The free bonus every player receives at every online casino is one of the best tools for those gambling websites to compete with each other. And no need to say that the players love them. And what’s not to love – free money just for choosing a casino? You’d be insane to skip on this kind of opportunity to increase your bankroll before you even spin those virtual slots reels.
But a mistake new online casino players make when they first join a gambling website (possibly lured by the large welcome bonus offer) is to not prepare themselves for the wagering requirements all casinos attach to their bonuses. They go by many names: wagering requirements, play-through requirements, rollover, but they all mean one thing – that nice bonus does come with some strings attached. And here we will explain those wagering requirements in a simple, but concise way. You will find out what is a bonus playthrough requirement, how does it work, how to best satisfy it, and much more.
Wagering Requirements Explained
Let’s briefly imagine a situation where an online casino is offering a 100% match bonus for new customers. Quickly thinking on our feet, we can say, “Hmm, I’ll just deposit, get the bonus, and withdraw it all right away!”, right? Double your money without absolutely no risk, who doesn’t want a piece of this imaginary pie?
Well, this is where the wagering requirements come into play. Since the online casinos aren’t being ran by idiots, every casino bonus comes with certain “play-through” requirements, before the customer can withdraw the winnings resulting from the bonus, (and/or the bonus itself, depending on whether it’s a cashable or non-cashable bonus). In a nutshell, the player must wager (or “play through”) a certain amount, before the money becomes eligible for withdrawal.
How The Play-Through Works
While there is some basic math involved, how the casino bonus wagering requirements work is very easy to understand. As mentioned, every bonus will come with them, and they are expressed as a multiplier of your bonus and deposit amount. Let’s look at an example, and we promise, everything will click right into place. For instance, a 100% welcome bonus by an online casino may come with “6 x deposit + bonus”, as a playthrough requirement. This means that the wagering requirement, i.e. the total amount the player must wager, should be equal or greater than six times the combined amount of the deposit and the bonus.
So, let’s imagine that the player deposits $100. They get another $100 free, as part of the welcome bonus, and start with the total of $200. Using our wagering requirement of 6 x deposit + bonus, it means that in this case, the player must wager at least $1,200, before they can withdraw any of the winnings, i.e. 6 x ($100 + $100) = $1,200. In other words, you need to place bets in the amount of $1,200 in order to satisfy those wagering requirements.
Thusly, the basics for calculating and clearing the wagering requirements follow this formula:
- Find out the playthrough multiplier (for example, 5x, 10x, 25x, etc)
- Add the bonus and deposit amount
- Multiply that amount by the wagering multiplier
- Place wagers in the amount of the wagering requirement or higher
- Withdraw your winnings and the bonus
As you can see, because of the nature of the bonus offers at the casinos, the play-through requirements will nearly always come as a multiple of your bonus and deposit amount. Since the casino doesn’t really know he exact amount you would deposit, this blanket rule makes it very easy to calculate the wagering amount needed, regardless of the actual dollar amount deposited.
How To Beat The Wagering Requirements
Well, you cannot exactly circumvent this casino rule, but there are a few tips you can heed in order to improve your chances of actually cashing out winnings, after you claim a bonus.
First, always make sure you actually read the bonus T&C, because you need to know how much the wagering requirement is for that particular bonus. This is where most new online casino players make their biggest mistake – not knowing about the playthrough, they assume that when they have won enough, they can just cash out. Unless it’s a custom offer tailored specifically for you by the casino, it’s safe to assume that every bonus will come with wagering requirements.
Second, don’t be afraid to compare the wagering requirements the same way you would compare the bonus amounts. You’d be surprised how different the playthrough numbers could be not only between two different casinos, but even between two different bonus offers at the same online casino.
And finally, try to avoid bonuses with very high playthrough requirements. Of course, we would all want to see bonuses with wagering stipulations in the single digits, but those would be very rare. Most of them, especially with welcome bonuses, would be around 20x – 30x bonus+deposit, but sometimes you can get lucky and find a wagering requirements in the teens, other times – well above 30x, the latter should be generally avoided, unless everything else seems like a really good offer and you can live with the higher bonus playthrough.