When using our Blackjack Trainer, pay close attention to this score, this is more important than your dollar balance. Random luck can sway your balance around, but as long as you are playing perfect blackjack strategy, you will give yourself the best chance of winning money long term! Then once the games become boring, then you can quit for the day, trip or whatever. Just know that blackjack betting systems don’t work, and the only way to bet and be profitable at blackjack is to use mathematically sound and proven blackjack strategies.
Analyzing the Systems and Debunking the Myths
Let’s start this discussion with a precursor and caveat—the only way you will ever win money long-term (that is, over thousands of hours of play) is to count cards and raise or lower your bet based on an accurate counting system. Of course, this takes hundreds of hours of practice and study, and you’ll soon wear out your welcome wherever you play. So if you’re just spending a week in Vegas and you want to learn how to come away with a winning trip, or you are just an occasional player who wants to limit their losses, we can help.
How can a betting strategy help you win? In the short term, betting systems can help you reduce variance, win large amounts in one session, avoid huge short-term losses, and have fun experimenting with different bet spreads based on your specific goals. So what are the different blackjack betting strategies, and how do they work? Let’s take a look at the good, the bad, and the ugly.
The Flat Bet
Flat betting is a method employed by a large majority of gamblers. They understand their limits and want to do their best to keep their bankroll intact throughout the night. When you flat bet, you generally bet the table minimum and never increase or decrease your bet for any reason.
The Positives: By employing a consistent betting pattern, you’ll avoid many of the large swings of standard deviation that are common in blackjack. If you’re looking for longevity without risk, and you don’t need the thrill of a big bet to have fun, flat betting is likely your best course of action.
If you are playing a six-deck game with S17 DAS rules, and you are betting $25.00 per hand at roughly 100 hands per hour, you are expected to lose $10.89 an hour playing perfect basic strategy. $10 an hour sounds like cheap entertainment to me, especially if you’re getting free drinks and casino comps to reduce that number to near 0, if not positive, by slowing down play. Most importantly, you’ll never have to return home to your wife explaining how you went all in and lost all of your vacation money in one night.
The Negatives: You’ll never lose it all in one night, but you definitely won’t win it all either. Your losses will be slow and steady, and your wins will be small. The standard deviation of the game above amounts to about $288 an hour, so you’ll never be a huge winner or loser. More so, your risk of losing in the long run is 100% (just like any betting progression). Given enough time, you will lose even a million-dollar bankroll—but at $25/hand, that bankroll will likely outlive you.
The Negative Betting Progressions
A Progression is a system in which players increase their bets after a specific event. In the case of a negative progression, that event is a loss, playing to get back to even. Because your win comes at a higher bet, the theory is that you’ll win bigger than you lose, coming out even or a winner. Let’s take a look at how this system works in reality.
The Martingale System
One of the most popular betting systems is the Martingale System. This negative betting system is a simple strategy in which you double your bet upon a loss. The idea behind the Martingale is that you will never be behind for long, because odds are you will win at least 1 hand to keep you even while enjoying an evening of free drinks and never-ending gambling. We don’t really need to analyze the game with this progression, because the results are the same no matter what you’re playing—you go bust. Given enough time, and often in short order, you lose your bankroll.
Here’s how it works:
- $25 bet — lose and double up
- $50 bet — lose and double up
- $100 bet —lose and double up
- $200 bet — win and you’re back in business, up $25.
- Back to a $25 bet
The Positives: If you avoid a string of bad luck (negative variance) you should be able to play for a while without losing a cent. If your bankroll is large, you can survive a string of losses to make up for it with a win at the tail end.
The Negatives: If you have bad luck, you’ll quickly run out of money, or run up against the table max before long. Let’s take a look at the 4th bet and reimagine a different outcome.
- $200 bet — split 2x, double 2x, bet totaling $1000, all which end in a loss. All the sudden, your next, 5th bet needs to be $2000. You’re now up against the table max, and if you lose again, you can’t double your next bet. Plus, you probably don’t have the bankroll for another split or double anyway, if you even have the bankroll for the 5th $2000 bet. You had $3000, and you thought you could never lose—but you didn’t even last 30 minutes.
Wins and losses for blackjack aren’t 50-50, even if we disregard pushes. For a perfect basic strategy player, the win-loss ratio is closer to 47 wins, 53 losses—and you’ll be perpetually chasing your losses. As a result, the Martingale system is flawed. Our advice is to avoid the Martingale like the plague.
The below chart expresses our chance of losing X number of hands in a row. Ignoring pushes, we win 47% of the time and lose 53% of the time playing basic strategy.
The Positive Betting Progressions
With a positive betting progression, you raise your bets with each win, funding larger bets with the sum of your smaller wins. This betting style feels more natural for many players, and many play it without even realizing that it’s a system. Often players will continually raise their bets after a win to take advantage of a perceived hot-streak or weak dealer. This system is more conservative than its negative betting counterpart, as a string of losses will not pile up and knock out your bankroll as fast or as often. If you are on a huge winning streak, you stand to make a big win, but eventually a loss will set you back to the beginning. As a result, many players use modified progression systems like the 1-3-2-6 betting pattern.
1-3-2-6 System
This progressive betting strategy works just as the name implies, betting in units. The key is to remember that your bet is not raised unless you win. So, for instance, if you lose 4 hands in a row, your bet never raises above 1 unit. Once you finish the progression—which is to say you win with 1, 3, 2, and 6 units, you start back from the beginning at 1 unit.
The Positives: This system allows for less of an “all-in” strategy than a normal progression which dictates continually raising your bets during a winning streak until you decide to quit or you hit a loss. By winning your first and second bets on 1 and 3 units, you’ll have won 4 units. If you lose your 3rd bet, you’ll still be ahead by 2 units. Because it’s less likely to win 3 in a row than 2, you may win more consistently in the short-term.
The Negatives: You won’t achieve as big of a win as you potentially can with a traditional positive progression betting system. For example, if you start out with a $25 bet and win 4 in a row ($25, $75, $50, $150) you would win a total of $300. A straightforward progressive system with a $25 bet and 4 wins in a row ($25, $50, $100, $200) would win a total of $375.
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The below chart expresses our chance of winning X number of hands in a row. Ignoring pushes, we win 47% of the time and lose 53% of the time playing basic strategy.
Oscar’s Blackjack Betting System
The most touted system for short-term blackjack winnings is Oscar’s Betting System, often called Oscar’s Grind. It combines some of the best features of both positive and negative betting progressions. Oscar’s grind aims to make 1 unit of profit with each run. Once a unit is won, the entire progression begins anew. Remember, you never raise your bet after a loss, only wins. It is a slow-and-steady system designed to grind out wins and avoid huge losses.
Here is an example run:
1st Bet: 1 Unit, Result: L, Total: -1
2nd Bet: 1 Unit, Result: L, Total: -2
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3rd Bet: 1 Units, Result: W, Total: -1
4th Bet: 2 Units, Result: W, Total: +1 (Stopping Point)
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1st Bet: 1 Unit, Result: L, Total: -1
2nd Bet: 1 Unit, Result: L, Total: -2
3rd Bet: 1 Units, Result: L, Total: -3
4th Bet: 1 Units, Result: W, Total: -2
5th Bet: 2 Units, Result: L, Total: -4
6th Bet: 2 Units, Result: W, Total: -2
7th Bet: 3 Units, Result: W, Total: +1 (Stopping Point)
The Positives: You can continue to bet and run into a string of losses without completely losing your bankroll, unlike most negative progressions. If you believe in winning streaks and positive table energy, this progression is for you. You’re never struggling to pull yourself out of a big loss with big bets.
The Negatives: Patience is definitely a virtue with this system. The mindset is slow and steady wins. If you’re looking to accrue comps and play a low-variance game, this system is for you. If you want big wins, you’re barking up the wrong blackjack tree. It is also a slow, calculating system, so you may have difficulty employing it at the tables without a little practice.
Conclusive thoughts by LV Bear
There is no good reason to not learn a system of advantage play. Yes, some folks play blackjack for the “entertainment value,” but they should be aware of how much their expected losses will be, progression systems or otherwise. Those losses pile up over months and years of ploppy play. It is not difficult to learn rudimentary card-counting skills that will give the player at least a small advantage, even if not used to their full potential.
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Most people recognize that unlike many casino games, blackjack is a game of strategy. It’s immediately obvious when you sit down to play a little blackjack; players have to make a large number of decisions on almost every hand, and the choices you make often make the difference between winning and losing.
Blackjack strategy can be broken down into two major components: basic strategy and card counting. Basic strategy comprises all of the playing decisions a player should make in order to keep the house edge as low as possible. In other words, a basic strategy chart would tell you the mathematically best play in every possible situation you might encounter during the course of play.
Every good blackjack strategy starts with a full understanding of basic strategy. Without that foundation, other, more advanced strategies – namely, card counting strategies – will fail, as players will simply make too many basic mistakes to overcome. On the other hand, learning just basic strategy will allow you to go into any good blackjack game getting excellent odds, sometimes good enough that you’ll show a profit with the help of comps and other rewards programs. With that in mind, it’s always better to focus on learning basic strategy first, until you feel completely comfortable with it.
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Blackjack Basic Strategy
A full basic strategy is quite complex since there are countless situations you could face during a blackjack hand that must be accounted for. There are several factors the player must take into account on each hand:
- The rules of the blackjack game they are playing;
- The score of their hand;
- The dealer’s up card;
- Whether they have the option to split and/or double.
The rules are particularly important because even small changes in the rules being used can noticeably change proper basic strategy. For instance, the right plays against a dealer that must stand on all 17s are not the right plays against a dealer who hits on soft 17. The number of decks, the ability to surrender (as well as when surrendering is offered) and other factors can also affect basic strategy.
With this in mind, it is very hard to suggest a single basic strategy that will work in any situation, especially in the scope of this article. Not only is basic strategy rather complex, but there are also countless versions of the rules which affect what basic strategy you should choose. Full basic strategy charts are available at my casinos (which don’t mind you playing basic strategy, since the casino will still hold a small edge), as well as in many great blackjack books and on some gambling websites.
Simplified Blackjack Strategy
On the other hand, it is fairly easy to suggest a simplified strategy that can help you get started in just about any typical blackjack game. This easy to memorize strategy won’t get you exactly the same odds as a full basic strategy chart, but you won’t be giving much up; the difference in the house edge until typical rules should be .2% or less when compared to perfect, optimal play. To give credit where it is due, this strategy is heavily based on one suggested at wizardofodds.com, an excellent gambling information site. Simply follow the few rules below, and you’ll avoid ever making any major blackjack mistakes!
- Double down if you have a 10 or 11 and the dealer has an up card that is worth less than your hand. Also double down with 9 if the dealer up card is a 3, 4, 5 or 6. In all cases, if you cannot double down, hit instead.
- With all other hands of 11 or less, hit.
- With hard hands of 17-21, always stand.
- With hard hands of 12-16, stand if the dealer is showing a six or lower, except hit hard 12 against the dealer’s 2 or 3. Hit if the dealer is showing a 7 or higher.
- With soft hands of 15 or lower, always hit.
- With soft hands of 19 or higher, always stand.
- With soft hands of 16-18, hit against a seven or higher, and double down if the dealer is showing a six or lower. If you cannot double down, hit instead.
- Always split eights or aces.
- Never split fours, fives, or tens.
- With all other pairs, split if the dealer is showing a six or lower, otherwise, play the hand according to the rules above, depending on your hand’s value.
- Never take insurance or “even money” on blackjacks – it is a sucker bet for the basic strategy player.
There you go! Eleven simple rules that will have you playing blackjack like a pro – or at least, close to it. This is a perfect strategy for anyone looking to quickly learn how to play blackjack very well, without taking the time to memorize an entire basic strategy. In addition, the simplicity of this system means you’re not likely to make mistakes at the table because you forget the correct play.
Best Betting Strategy For Blackjack
Card Counting
Many players aren’t content with simply minimizing the house edge. Instead, they want to have the edge for themselves! In blackjack, this is actually possible thanks to card counting.
Card counting works by tracking which cards have come out of the shoe. Because there are a limited number of cards available, it is often the case that the remaining cards in the shoe don’t actually resemble a random assortment. There may, for instance, be a case where very few tens come out on the first few hands of a new shoe. This tells us that the remaining shoe is very rich in tens, which is great for the player.
In general, tens and aces are the best cards for the player to have remaining in the deck, while low cards are the worst for the player. Card counters take advantage of this fact by wagering more money when they know that the deck is rich in cards that are good for the player. They also make other adjustments, such as taking insurance (normally a sucker bet) when the deck is very rich in tens, and occasionally changing their basic strategy plays based on the cards that have been seen so far. However, it is critical to have a complete understanding of basic strategy before moving on to card counting, since counting relies on your ability to make the right plays along with keeping track of the cards that have been dealt. For more information, check out our full article on card counting!
Bad Blackjack Strategy
One final word of warning: it’s often the case that you’ll get bad “advice” from other players at the blackjack table, which contradicts what you’ve read here or seen on a basic strategy chart. Most of the time, the other players will be well-intentioned, but simply don’t have a deep knowledge of blackjack. Often, these players use strategies like always assuming the dealer has a ten in the hole, which – while often pointing the player in the right direction – causes the player to lose more money than with basic strategy.
Luckily, if you use basic strategy, you won’t be making any outlandish plays, which should keep anyone at the table from getting too angry at you or commenting on your play too often. Blackjack players are often a superstitious lot, and while nobody has any idea which card is coming next, many players will still get mad at a player who takes a card that would have busted the dealer, causing the dealer to win the hand instead. If that ever happens to you, don’t let it bother you; be confident that you’ve been playing proper blackjack strategy, and that your results will prove that in the long run.
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