Close to 100% of your wagers can be paid out when playing Video poker. So why do online casinos offer this game you ask? Well because the average player follows his gut feel and whims and this does not pay off. Your play can be stretched out significantly, until you have a lucky strike by following the basic strategy. A Royal Flush would be considered lucky. Keep scrolling down for a brief strategy to help you enjoy the game of video poker.

In order for a payout your original versions of Poker required Two Pair or Better. By increasing the payout schedule to include a high pair, Business boomed. After this change, numerous different versions evolved. To play video poker is easy. After you have placed your bet, which is one to five coins, the initial five cards are dealt. You now choose which of the five cards, if any you wish to keep after which you draw replacement cards to obtain your final hand. You will get paid according to the value of your final hand as the video poker machine will recognize the ranking once all your cards have been dealt. The only strong advice we have is that you should always play for maximum coins as the payout line always rewards such play!

Although the odds are NOT affected by the type of software, each casino has their own band of software that they use which in turn affects the game diversity that they may offer. Casinos CAN adjust the odds though and are not dependent on the software. Therefore we do advise that you compare odds (pay tables) so that you can play with the best odds. We have set up an example of a Jacks or Better machine below:

Machine Return
9 for a full house / 6 for a flush = 99.5%
8 for a full house / 5 for a flush = 97.4%
7 for a full house / 5 for a flush = 96.3%
6 for a full house / 5 for a flush = 95.2%

By looking at the table above it means that you should only play where the 9/6 pay tables exist. Because of the advent of multihand games however, many casinos have moved to, for example, 8/5 for the 100 hand game. Should you get a 100 hand machine where the 9/6 exists then play it and then you can see why the odds have been reduced by so many of the casinos. Remember though that pay tables differ by game type too. However by simply looking at the pay tables you can play and have far better payouts rates and therefore extend the number of hands you can play. Quite a few of my friends have preferred playing bonus video poker where the odds are higher for getting 4 of a kind for specific denominations. However for me, I prefer Deuces Wild, but then there are those that prefer Joker Poker, so it simply is a matter of finding the game that you enjoy the most. That's why the "Play for Fun" mode was invented!