Roulette Strategy

Please read the game rules first. Only when you fully know and understand the rules, you can apply tactics and strategies.

Roulette is a casino and gambling game named after the French word meaning "small wheel". In the game a croupier spins a wheel in one direaction, then spins a ball in the opposite direaction around a tilted circular surface running around the circumference of the wheel. The ball eventually falls on to the wheel and into one of 37 (in European roulette) or 38 (in American roulette) colored and numbered pockets on the wheel. Players place bets on the winning number and the color of the pocket, whether the number is odd or even, etc.

Albert Einstein is reputed to have stated, "You cannot beat a roulette table unless you steal money from it."

Nevertheless, the numerous even-money bets in roulette have inspired many players over the years to attempt to beat the game by using one or more variations of a Martingale betting strategy, wherein the gamer doubles the bet after every loss, so that the first win would recover all previous losses, plus win a profit equal to the original bet. As the referenced article on Martingales points out, this betting strategy is fundamentally flawed in practice and the inevitable long-term consequence is a large financial loss. Another strategy is the Fibonacci system, where bets are calculated according to the Fibonacci sequence. Regardless of the specific progression, no such strategy can statistically overcome the casino's advantage.

While not a strategy to win money, Los Angeles Times editor Andrés Martinez described an enjoyable roulette betting method in his book on Las Vegas entitled "24/7". He called it the "dopey experiment". The idea is to divide one's roulette session bankroll into 35 units. This unit is bet on a particular number for 35 consecutive spins. Thus, if the number hits in that time, the gambler wins back the original bankroll and can play subsequent spins with house money. However, there is only a (1 − (37 / 38)35) * 100% = 60.68% probability of winning within 35 spins (assuming a double zero wheel with 38 pockets).

There is a common misconception that the green numbers are "house numbers" and that by betting on them one "gains the house edge." In fact, it is true that the house's advantage comes from the existence of the green numbers (a game without them would be statistically fair); however, they are no more or less likely to come up than any other number.

Various attempts have been made by engineers to overcome the house edge through predicting the mechanical performance of the wheel, most notably by Joseph Jagger at Monte Carlo in 1873. These schemes work by determining that the ball is more likely to fall at certain numbers. Claude Shannon, a mathematician and computer scientist best known for his contributions to information theory, built arguably the first wearable computer to do so in 1961.

To try to prevent exploits like this, the casinos monitor the performance of their wheels, and rebalance and realign them regularly to try to keep the result of the spins as random as possible.

More recently Thomas Bass, in his book The Eudaemonic Pie 1991 (published as The Newtonian Casino in Britain), has claimed to be able to predict wheel performance in real time. The book describes the exploits of a group of computer hackers, who called themselves the Eudaemons, who in the late 1970s used computers in their shoes to win at roulette by predicting where the ball would fall.

At least in the 1930s, some professional gamblers were able to consistently gain an edge in roulette by seeking out rigged wheels (not difficult to find at that time) and betting opposite the largest bets.

In the early 1990s, Gonzalo Garcia-Pelayo used a computer to model the tendencies of the roulette wheels at the Casino de Madrid in Madrid, Spain. Betting the most likely numbers, along with members of his family, he was able to win over one million dollars over a period of several years. A court ruled in his favor when the legality of his strategy was challenged by the casino.

In 2004 it was reported that a group of two Serbs and one Hungarian in London had used a laser scanner hidden inside a mobile phone linked to a computer to predict the sector of the wheel where the ball was most likely to drop. They were arrested, but released without charge as there was no proof they had technically interfered with casino equipment.


Betting only on red
One conceivable strategy would be to bet on the ball landing in a red space for a certain number of spins, for example, 38.

There are 18 red spaces on a roulette table with 38 total spaces. Dividing 18 by 38 yields a probability of landing on red of 47.37%. This probability can be used in a binomial distribution and made into an approximate standard normal distribution.

Doing so indicates that, if one were to spin the wheel 38 times, there is a 99% probability that the ball would land on red at least 10 times. There is an 83% probability that in 38 spins, the ball will land on red at least 15 times. Out of 38 spins, there's a 50% chance that 18 will be red.

However, the break-even point is 19 spins, since the bet on red is 1:1, and the probability of 19 red spins in 38 is only 37%. This indicates the difficulty of winning by only betting on red.

The results occur because, as indicated by the 18 divided by 38 equals 47.37% figure, the ball will land on red less than half the time. This percentage applied in the binomial and standard normal distributions creates the vast divide in probability from 18 red spins to 19 red spins out of 38 spins. It is very unlikely for anyone to spin much more than 18 red spins out of 38 spins.


Betting multiple times
This type of bet is a combination of the red bet and the martingale system. The difference is that this bet also includes the odd. This strategy starts off with a bet of 1 on each the red and the odd (or you can do the black and even). Each bet is treated separately. When one bet loses, it is doubled. When one bet wins, it gets set back to 1. The reason that this technique keeps the player in the game so long is that there is almost a 25% chance of winning both the red and the odd and there is almost a 50% chance of breaking even (win one bet and lose the other). Of course, in order for this method to last, the player would need an unlimited source of money, and a casino with another one to boot. In reality, this method backfires when the player can't bet any longer and loses. The loss that this causes is possibly hundreds of times bigger than a loss made when starting. Also, in the long run, because the house still has an edge, the player will lose money just like with all other "unbeatable" casino games.


Using the dozen bet
There are two versions to this system, single dozen bets and double dozen bets. In the single dozen bet version, the player uses a progressively incrementing stake list starting from the casino table minimum, to the table maximum. The aim here is to use a single dozen bet to win before the stake list ends. Many techniques are employed such as: betting on the same dozen to appear after two consecutive appearances, betting on the dozen that has appeared most in the last 15, 9, or 5 spins, betting on the dozen that, after a long absence of 7 or more spins, appears for the first time. The double dozen bet version uses two dozen bets and half the stake list size of the single dozen bet version.


1st and 3rd column strategy
One bet of 2 pieces on the 1st column and one bet of 2 pieces on the 3rd column covers most of the red numbers on the table. One bet of 2 pieces on the black will provide insurance for occurrence of black. This betting system covers nearly all numbers except for the 4 red numbers in the middle column and the zero (and double zero in American Roulette). If the result is a red number in either the 1st or 3rd column, the player only breaks even. If the result is red in the middle column the player loses 6 pieces. If the result is black and in the middle column, the player loses 2 pieces. If the result is a black in the 1st or 3rd column, the player wins 6 pieces.