It would be easy to think online gambling sites are rigged, especially by anyone who has just experienced a particularly bad losing streak. It is quite normal to wonder if the odds were unfairly, or even illegally, stacked against the losing player. Everyone knows that ‘the house always wins’ but that phrase doesn’t mean what many believe it to. Yes, the house ensures it always has a winning edge, but that edge is small. A typical winning edge amounts to somewhere between 3% and 10%.

All online gambling sites are required to be licensed. This means the sites must adhere to strict standards, which includes providing fair odds of winning, and ensuring that the players’ information is kept secure. Anyone considering risking their money on an online gambling site should do some research first. That research should include reading reviews by other online players, checking to make sure that the site’s license is current, checking that strong measures are taken to keep personal information secure, and that there is a good customer service provided should a player have a problem. By being licensed any report of a deviation from the rules that govern that license will be investigated and if found to be true, the licensee may have their license revoked and may be banned from applying for a new one. This helps to keep online gambling sites honest.

Many sites offer a free trial period where the player is given ‘play money’ to gamble with. There are several reasons a site will offer such a trial, the main one being to provide the player with a good experience so that once the trial period has ended and the play money has been spent the player will then go on to become a member and play with real money. The prospective member should use this free trial period to take a good look around the site, determine whether it offers the type of games the player likes, and addresses the aforementioned concerns regarding license, personal information security and customer service.

The duty of the online gambling site to its players is to provide a fun experience. This is done by ensuring the player always has a good range of fun and exciting games to play, with jackpots that are enticing. The addition of new games periodically will also help to keep members coming back to try their hand at winning. Members need to have a fair chance of winning to ensure they will return, but given that the odds of winning come down to simple mathematics and not rigging, it all comes down to luck or how well the player plays.

As large amounts of money exchange hands between players and the ‘house’ every hour, there simply is no need for a reputable site to introduce rigging. The ‘house’ always has that small edge that ensures that it makes money. The jackpot size is relevant to the money spent on any one game and is never more than the house can afford. Players will always try to come up with methods to ensure they win more often, but at the end of the day mathematics will always win out. It is simply a numbers game. Provided an online site is being operated effectively sufficient money will be made and rigging of games would not even be a consideration.

So are online gambling sites rigged? For the most part there is no rigging going on, however there is always the chance that an unknown site could try to do so. Online gambling sites are being created daily as owners hope to cash in on their growing popularity. Some of these sites are slapped up quickly, and do not have licenses.

These sites may rig the games as they are not being governed by license standards, and therefore should be avoided at all costs. This type of site is often eventually found to be operating illegally and is shut down, but the owners will just turn around and create another similar site. That is why it is always vitally important that prospective players do their due diligence and ensure that they only gamble their money on reputable sites.