Bingo Roulette: What It Is and How To Play

If you’re interested in variations of roulette, the good news is you are spoiled for choice. Especially online casinos keep coming up with new ways to entice players, by bringing new and interesting game variations.

In this article I’ll discuss bingo roulette including what it is, how to play, and potential for exploiting it as an advantage player.

What Is Bingo Roulette?

In simple terms, you don’t specifically predict the winning number as you would with normal roulette. Instead, you wait for your numbers to spin. So essentially the roulette wheel replaces the number tumbler.

There are numerous casinos offering bingo roulette, so there are a few variations to it. On all the cases I’m aware of, you don’t get to choose your numbers. Instead, you are assigned them randomly.

For example, in this bingo roulette game, you begin by buying tickets for the game. Each ticket has 5 randomly selected numbers. These five numbers are called a strip, and are most similar to the street bet on the traditional roulette table. But the bingo roulette table doesn’t have numbers 0 to 36. The amount of numbers will vary between casinos.

The roulette spins then begin, revealing each number until a player marks off all of their five numbers. So, it’s very simple in principle, and not that different from ordinary bingo. Ultimately the only difference is the mechanism that determines the winning numbers.

The Mechanism That Determines Winning Numbers

As we’ve covered in other articles, all gambling games are odds versus payout. Specifically, I mean that casinos derive their edge from the difference between the odds of you winning, and the payouts to you when you win. Basically, even when you win, the casino pays you unfairly. This is known as the house edge.

The difference between each game is ultimately the mechanism that determines the winning number (or game outcome). In the case of bingo roulette, it is usually a random number generator. As a general rule, if you see a computer animation and a number appear, a random number generator determines the winning number.

There are two types of number generators: pseudorandom number generators, and true random number generators. Almost every casino nowadays uses pseudorandom number generators. And these are nothing more than software and algorithms.

The Potential for Advantage Play With Bingo Roulette

First and foremost, you don’t get to choose your numbers in bingo roulette. The only real control you have is the number of tickets you purchase. And while you could purchase far more tickets than other people, thereby increasing your chance of winning, the odds of you winning are still below the payment expectation.

Think of it this way: with any gambling game, you can apply the Martingale betting system. This is where you double bets after each loss, in attempt to cover losses with a big win. The problem is all increasing bet size does is increases your risk. You might get lucky and win big. But the chances are higher that you’ll just lose big. No matter what you do, with the Martingale, the odds of losing are always slightly larger than the odds of winning.

In the case of bingo roulette, the potential winnings of each round would be slightly lower than the total cost of tickets. So, no matter who plays and who wins, the casino will always profit.

If I were personally looking to exploit bingo roulette, I would consider casino comps.

These are various benefits you receive from casino, based on the amount you wager. For example, you might receive free or discount accommodation in your favorite resort, after wagering $5000. There are a wide variety of casino comps you can receive. But to make it viable, your expectation would be you barely lose anything – so the house edge would need to be close to zero.

While this may not be winning money, is probably the best you can do for any kind of long-term or sustained profit from bingo roulette.

What If a Real Wheel Was Used?

As per previous articles, there are only a few handful of ways that random number generators can be beaten. Generally, it is not practical, and in some cases nearly impossible. Yes, it’s possible, but there are far better ways of beating casinos than attempting to exploit random number generators.

If a real physical roulette wheel was used, this may change matters, but only if you have the capability of selecting your numbers. As numbers would most likely be selected before the wheel spins, you would be limited to particular advantage play techniques such as bias analysis. Roulette wheel bias occurs when there are physical defects that cause some numbers to win more than others.

So essentially to use this strategy in bingo roulette, you would need the ability to choose your numbers. If you couldn’t use your numbers, then you would need to purchase more tickets until the biased numbers were in your list of numbers. To make matters more complicated, the numbers may be arranged in rows or streets on the betting table. So you may have one biased number out of five. One problem with this is on a biased wheel, positively biased number spin more frequently than random. But it also means there are negatively biased numbers that spin less frequently than random. So if your strip of numbers includes both positively and negatively biased numbers, your net result is no better than random.

I’m not saying it’s not possible to beat bingo roulette with a biased wheel. But the conditions would have to be absolutely perfect for it to be viable. The chances of finding a biased wheel are about 1 in 50 (for at least some bias, even if not enough to overcome the normal house edge). Then you would need to have the right numbers in a strip. The odds of this may be 1 in 1000. So while the potential is there, forget it. Bingo roulette is more for players who like the feel of roulette, but also enjoy old classics like bingo. It is a game for entertainment, and not professional advantage play.