What Are The Odds Of Winning A Slot Machine Jackpot

Progressive jackpot slots are the most exciting casino games. A chance to win a life-changing sum of money will undoubtedly get everyone's attention (and bankroll). But progressive slot machines are far from a good investment; in most situations, they're the worst possible slots you can play, and they will suck your wallet dry faster than any other casino game.

  • On many slot machines, the 5-coin bet pays out a higher percentage on the top fixed jackpot. For instance, a 1-coin bet might pay $200, a 2-coin bet might pay $400, a 3-coin bet might pay $600, and a 4-coin bet might pay $800.
  • Basically, when it comes to slot machines, strategy boils down to this: Know the rules, your probability of winning, and the expected payouts; dispel any myths; and quit while you’re ahead. If you win $100, cash out $50 and play with the rest, for example. After you lose a certain amount (determined by you in advance), don’t hesitate to quit.
  • If you have four jackpot symbols on each reel, your chances of hitting a winning combo drastically lower to 4/20 x 4/20 x 4/20 = 12 / 8,000 = 1 in 666. But most online slots have five reels, which puts the possible combinations into the millions.
  • The more people play them, the higher the jackpot amount. However, because of the number of people vying for that jackpot, your odds of winning at progressive machines are lower than fixed machines. Among flat-top machines, the overall odds are generally similar, no matter how high the jackpot is.

Jackpots may often seem close but not quite there - this happens because a slot machine's wheels are weighted differently. The first reel is the lightest and the last one is the heaviest - from the first reel to the last one, the odds of getting a jackpot become worse and worse.

Jackpot 6000 is a thrilling classic slot machine from NetEnt with a real old-school vibe. You can play with up to 5 paylines active, betting between 1 and 10 coins per spin. It is highly recommended to play with the maximum bet of 10 coins however, as this creates the possibility of triggering Supermeter mode.

Types of Jackpots

Casinos have fixed and progressive jackpot slots. With fixed jackpot slots (or 'flat-top slots'), there's usually an incentive to play with maximum coins because the jackpot is bigger relative to the bet than if you made any bets other than with maximum coins. Two examples:

Slot MachineBetsJackpots
Double Diamond Deluxe$0.25/$0.50/$0.75800/1,600/2,500
The Phantom of the Opera$0.25/$0.50/$0.751,000/2,000/5,000
Winning

So a simple yet effective rule is to always bet the maximum when playing flat-top slot machines.

Flat-top slots have a lower house edge than progressive slots and you will win more often (in other words, have a higher hit frequency) since a smaller portion of total payback comes from the jackpot (in flat-tops, this is often around 2% but in a progressive jackpot like Megabucks it's around 10%).

With progressive jackpots slots, a certain percentage of each pot is added to the jackpot and the jackpot increases until someone hits it, after which it re-starts. Because a portion of the bet goes to the jackpot (and not the casino), the house edge is often over 10%, possibly close to 20%.

In fact, in Megabucks 10% of the bet goes to the jackpot, and then the casino must make something on top of that, so the payback is well under 90%.

Progressive jackpots may be high enough to make it worthwhile to play them, however, there's no telling when this is the case since casinos aren't required to share payback information for individual slots.

Winning

If you do play them, always bet the maximum amount of coins in order to compete for the jackpot (just like with flat-top slots).

Progressive slot machines can be divided into three categories:

  1. Stand-alone slots:
    Individual progressive slots, not linked to any other machines. Instead of having a fixed jackpot, a percentage of each bet goes to the machine's own jackpot. Obviously the jackpot is smaller than with machines that are linked to each other.
  2. Local slots:
    A group of slot machines linked together in a casino or in properties of the same gaming company. For these machines, the jackpots are already big, but not necessarily in millions of dollars.
  3. Wide-area slots:
    These machines aren't just linked locally but between several casinos in several states; one example being Megabucks, in which the jackpot can become eight figures (as of right now, it's slightly over $11 million.)

There are also multi-level progressive slot machines, in which the player gets to decide which level of jackpot he or she wishes to play for. Obviously, you can win more often by playing lower level progressives and vice versa.

What Are The Odds Of Hitting A Slot Machine Jackpot

Popular Progressive Slots

You can participate in real money slots with progressive prizepools at casinos like Slotland, Spin Palace and Loco Panda. By the way, I've also written about USA slots, Aussie slots and United Kingdom slots.

Following is a list of popular progressive slot machine - this is not a comprehensive list of progressive jackpot slots, just examples of some of the machines that I know of. There are many more but these are some of the biggest.

More information:

When you play the slots you want to do your part to increase your chances of winning the jackpot. If you want to find a loose slot machine then you will find these tips to be helpful to you. The first thing you want to realize is the slots games do win at random and this means you should never count on a slot machine to produce certain results, but this doesn’t mean there aren’t some things you can do that will help you to increase your chances of winning. Below are 5 tips that will help you with finding loose slot machines to hit a jackpot.

  1. The first tip that will help you to increase your chances of hitting a jackpot is to time the machines. If you are in a land based casino playing the slots then you can simply sit near the slot machine you are timing and watch the results. However, you do want to make sure you are playing while you are timing that machine otherwise you can look like you are up to something and this will make the other players uneasy. If you are watching a certain machine and you see that it is getting a lot of attention and has yet to pay out a bog win then this is an indication that it should be getting close to paying out some nice wins soon. If this is the case, then you want to be the next person to jump on that machine when the person playing it steps away from it. If you are playing at an online casino then you want to watch for the announcements which many of the casinos post to let you know about recent big wins. If a slot machine has just paid out a large jackpot then you should give it some time before playing it.
  2. Another thing you want to keep in mind is the slot machines will have their cycles. There is not a game out there that will remain tight forever and at some point that machine is going to pay out big and you want to be the player that is playing it when this happens. If a game has been tight for a good length of time then it will reach a point where it will payout some nice sized wins, generally pretty much in a row. So, if you get on a game and it pays out a nice win don’t assume that is it and leave that game, stick around for a while and see if it has more to give. Many times you will see that pattern happen which will lead to you seeing quite a few bigger wins in a row.
  3. You should stay away from playing the slot machines that aren’t popular with the players. You want to play a game that has been getting a lot of attention from players. It is the more popular games that have a better chance of becoming loose and offering you the results you are looking forward to. By getting on a stale and less popular slots game you can waste your money only to find that the machine has nothing good to offer you in the way of decent wins. Plus, these games tend not to be very entertaining and are generally the ones that lack those special features which add both more excitement and chances for you to win.
  4. Another tip you want to keep in mind is not to fall into a trap of playing a game for too long. If the game is just keeping you going and giving you enough wins along the way to give you a false sense of hope then you want to realize that the game may not be getting loose and should be one you should stop playing. The best way for you to approach a game that is doing this to you is to stop playing it for a while and return to it in a little while. The best way to think about this is it’s like you are letting other players loosen it up for you and then you are returning when it’s closer to hitting. You never want to sit at one slots game and watch it take your money all the way down.
  5. Another great tip you want to follow is to play the high limit slots games. These games may cost you more to play, but they also pay out more. Plus, they tend to pay out more often. However, you will really need to watch your bankroll when you are on the high limit slots. If you are a player who is used to playing the regular slots then you need to be extra cautious when you switch to the high limit games because your money will go much faster and if you don’t watch it closely you could be in for a big surprise. However, when you want to find looser slots games, these will be your best bet.

What Are The Odds Of Winning A Slot Machine Jackpots

Conclusion

When you want to find the loose slot machines and hit a jackpot you should follow the tips listed above. Always make sure you start out with a good money management plan and follow it. You should also make sure you have a good time. This way, you will enjoy your time playing no matter what the results end up being. With so many different types of slots games for you to choose from you should find many of them that will meet your own individual slots gaming needs. Don’t be afraid to leave a game that isn’t winning and which you feel isn’t going to hit any time soon. A lot of players get trapped into thinking that it will be just their luck that they will stop playing the game and it will payout big as soon as they leave it and this can be a costly way of thinking.