In the online casino world, there is one game that has seemingly stood the test of time and remained an ever-present popular fixture, that being blackjack. This game is rooted in history, having its origins dating all the way back to the 1700s in France. The game has some distinct rules and gameplay, and with a proper blackjack cheat sheet, all of the probabilities, rules and side bets will be fully explained for both new and experienced players. This blackjack cheat sheet is relatively similar to some of the sports betting guides we have on sight, and this could potentially teach you how to play online blackjack better.
How Does Blackjack Work?
Before delving into any specific strategies or ways you could win at online blackjack, we must first delve into the general concept of blackjack itself. At the beginning of each blackjack hand, players select a stake to play with. Following this, players are dealt two initial cards, with the dealer also giving themselves a single card.
Each of the cards in blackjack has their own value, with numbered cards having a value representative of their face value, and the card royals having a value of 10. The ace is the only card which is different from this, with the ace either being valued at 1 or 10, depending on the other hands that are currently in the player’s hand.
From here, players can choose to either stand, hit, double down or split. A hit means the player takes another card, standing refers to staying with your hand value, doubling down includes taking one final card whilst also doubling your stake and a split means the initial hand is split into two separate ones should they be the same.
How To Win At Online Blackjack
Now that you understand the game as a whole, you may be wondering how to win at online blackjack. The overall aim of blackjack is to get a hand value of 21, or as close to it as possible, all without exceeding it and going bust. However, players must also beat the dealer’s hand value in order to win at online blackjack.
This is the general concept of how to win at online blackjack, but there are a number of alternative side bets which could also be selected should you wish to do this in another way. One of the most popular side bets is ‘Perfect Pairs’. As its name implies, this refers to the player placing a stake that their hand will contain two matching cards before they are actually dealt. The odds for perfect pairs often differ depending on the casino, however, this side bet is usually valued at 25/1.
Another popular side bet in online blackjack is insurance bets. An insurance bet involves the player placing a stake on the dealer to have a blackjack from their two initial cards. Although you can’t exactly make profit from this side bet with it only returning your initial stake, however, it provides protection if the dealer initially draws a 10 or ace.
The final side bet you could use to potentially win at online blackjack is the ‘21+3’ bets. These side bets combine the player’s two initially dealt cards with the dealer’s upturned card to create a 3 card poker hand. Should these 3 cards form a flush, three of a kings, straight flush or a straight, this could result in various returns depending on the rarity of the poker hand.
Although these options have their own odds, learning how to win at online blackjack with these can still be tricky due to them still remaining completely luck bases. However, in the following section of this blackjack cheat sheet, we will be breaking down bust rates based on certain hand values as well as when you should stand, hit and double down.
Online Blackjack Tips & Strategies
One of the first online blackjack tips we will be touching upon is understanding the odds of busting on certain hand values. Depending on your hand value, there are different chances of busting should you choose to take another card. These percentages are as follows:
- Hitting on 21 – 100% of busting.
- Hitting on 20 – 92% of busting.
- Hitting on 19 – 85% of busting.
- Hitting on 18 – 77% of busting.
- Hitting on 17 – 69% of busting.
- Hitting on 16 – 62% of busting.
- Hitting on 15 – 58% of busting.
- Hitting on 14 – 56% of busting.
- Hitting on 13 – 39% of busting.
- Hitting on 12 – 31% of busting.
- Hitting on 11 or lower – 0% chance of going bust.
When combining these bust percentages you could then determine whether or not to hit on a hand. Another of the online blackjack tips you could use is learning which hand values to hit on. The general rule is for players to hit when holding a hand valued between 10-16, whilst standing on anything 17 or over.
Paying attention to the dealer’s hand is another one of the blackjack online tips we recommend. If the dealer initially turns over a hand value lower than 9, this could increase your chances should you choose to hit or stand as they cannot hit blackjack with a single card. The dealer has their own bust probabilities based of their face card, with these percentages being:
- Ace – 17% of busting.
- 2 – 35% of busting.
- 3 – 37% of busting.
- 4 – 40% of busting.
- 5 – 42% of busting.
- 6 – 42% of busting.
- 7 – 26% of busting.
- 8 – 24% of busting.
- 9 – 23% of busting.
- 10 – 23% of busting.
All in all, we hope this insight into the game of blackjack, its side bets and the probabilities have helped you understand how to win at online blackjack. Despite these online blackjack tips sometimes having statistics and probabilities to back them up though, the outcome of each game is still completely reliant on luck and change, with these tips purely helping you make more informed decisions. However, if you want to learn more about other online casino games and how to increase your knowledge on them, we here at OddsMonkey have a whole array of betting calculators that could come in handy, such as the aptly named Blackjack Strategy Calculator.
