What is a Casino Wagering Requirement? A Complete Guide

Yes, we’re going to introduce you to the “basics of gambling” again. 😉 And you have three options:

1️⃣ If you consider yourself an all-knowing player who perfectly understands tricky definitions, there’s no point in reading further.

2️⃣ If you don’t suffer from a big-head like in the first case and want to refresh your knowledge, reading is recommended.

3️⃣ If you’re a newbie and still don’t know what a wager is and why it’s scary,  read and re-read .

Unlike types of bonuses, the wager itself comes in only one form, which definitely simplifies understanding how it works. For clarity, let’s take a current casino bonus offer:

For the first deposit the player gets 100% up to 7000 rubles and 100 free spins. Wager X50. I’ve always liked promos like that, 😋 well, they look very attractive, but sometimes only until you start reading the “fine print”.

Yes, I get it, it’s hard, you want to deposit and smash the casino right away. But pull yourself together and read the bonus rules. So, in this case we’re interested in the wager, namely:

By the way, wager is sometimes called “otygrysh” in Russian, which sounds nicer to RU players.

Having figured out which amount is subject to wagering requirements, let’s calculate the wager itself:

So you need to place bets totaling 175 thousand rubles and only after that can you withdraw funds from the casino, if there’s anything to withdraw, of course.

To calculate the wagering requirement you need to find out which amount the wager applies to. Then multiply the bonus amount by the numeric value of the wager. Don’t be scared by the resulting sums, and believe, 💪 that it’s all possible.

🔁 The process of meeting a wager

Overall the wagering process is very concise, apparently designed so the player won’t be distracted by various mental processes while playing.

Seems simple: make a deposit, mash the spin button and hope to clear the wager.😝

Hope is good.👈 But most players exhibit 🤪 extreme optimism during play, which blocks the ability to think rationally. Which is exactly what the folks at online casinos decided to exploit. They figured the wagering contribution would vary across games, then they thought some more and set zero contribution in certain games.😦
Of course, they put on a decent face and listed all those games in the bonus rules. By the way, some online casinos have this rule covering more than 100 slots.

⁉ Why is it dangerous to play slots with reduced wagering contribution? When you spin for, say, 100 rubles, only 10 rubles counts toward the wager. So if you play slots with that restriction, the wager will effectively grow 10 times. And you’ll get noticeably older by the time you finish meeting it.👴

But that still wasn’t effective enough, players still managed to clear bonuses. So a list of forbidden games appeared. If you place a bet in such a game, the casino may be entitled to forfeit your winnings.

Don’t be sad, all….

😢 Calm down, wipe your tears.  The wager can still be cleared  and it’s not as 😠 brutal as it may seem. First of all  you need to choose not only a reliable but also a reasonable online casino, or rather an establishment with acceptable wagering requirements. 

Of course, no casino will let you play slots that, in their opinion, facilitate stable clearing of the wager (and it’s not a myth, such slots do exist). So they’ll put them on some restriction list.

BUT how does a reasonable site act? It automatically restricts a player’s access to forbidden slots if they have an active bonus. That’s much more convenient than opening a “list of 100+ slots” and checking it every time you switch games.

If you don’t consider slots a legitimate option and play only table games, and somehow want to clear a bonus – it’s hard but possible. The easiest solution is to take a bonus for table games. Yes, such promos exist, they’re rare, but they do exist. In those promotions players can meet wagering requirements in table games.

Conclusion

If you want to take advantage of a casino bonus, first of all pay attention to the size of the wager and which amount it applies to.

👍👉Simple rule: lower is better and only applied to the amount of the bonus given.

Familiarize yourself with the 📃 list of games where ✖ it is forbidden to clear the bonus and ask the 🧙 casino support whether there is an automatic restriction blocking games from that list while an active bonus is on the account.