Blackjack is the world's most popular casino card game. It is based on a short list of rules that are quick and easy to learn. The game is fast and a game round lasts under a minute. One's bet is either lost or doubled (with one exception). Moreover, there are clearly right and wrong or good and bad moves, so it is relatively easy to find an optimal strategy.
If you enjoy playing Texas Hold'em and are looking for another game to distract yourself a bit if you take a break, Blackjack is most likely a real option.
If, on the other hand, you've come to us because of Blackjack, but you don't play poker, we recommend that you take a look at our main section. Poker is most likely of interest to you as well.
It is the overall most popular card game in the world, and the world championship attracts tens of thousands of players to the poker capital of Las Vegas in the Nevada desert every year.
Las Vegas, however, is far away, while you are just a few clicks away from a round of online blackjack. So let's get started, and let's start dealing the cards, of course.
Online Blackjack Gameplay
Unlike Blackjack in the casino, where up to six or seven players compete against the bank at the same time, online Blackjack is basically a game between you and the - virtual - dealer only.
At the beginning, you are dealt two cards face up, while the dealer shows one card face up and one card face down. After that, you draw as many more cards as you want to achieve the game objective.
The objective of the game of Blackjack is to reach or come as close as possible to 21 points with the sum of your card values. If you have more than 21 points, your hand is dead and you have lost even before the dealer has made his move.
As you can see, the ace can take two different values. We will come to this under the heading Soft Hand / Hard Hand.
Let's assume you have your cards together and stand at 18 points, for example. Now it's the dealer's turn. He must now try to beat your 18 points without going over 21. Unlike you, however, the dealer does not have the choice of drawing cards, but must follow strictly defined rules.
These rules are usually put in writing and visible to all on the blackjack table in a single set. The most common variant and therefore the one you will encounter most often is:
Dealer must draw on 16 and must stand on 17.
Translated, this means that the dealer must draw another card if he has 16 or less points, but may not draw another card if he has 17 or more points.
If the dealer breaks the 21-point barrier with the next card, the player automatically wins. If neither the player nor the dealer has more than 21 points, the game is settled. Whoever has more points wins, in case of a tie the bets go back to the player. That's it, the next round can begin.
With that, let's move on to the additional actions available to a player: splitting and doubling down.
Double
The player can double his bet if he thinks his chances of winning are particularly promising after the first two cards. The best situation for doubling is, of course, when you have collected ten or eleven points with the first two cards, because now you get a 20 or 21 with every ten-point card - that is, both the ten and all the jacks, queens and kings.
It is important to note that after doubling down, a player is dealt only one card and that doubling down is generally only possible after the second card 8is shown. So if the third card is a low card, you have no way to improve your hand and have to hope that the dealer "overbought". The dealer does not have the option to double down.
Split
If the player's first two cards are a pair, that is, two cards of the same value, the player may decide to "split". This means that the two cards will continue to be played separately as independent hands. However, the player must now also place the base bet for the second hand if he wants to split.
Once the split is complete, the player receives a second card for each hand. Note: Multiple splitting is possible! After the second card, the player has exactly the same options as usual: buy, stand or double.
There is also an optimal strategy for splitting that involves the dealer card. As a rule of thumb, however, you can already remember the following:
Eights and Aces always split
Never split fives and tens
You can also find more information on this topic in the corresponding table.
Insurance
Insurance is an offer made by the casino to the player. If the dealer shows an ace, you as a player can "insure" yourself against the dealer drawing a blackjack. If this happens and you have accepted the insurance, you get back the loss suffered, so to speak.
Generally speaking, any guide to blackjack will ask you to decline insurance as a matter of principle. Statistically, the dealer draws blackjack too rarely, less than every third time.
Therefore, as a general rule, you should not buy insurance as a player, for purely mathematical reasons. However, advanced players can approach this issue differently. Insurance cannot increase profit, but it can limit losses. It is therefore a way for very good players to limit variance by simply eliminating one possible outcome of the game: the one that, with a good hand, you might still be caught by the dealer.
Blackjack and 21
A Blackjack is the combination of an Ace and a ten point card (Ten, Jack, Queen, King). If a player is dealt these two cards, he has drawn a Blackjack and wins immediately. The dealer does not get a turn. That is why there can never be a draw with a Blackjack.
With a Blackjack, you win at a ratio of 3:2. With any other winning game, you win at a ratio of 1:1. This also applies if you reach 21 points with more than two cards.
Special rules - which are, however, house rules, so in online blackjack depend on the online casino - can include, for example, the 5-card blackjack. This means that a combination of five or more cards that reach exactly 21 points also wins automatically. Another winning combination in some casinos is three sevens. This is an additional offer from the casino, a jackpot that can pay out up to 5000:1 if you get three sevens from one card suit. By the way, you can use different payment methods to deposit and even withdraw your jackpot, we recommend trying PayID at Australian online casinos.
If your favorite online casino offers the "Triple Seven Jackpot", it usually follows the following payout rules:
If the first card is a seven, you win 3:1.
If the first two cards are sevens, you win 50:1 if the sevens are of different suits.
If the first two cards are sevens of the same suit, you win 100:1.
If the first three cards are sevens of different suits, you win 500:1.
If all three cards are sevens of the same suit, you win the jackpot at 5000:1 odds.
Some casinos offer worse payout rates. You should avoid these casinos when it comes to blackjack.
Soft Hand - Hard Hand
As mentioned above, the Ace in Blackjack can have two different values. In this context, one speaks of a soft or hard hand. However, the principle is quite simple and works to the player's advantage.
Generally, at the beginning of the game round, the ace counts for eleven points, and the hand you play is a soft hand. However, if the case arises that you overbought, the ace is automatically downgraded to one point, so you still have a chance to get a high score.
For example, the first two cards are an ace and a five. This equals a soft 16. Now let's take a risk and draw another card. We get a ten. This brings our score to a soft 26, and we have overbought. But now the hard hand rule kicks in, and the ace only counts for one point. This brings us back to 16 points (1+5+10), which is now called a hard hand.
Card Counting in Blackjack - The Big Score?
Since the beginning of the casino era in the 19th century, the house has had an advantage over the players - the so-called house advantage. This exists so that the casino can cover its costs - and maybe a little more.
But since the house advantage exists, players try to neutralize it and, in the best case, even give themselves an advantage. There are several ways to do this, many of which fall under the heading of cheating. However, card counting in blackjack is the exception to the rule.
Although it is forbidden in casinos, it is not illegal, and those who master it can reliably win in the long run. With the invention of card counting, the game of blackjack was solved, that is, the house lost.
How to Beat The Casino
Here's how the principle works in a nutshell: the cards are divided into three groups: high, medium and low. Each group is assigned a value. The high cards - ten to ace - get the value -1, the low cards - 2-6 - get the value +1. The medium cards get the value 0.
The card counter now waits for the cards to be reshuffled. After that, the card counter has to keep track of all the cards that are dealt and count them in his mind. While he does this, he makes a few low bets so as not to attract attention. In most rounds of play, the cards will be so evenly distributed that even a card counter can't take advantage of them. However, his great hour comes when there is an imbalance and a relatively large number of small cards are played while the high cards are still in the deck. The deck "runs hot".
Now the card counter goes into action and increases his bets, since the chances of a Blackjack increase with each round of play. Of course, this doesn't always work, but in the long run, this is how the casino can be defeated.
Counter Reaction of The Casino
Of course, a casino cannot accept being deprived of its house advantage. After all, this is the basis of the company's business. That's why blackjack has long been a tug-of-war over who can book the advantage for themselves.
Among the casinos' countermeasures are the use of multiple decks of cards - starting with a single one, there are now up to eight decks in a card shoe - as well as the cut made by a randomly selected player, in which a barrier is inserted somewhere in the last third of the cards. When this is reached, the cards are reshuffled. This prevents skilled card counters from gaining an advantage as the cards slowly run out.
To this day, blackjack is also a bit of a story of a duel between casino and card counter. A particularly vivid and atmospherically dense description of card counting - and its darker side - can be found, for example, in the movie "21" with Kevin Spacey.
The most famous depiction in literary form comes from the bestseller Beat the dealer by Edward Thorp, which was published in 1962.
Today, card counting in the casino is forbidden but not illegal, and that already describes the dilemma. Remembering the cards is not cheating, which is why it is not a criminal offense. Casinos, on the other hand, use their domiciliary rights, and they are therefore allowed to expel guests from the building without giving solid reasons for doing so.
However, this does not mean that you can no longer make money by counting cards. Croupiers are not necessarily better trained today than they were 25 years ago, and budgets for camera surveillance have tended to shrink in that time.
Sitting at your computer at home, of course, you don't have to worry about being accused of card counting. So go ahead and give it a try.
Blackjack Variants
Blackjack is not just blackjack. Over the decades, a few variants have emerged that have found their way into the casino. Some of these variants are also offered in online casinos, so you better familiarize yourself with them.
Switch
Switch gives the player additional advantages. In this game you basically play two hands simultaneously and are allowed to exchange cards with each other.
Let's say you have received an A-5 and a Q-6. Now you exchange the cards and get a blackjack with A-Q and an eleven with 5-6, which is an excellent basis for the next move.
Besides that, a "natural" blackjack, i.e. a blackjack consisting of an ace and a ten/picture card, is paid out at a ratio of 1:1 and not at 3:2 as usual.
But the dealer also gets a bonus. He can't easily overbuy at Switch. If the dealer has 22 points, it's automatically considered a draw against any player at the table who doesn't show a natural Blackjack.
There is more to Switch than meets the eye. Beginners often tend to build at least one strong hand out of their two in order to beat the dealer. However, this often leads to a draw because the weak hand loses.
It follows that exchanging cards is not necessarily the best strategy. Again, the optimal play depends on which card the dealer shows. In our table you can see when you should rather continue playing without exchanging.
Blackjack Surrender
"Surrender" means "to give up", and that's exactly what it's all about. In this variant, a player may surrender his hand if he pays half the bet, either before the dealer has looked at his cards ("Early Surrender") or after ("Late Surrender").
However, in the meantime it is not quite easy to find casinos that still offer this variant (it's as hard as finding a payID casino in Australia), because it quickly turned out that this variant actually favors the player. Make sure that your favorite casino offers Blackjack Surrender only with more difficult conditions.
If you managed to do that, remember the following strategy tip! Surrender your cards exclusively in these cases: When you have 15, 16 or 17 points and the dealer holds a nine, ten or an ace. Only in these situations is it profitable to discard your cards.
Spanish 21
In this variant, the tens are missing from the card shoe. Mind you, only the tens, not all ten-point cards. This is a disadvantage for the player, but it is compensated by a few rule changes.
For example, not only Blackjack wins, but any 21-point hand, even against a dealer's Blackjack. You can still double down after splitting, and you get additional payouts for special card combinations like 6-7-8 or 7-5-4-3-2, the latter of which might seem oddly familiar to mixed-game poker players in particular, since it's the best possible hand in the 2-7 lowball variant.
Blackjack Redeal
An interesting and relatively new variant, where you have the option to have new cards dealt if you are not satisfied. This costs money if you re-deal your own cards, but not if you re-deal the dealer's cards. That is also possible.
