Slot Machine Odds: What Are Your Chances?

April 30, 2024 by Staff

Slot machines are known all over the world for their ability to drastically change one’s life. If everything aligns perfectly it’s possible to win hundreds of thousands even millions. But what are the odds of that actually happening? Well, if you wondered about your perspective on winning at slot games stick around. We’ll be uncovering how these machines work and what are your odds of winning big.

Different Types of Slot Games

There are many sub-categories of slots, and they vary in bet range, volatility, hit frequency number of paylines, and return-to-player percentage. Reputable online casinos in Poland have different types of automaty online or slots that are designed around player preference. But regardless of the type or features they have, slots, much like any other casino game will favor the house. So, statistically speaking if you go through 10,000 spins or more, your starting budget should be down between 2%-8%.

RTP and Slot Winnings

Regardless of the slot genre or features they are all designed and tested around RNG. After the slot is tested you get its approximate RTP, which gives an estimate of how much money is approximately lost after tens of thousands of spins. So theoretically if you spend $10,000 on a slot game with an RTP of 95% you should end up $9,500, or lose $500.

In practice though things are different many players simply break even or lose their daily budget. But in incredibly rare instances they win big.

  1. Cynthia Jay Brennan - Won a jackpot of $34.9 Million on Megabucks slot at Desert Inn Hotel
  2. Johanna Heundl - Won $22.3 Million Megabucks progressive jackpot in 2002 while celebrating her 74th birthday at Bally’s.
  3. Jon Heywood - Won £13.2m while playing Mega Moolah on Betway’s site in 2015.
  4. Anonymous - Won almost $3.3 million on Ancient Fortunes: Zeus online slot at Draft Kings in 2023.

Given how there are millions of slot players out there it’s not surprising that there are dozens of big winners.

RTP, House Edge and Payouts

In general terms, RTP indicates the level of fairness, or how accurately the risk-reward ratio is reflected in payouts. If your odds of winning on a bet are 35:1 and the payout for that bet is 35 times the stake then the RTP is effectively 0%. Of course, the casino needs to take its cut so a more accurate scenario would be that you get 34 times the stake for a 35:1 odds.

In slots, you effectively place multiple bets per spin. To be exact you can bet money on each available payline and if the winning combination comes up on one or more of those lines you win. Because you are placing dozens of bets per spin, getting a common winning combination rarely helps you break even. Also if the highest multiplier for a big payout can be between 10,000x to 50,000x the stake. This would mean your odds of hitting that combination are lower than 10,000:1 or 50,000:1. 

Does More Spins Mean Better Odds?

Yes and no. The well-known Murphy’s law states that if something can happen it will, so if try a ridiculous number of times you might hit a big win. But let’s explain how slots work, in order to give you an accurate depiction of your odds.

The software in slot machines generates a random number and then uses that number to map out the spin outcome. If that number corresponds to a winning combination you will win money, bear in mind that a lot of possible combinations don’t win you anything.

What’s more, the RNG algorithm is constantly working even when you are not playing. In fact, when you press the spin button you simply tell that algorithm to stop and show what combination it got. This means that you have 0 control over that outcome, the only thing you can do by continuously pressing the button is see the results faster.

No matter how many spins you have your odds of hitting the jackpot stay the same for each spin. So, think of it this way. What are your odds of winning in a race against Usain Bolt? If you are not an athlete this is impossible. Sure Usain might trip and fall which will give you the edge, but even then it will be difficult. Now, will your odds improve if you race him multiple times, assuming both of you are fully rested? Well no, they will remain the same, and once again you would have to hope for a miracle.

That’s exactly how the number of spins affects your odds of hitting the jackpot. You are not making the machine exhausted nor are you getting better. But each spin is a possible scenario where a miracle or an extremely unlikely scenario can occur.