Beginner's Guide to Casino Bonuses

Unlike land-based casinos, there are no geographic restrictions preventing you from moving your money from one online casino to the next. So in order to attract customers, the casinos make various cash and non-cash offers, known as casino bonuses. For example, Golden Palace Casino offers new customers a 300% sign-up bonus, up to a maximum of $300.

Sign-up Bonuses

So what does this mean exactly? It is quite simple - deposit $100 and Golden Palace will credit your account with another $300 free, leaving you with $400 to play with. You are then required to wager a certain amount of money before you are allowed to withdraw the bonus - this is known as a wagering requirement. At Casino Listings we always list the wagering requirements as a multiple of the bonus amount to make the various offers easily comparable - in this case the requirements are 27xB, or 27 times the bonus amount.

We have a ranked list of the best casino sign-up bonuses available here.

After receiving a bonus you have a couple of options. The first is to use the free money and go for a huge win on a slot machine or table game with a progressive jackpot. Some of the slots on offer such as Casino on Net's Millionaire Genie have jackpots of over $1.5 million (US dollars), so this strategy can seem very appealing. If the bonus offer has doubled, tripled, or quadrupled your money then you have just multiplied your chance of winning the jackpot by the increase in your bankroll.

Bonus Clearing - playing to keep the free bonus money

The second strategy is for the patient gambler, who can take advantage of these offers and play conservatively - not with the aim of winning big, but with the aim of meeting the wagering requirements and pocketing most of the bonus money. Games such as blackjack and video poker often have, when played with a basic strategy, a very low house edge. This simply means that over a long period of time, on average you are expected to lose less than half a cent on every dollar wagered. For example, playing basic blackjack strategy on the Golden Palace $300 bonus, you can expect to end up with around $368 on average, after depositing only $100. Nice change for a couple of hours in your spare time.

As you are able to do this at multiple casinos, you can see how it can be relatively simple to build your bankroll from a $100 start into a healthy $1000. In fact there is even a term for a player who plays a conservative game exclusively for casino bonuses - a bonus whore, or as the casinos like to call them - "bonus abusers".

If this sounds like your cup of tea, check our guide to your first 5 casinos and learn how to turn $100 into more than $1000 with very little risk and time investment.

No deposit bonuses

Don't feel like risking your own cash? No problem! Many casinos offer free cash to new customers, allowing you to play for free with zero risk. These no deposit bonuses are often much smaller than the sign-up bonuses, but they can be a good way for you to have a go at online casinos without risking any of your own money.

We have a ranked, sortable, list of the best no deposit bonuses available online here.

Free play bonuses

Free play bonuses are a little different to no deposit bonuses. Casinos offering free plays give you a set amount to play with (say $1000) and then you have one hour to try to win as much as you can, up to a limit (such as $1250). Once the hour is up, whatever you win above the free $1000 is yours to play with as a regular casino bonus. This can be a good way to get to know the various games, and have a bit of fun without fear of losing any of your own cash.

Monthly and weekly bonuses

Some casinos offer monthly and even weekly bonuses in an attempt to keep their customers loyal. Clearing these bonuses can be quite an easy way of making a spare couple of hundred dollars each month if you follow our bonus clearing strategy guide.

Our list of the best monthly casino bonuses is here.

Cashable bonuses vs non-cashable bonuses

If you are allowed to keep the bonus money after meeting the wagering requirements, the bonus is termed "cashable". On the other hand, non-cashable bonuses are money the casino gives you to play with that you cannot withdraw. Cashable bonuses are generally more valuable than non-cashables, but are generally of a smaller amount.

Non-cashable bonuses are not without value though, depending on the playing strategy you prefer. If you are a slots player, then obviously a non-cashable bonus means more spins and more chances to hit a jackpot. For the bonus clearers, they can be used as "leverage" to increase your bet size at the start of a session, then if you reach a certain betting target (e.g. double your deposit, or +$100), you can then decrease your wagering to smaller amounts while clearing the bonus. We cover non-cashable bonus clearing strategy in Ed's blog article on bonus clearing strategies.

» Next up we help you through your first 5 casinos to start building your bankroll from $100 to $1000 in short order.