (Single Zero) – 2.7%
- American Roulette (Double Zero) – 5.26%
- Triple Zero Roulette – 7.69%
Always play European roulette over the other variations of roulette wheels. European roulette is hard to find at American land-based casinos on the main gaming floor — usually only in the high-limit room — but roulette online has European roulette tables at smaller limits. Never consider playing roulette with a triple-zero format; that is plain stupidity.
Keep in mind that you will need to find the right roulette calculator for your game of choice. Using an American roulette calculator on European roulette is not going to be helpful since there is an additional zero. If you are playing European roulette — which we advise — then a European roulette calculator must be used.
Calculator For Roulette
A roulette calculator is not like a traditional calculator you use for mathematical equations. This roulette is a little different and does the calculations for you depending on the results of previous spins. The roulette calculator analyzes the data and provides a probability of what the next result is going to be.
The roulette calculator collects data from online casinos and analyzes what the chances are of each bet winning for the next game. For most roulette calculator apps, the user will have to enter the results of each spin manually, though there is open-source software that does this automatically.
The roulette calculator will provide a percentage for each bet on the table. In other words, if a number has a higher percentage to win, then the roulette calculator is suggesting betting on this number. The premise is to avoid bets that have a lower percentage and bet on higher percentages to win.
Are Roulette Calculators Accurate?
A roulette calculator sounds amazing on paper. Providing players with the probability of each bet winning appears like it should give us an advantage, right? If only it was that easy.
Is the roulette calculator probability formula accurate enough that we should take it seriously? It is important to keep in mind that the number of pockets on a roulette wheel does not change from spin to spin.
For every spin of the ball on a European roulette wheel, there is always a 1 in 37 chance that it is going to land on any particular number. There are 36 counting numbers from 1 to 36 and a green zero. Therefore, a 2.7% chance that the ball lands in any pocket on the wheel.
The odds of the ball landing on a red or black space is 48.6% on a European roulette wheel. The same goes for winning on an odd or even bet. The point here is that the odds of a bet winning never change regardless of the previous results.
Each spin is an independent event and not impacted by the previous result. Even if you were to play roulette for days on end with thousands of bets, the odds to win each wager do not change.
There can be 20 reds that win in a row, and statistically, red and black have the same odds of winning on the 21st spin at 48.6% on a European wheel. A calculator for roulette does not change the odds of a number hitting or can determine an accurate percentage. The percentage is static and not dynamic, so no, in most cases roulette calculators do not accurately depict your chances of winning a certain bet.
Biased Roulette Wheel
There is one instance where a certain type of roulette calculator would be helpful. However, advantage gamblers exploiting biased roulette wheels are no longer viable. Roulette wheels are connected to computers, which can determine if there are any biases on a wheel.
A biased roulette wheel leans towards one quadrant on the wheel because of mechanical wear. Parts on a roulette wheel can wear out and lean slightly to one side as a result. The roulette calculator could track thousands of bets to determine a bias, but modern casinos are quick to fix any deficiencies or flaws in the wheel.
Roulette Calculator Fallacy
We wish that there was to consistently predict the next winning bet on a roulette wheel. Despite a calculator for roulette sounding promising, a strategy that utilizes one is not rooted in accuracy. In short, they are a waste of time and not going to provide gamblers with an edge over the house.
Any roulette calculator that has different percentages after every spin of the wheel is not true. The only roulette calculator that would be accurate is one that has the same percentages of success no matter how many spins it is tracking. The game of roulette is completely random, and a roulette calculator is, unfortunately, unable to determine winning numbers.
When your lucky number hits on the #roulette table!
— Bovada Casino (@Bovada_Casino) January 9, 2023
via@Bovada_Casino
You are better off betting on your lucky numbers or on a hunch. This strategy has the same odds of success as using a roulette calculator. By all means, use a calculator for playing roulette and let us know how it goes over a large sample size. However, a roulette calculator is just about as useless as a “guaranteed winning” roulette strategy.
There is variance and regression toward the mean, but this is over days and days and thousands of wagers on one wheel — not in a single roulette session. Because red did not hit 48.6% of the time across an hour of playing at a table, does not mean the trend will reverse in the short term.
Find the best casinos for roulette online at TheSportsGeek. We have recommendations for the top casino websites with live dealers for roulette online.
