Roulette

Roulette is the cleanest illustration of house edge in the casino, because the mechanism is visible. The wheel has 37 or 38 pockets. The payouts are calculated as though it had 36. The difference is the entire margin, and it applies identically to every bet on the layout.

That last point is what makes roulette simple and what makes roulette systems futile. On a single-zero wheel, a straight-up number, a corner, and red/black all carry exactly the same 2.70% edge. Combining them changes nothing, because the edge is a property of each bet, not of the pattern.

There are exactly two decisions in roulette that affect your expected loss: which wheel you play (single zero costs half what double zero costs) and whether the table offers la partage or en prison on even-money bets (which halves it again).

Guides

Roulette Payouts and Odds Every roulette bet with its payout, true odds and house edge, on both single-zero and double-zero wheels — and the arithmetic that shows why they are all identical except one.

American vs European Roulette One extra pocket doubles the house edge. The wheel layouts, the numbers, and how to tell which table you are at before you buy in.