How to Win Big on Penny Slots at Casinos
Have you ever wondered how to win on penny slots in the USA? While slots are typically games of chance, there are still ways for you to be successful when betting on these ever-popular titles. In this article, we’ll propose a few ways to get the most out of your slot experience. We’ll cover RTP and payline structure and provide helpful tips to get you firing on all cylinders. Let’s get started.
How Penny Slot Machines Work at Casinos
There are all sorts of slots at online casinos that you can play. These include MegaWays games, jackpot slots, fruit machines, classic slots, and more. One genre best suits those players on a budget and those who don’t want to dive too deeply into their pockets — penny slots.
As any other machines, penny slots have a great variety of symbols, which can be:
- Standard
- Multiplier
- Scatter
- Sticky
- Stacked
- Bonus
- Wild
Penny slot machines are games that feature multiple paylines (like all video slots) and allow for payline manipulation. They will permit you to lower your coin value to $0.01 and play with just a single payline if you wish. Not all slots enable this level of bet structuring. Being able to do so is attractive to players on a budget and first timers who don’t want to risk their balance playing with more significant stakes until they are more comfortable doing so.
How to Win Big with Small Bets
The best way to conserve your balance is to play with the lowest minimum stake, which is often $0.01. However, to increase your chances of success, you’ll also want to play with all possible active paylines. Because you’re playing with small stakes, low variance (low volatility) games will suit your needs well. These provide smaller winnings but pay out regularly, allowing players on a budgetary tightrope to replenish their losses more rapidly than if they were playing a slot with higher volatility.
RTP Explained
One of the best ways to win at penny slots at casinos is to choose a suitable game. One of the ways to do this is to check for a game’s RTP rate. This theoretical figure is displayed as a percentage and tells you how much of each bet the casino will put back into the pot. In short, the RTP of a slot is the opposite side of a coin that also includes house edge (the portion of each bet the casino takes as pure profit).
| Slot | Software | RTP |
|---|---|---|
| Starburst | NetEnt | 96.10% |
| Finn and the Swirly Spin | NetEnt | 96.62% |
| Dead or Alive | NetEnt | 96.80% |
| Cleopatra | IGT | 95.13% |
| Pirate’s Charm | Quickspin | 96.49% |
Ideally, you want to choose games with an RTP rate of 96% or higher. The industry standard hovers at around the 95% mark, but there are plenty of slots with higher RTPs. The higher the RTP rate, the more money there is in the pot to win, and the fairer the slot you’re playing.
Penny Slots Paylines
As touched on above, penny slots allow you to adjust your stakes to a considerable degree. It may not seem the most logical way to make money, but playing with small stakes is safer, especially if you are new to betting or have limited funds.
Penny slots typically allow you to play with anything from one to nine, ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five or even thirty paylines. Beware of 243 ways to win titles, 1,096 ways to win, MegaWays games, and Cluster Pays slots here. They do not allow you to wager “per line”. If you want total control over your bets, you need the flexibility to adjust paylines and lower your coin value to just $0.01.
Free Penny Slots vs Real Money Gambling
The next piece of advice we have sounds counter-intuitive at first — play free penny slots online. Why play free penny slots online when you want to win money on penny slots in the USA? The answer is more straightforward and beneficial than it first seems.
Yes, you can only win real money when gambling for real stakes. You won’t win a bean playing free slot machines. However, you do get something for the time you put in. By playing free penny slots, you can learn how each slot works. This is critical if a game comes with a wealth of features. It also allows you to tinker with paylines and bets, ensuring you fully understand everything before you risk your cash later.
Almost all online slots can be played in a free demo mode, and we strongly suggest you have a stab at them. You’ve nothing to lose in this risk-free environment, and the knowledge you gain can be put into practice for real money later.
Wagering Requirements on Penny Slots
Claiming an online casino bonus can help you bolster your balance when tackling slot games online. However, if you win at penny slot machines when using bonus funds, you will likely encounter wagering requirements. The casino isn’t going to let you walk away with their money just like that. Terms and conditions must be met before you can withdraw those winnings.
While casino bonuses have terms like minimum deposit limits, maximum win caps and game eligibility rules, wagering requirements are the most important. Without fulfilling these, you can’t withdraw winnings accrued from bonus bets.
They will typically be displayed as a number followed by “X”. For instance, 20x means that you must wager any bonus you receive (sometimes the bonus and deposit total) twenty times withdrawing. If you claim a bonus worth $100, you’d have to bet $2,000 before withdrawals are permitted. The general rule is this: the lower the wagering requirements, the better.
Tips on How to Win Big at Penny Slots
As promised, we have a few tips to help you learn how to win big at penny slots. Let’s get started.
Learn and Analyze the Rules of the Game
We strongly suggest that you play free demos, which will help you analyze the rules of each slot before you risk your cash on them. Reading slot reviews isn’t a bad way of learning how penny slots work, either.
Pick the Best Penny Slots
Slot reviews and your experience playing free games will help you decipher the best penny slots out there. Look for high RTP rates, low variance games, and decent prizes in relation to your stake.
Choose Progressive Jackpots
If you play penny slots at the casino and want to win progressive jackpots, it is best to aim for those that have randomly triggered prizes. These usually offer multiple prizes, so a progressive win is not out of the question, even with a minimum stake in play.
Determine Maximum & Minimum Bet Sizes
Be sure to check out the maximum and minimum bet sizes. You’re looking for games that let you adjust the number of active lines and permit stakes as little as $0.01 per line per spin.
Use Online Casino Bonuses
Using casino bonuses can bolster your balance. Again, though, be sure that your bonus has fair terms and conditions, most specifically wagering requirements. Aiming for bonuses valid on games that provide free spins on your favorite slots is not a bad idea, either.
Money Management
If you want to beat a game, you need to be in it to win it. Running out of funds will curtail that quickly. Manage your balance, and don’t splash the cash. Remember, you’re playing penny slots here.
Time to Play
Be sure you make a note of how long you’re playing. You don’t want to overdo it. The longer you play, the more likely you are to get sloppy and make a mistake when betting. Don’t fall into this trap.
Stop in Time
Pull out if you manage to land a sizeable win (or any win that you are content with). It is always tempting to keep going to maybe trigger another bonus round or a big haul, but there’s no guarantee of that happening. Quit while you’re ahead.
Penny Slot Machines Strategies
You can Google this all you want, but there is no such thing as a winning slot strategy. If there were, we’d all be using them, and if somebody has figured one out, they aren’t sharing it with you. As such, penny slot strategy is more about playing cleverly and using the tips we’ve listed above. We can’t guarantee you’ll win, but we can guarantee you’ll be in with a shout from time to time.
How to Win on Penny Slots in Las Vegas
Online slots aren’t so different from those you’d expect to see in Las Vegas or other land-based gambling haunts. Learning how to play and win on penny slots in Vegas is no different than online. Use the same tips we’ve mentioned here. In fact, many of Vegas’ most successful slots can also be found online. Get some practice on free-to-play demos online because you won’t get this opportunity once you step foot inside Vegas’ brick-and-mortar casinos.
