How to Play Online Slot Machines

Learn how slots work. Despite the seeming variety, the general rules of every slot are the same. Almost every slot has reels, symbols, and paylines. Advanced video slots also have special symbols, like wilds and scatters, that enhance your gameplay, activate special features like bonus rounds and free spins, and grant extra winnings. Here’s a short glossary:

• Reel - a vertical line where symbols are located. Usually there are 3-5 reels in a slot, and each reel fits 3-5 symbols.
  

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• Symbol - basically, any image that is used to create a winning combination along the payline.
  

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• Payline - a virtual line that goes across the reels, usually from left to right. A win occurs when you get a certain number of matching symbols on an active payline as indicated in the game’s help screen.
  

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• Wild symbol - a so-called Joker in slots that substitutes other symbols to create a winning combination. For example, if you get three Cherry symbols and a Wild on an active payline, it counts as four Cherries.
  

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• Scatter symbol - a special symbol in advanced slots. The special thing about it is that it doesn’t have to appear on an active payline to trigger a win. It may be “scattered” across the reels. In most cases it also activates some kind of bonus round.
  

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• Bonus round - a mini-round within a slot game that grants extra winnings. It may be a simple “pick one of the three chests” game, where your pick determines the win amount, a complex multilevel videogame-like experience with shooting aliens, or anything in-between.
  

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• Free spins - another form of a bonus, where you get a number of spins that don’t reduce your balance. It sometimes comes with additional features like extra Wild symbols, win multipliers, etc.
  

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Find a reliable slot-heavy online casino. Almost every online casino these days has slot machines in its game library. However, there are casinos that specialize on slots, offering thousands of those from various developers. They also make it easy for you to find the slot you want by filtering the games by themes, features, and paylines. As for reliability, you should check the casino’s licenses, terms and conditions, bonus policy, and the Return to Player rate. There are portals that review casinos and assign them ratings based on the casino’s quality and trustworthiness, you may Google those as well.

Check our the slots collection and play in demo mode. Most online casinos allow you to try out their games without registration. Browse around the casino, find the Slots section, try out some of the games. If you find something that interests you and feel like playing for real - proceed to registration.

Register at the casino. The registration process is usually very simple and requires you to fill in your email and personal details like post address, date of birth, and full name. The casino needs this information to verify your identity in order to pay out the winnings, so make sure the information is correct.

Choose a slot. While you can choose whichever game you like based on your personal preferences, there are two things you should keep in mind - RTP and Variance.

• RTP - stands for Return to Player. This is a theoretical percentage a game gives back to players in the long term. For example, if the RTP of a slot is 97%, it means that for every €100 wagered it returns €97 as payouts, keeping €3 in the casino. Note that this number doesn’t necessarily apply to your particular gaming session, but rather to billions of spins made by all players in total in the lifespan of the game. You may win €1000, and it would mean that a hundred other players lost €10 each. The opposite is also true. Good casinos usually publish this information somewhere on the website. Some slots also have this information available in the game rules.
• Variance - this is basically how often a slots pays out. Low variance slots pay smaller winnings often. High variance slots are the opposite: you may not get any wins for a while, but when the win comes - it’s big. This may result in the same overall RTP, so it’s just a matter of personal preference.

Play! Now it’s time to spin. The controls in slots are fairly simple, so you shouldn’t have any trouble figuring them out. Check the paytable to see the highest paying symbols and paylines, adjust your bet size, and click the spin button - that’s all it takes.