Casino Holdem is a relatively new casino game. It has elements of Texas Holdem poker, but instead of playing against other players, you play against the casino. It’s available in casinos all over the world, as well as at casinos online, so it’s not difficult at all to find. It also has a very low house edge of 2.16%, making it one of the least expensive casino games to play.
If you haven’t played Casino Holdem before I recommend trying it out. Although the game cannot be beaten, it’s a lot of fun to learn how to play, especially if you’re a fan of Texas Holdem.
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The rest of this page will be dedicated to showing you more about Casino Holdem, including it’s short history, rules and odds.
Casino Holdem History
Knowing the history of casino holdem won’t make you a better casino holdem player, nor will it make you any more money playing the game, but you might find it interesting nonetheless.
The game hasn’t been around that long, in fact. Casino holdem was introduced in 2000 by Stephen Au-Yeung. Stephen started off as a professional gambler, initially playing backgammon and blackjack, and then poker once it made it’s way to the UK in the late 1980s. Later in life he started a new venture, Millennium Casino Games, creating new games. He has 100+ casino games credited to his name, earning him the nickname, Mr. Casino Games. Casino holdem was one of those games. It was the first Holdem variation to be played against the house.
How to Play Casino Holdem
Learning how to play Casino Holdem is simple, especially if you’ve played any form of Texas Holdem or flop poker in the past. Here is what a hand of Casino Holdem looks like:
- Each player makes an ante bet. This will be as little as $1 online, and $5 live.
- There are a couple of different progressive bets, which I’ll explain more about below. But if you wanted to make a side bet on your hand of Casino Holdem, this would be the time to do it.
- Once the wagers have been placed, each player is dealt 2 cards face up and the dealer is dealt 2 cards faced down. 3 community cards are dealt, which is known as the flop.
- At this time each player has 2 options, to fold or to raise. If you fold you forfeit your initial wager. If you decide to raise, your raise must be twice the size of your initial wager. So if your first bet was $5, then your raise must be $10, for a grand total of $15.
- After the raises have been made, two more community cards are dealt (the turn and river).
- Each player’s hand is now compared to the dealer’s. Players must use their two hole cards and 3 community cards to make a better 5-card hand than the dealer.
- In order for the dealer to “qualify,” it must have a better hand than a pair of 4s.
- If the dealer’s hand doesn’t qualify, then the player(s) win the ante bet (based on the payout table) and push/tie their raise bet (receive it back). If the dealer does qualify, than the player(s) wins the ante bet and the raise bet at 1:1 odds.
- All ties between the dealer and player is a push, and the players will receive their money back.
Casino Holdem Side Bets
There are a couple of different side bets that you can make playing Casino Holdem:
AA+ Bonus – As the name implies, players will receive a payout if they make a pair of aces or better. Here are the payouts:
- Aces to Straight = 7:1
- Flush = 20:1
- Full House = 30:1
- Four of a Kind = 40:1
- Straight Flush = 50:1
- Royal Flush = 100:1
Progressive Jackpot – This progressive jackpot works the same as any other. If you make the bet and hit one of the hands, you’ll receive a payout based on the table. The payouts will vary from site to site, but royal flushes will be 100% and then it’ll go down from there, either in percents or dollars.
Each casino will be different, so some sites will have the side bets and others won’t. You might even come across (a unique) one that we don’t have listed.
Casino Holdem Optimal Strategy
According to the Wizard of Odds there is no optimal strategy for Casino Holdem. He mentions that players should raise about 82% of the time and fold the remaining 18%.
That leaves a little to the imagination, so here is how I recommend you play:
- Raise all pairs, up/down straight draws, flush draws and gutshots with over cards.
- Raise J high hands (or better) on paired boards. For example, T-T-4 or 5-5-K.
- Raise Q high hands on everything else.
- Fold hands that have no possibility of hitting a flush or straight.
And although they’re fun, you should avoid progressives too, as it only increases the houses’ edge.
That’s all that you can do strategy-wise for Casino Holdem. The game is not beatable, so all you can do is play as close to perfect with the little info we have here and keep your losses down to the casino edge of 2%.
Basic Casino Holdem Bankroll Guidelines
I’ve created a page outlining a few tips on how to prolong your bankroll, but I wanted to stress a couple of points:
- For every wager that you make, remember that you’ll end up spending 3x it. In other words, if you want to place a $5 wager, you’ll end up spending $15 by the time the hand is completed if you see the hand to the end.
- Because of this I suggest wagering no more than 1% of your total bankroll, which will work out to about 3% if you see the hand all the way through. That means $100 minimum for online play, and $500 for live play.