When you play live roulette online at NetBet, you are as close as you can get to having a casino experience without being in a real casino (unless you ARE in a real casino and you are playing on a mobile device – in which case, we salute your commitment). You have a dealer, known as a croupier, and you are playing with hundreds of other people.

It’s one of the most popular games in any casino and has been hugely popular for gamblers for hundreds of years. However, its creation has nothing to do with gambling. It is said that Blaise Pascal invented the roulette wheel while trying to create a perpetual motion machine. The idea with this is that once set in motion, the device would be heavy enough but spin smoothly enough to continue spinning forever. Of course, we now know that perpetual motion is not possible (at least, not on earth). Still, it is fortunate that Pascal’s wheel was not thrown out with all the other strange devices that did not work, but instead found a second life as a gambling game. Now live online roulette is one of the world’s favourite pastimes.

European or American

There are two types of wheel and depending on the one you choose when you play live roulette online, it can change your style of play. The difference is very simple but can make a huge difference. In Europe, there is only one green zero; in North America, there are two, one single and one double zero. This makes a small difference to your chances to win, giving you 1 in 37 for European roulette and 1 in 38 for American roulette. But this small difference can make a huge difference to the house’s chances of winning. For European, they have a 2.70% edge; for American, this grows to 5.26%. Something that you need to bear in mind when you play live roulette online.

You may think that the double zero followed the single one, but in fact it was the other way around. All casinos in the beginning had the double zero. But when Francois Blanc, one of the most important men in the history of roulette, wanted to attract customers away from the Paris salons to his ventures in Germany and Monte Carlo, he dispensed with one of the zeros to give his new players better odds. This eventually became the norm across the whole of Europe.

These are not the only changes that have been implemented. In 2016, for example, the Venetian Casino in Las Vegas introduced the first ever triple zero roulette wheel (which changes the house edge to 7.69%), which has been taken up by a few other places over the last few years. In California, games of chance with balls and dice are forbidden. So, in order to play roulette, you use cards instead. All the rules and the bets are the same, but instead of spinning a wheel to select a number, you just pick a card instead. Something to bear in mind if you want to play roulette on a budget.

La Partage and other phrases

There are a number of phrases specific to the game that you will need to learn if you want to play live roulette online. For example, there is the La Partage rule variation for live online roulette, which acts as a safety net for players. If the ball lands on the green zero (and you have not bet on it), you only lose half your stake instead of the whole thing (which cuts the house edge down to just 1.35%). En Prison is a similar variation, where your stake is ‘goes to jail’ and remains where it is until the next spin.

There are some phrases you’ll need to learn for betting too, if you want to play live roulette online seriously. Because the roulette wheel has so many betting options, it’s possible to bet on sections of it at a time. The most basic of these choices is whether you bet on red or black, or odd or even when you play live roulette online. But the rest of your options are broken down into simplified choices too. Bet on the first, second or third 10 consecutive numbers. You can even bet on two, three or four numbers with a chip simply by placing it on the lines that separate the individual numbers.

But there are three more categories of numbers you can choose when you play live roulette online, and these are divided into sections of the wheel. The 17-number section between the numbers 22 and 25 – an area that covers almost half the wheel – is known as Voisins du zéroi (neighbours of zero). The opposite section is known as Le tiers du cylinder (third of the wheel) and covers a range of 12 numbers. Finally, we have the Orphelins (orphans) which are the 12 numbers that are either side of the other sections that don’t quite fit into the first two sections.

No cheating

Live online roulette, as with the casino version of the game, is one of the most truly fair and random games that can be played. Despite this, there has long been a tradition in movies to have a ‘rigged’ roulette wheel, going all the way back to Casablanca in 1942. In that film, club owner Rick takes mercy on a young couple and recommends the young man play – twice – the number 22. In later films, with the advent of digital technology, the implication is that a corrupt dealer can press a button either in his pocket or under the table, that will cause the ball to land on a number that they specify. While this is technically possible (presumably using strong electromagnets), it would be nearly impossible to manage in practice as eagle-eyed gamblers would surely notice the ball not acting normally.

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