Every casino game carries a number that tells you exactly how expensive it is to play. It’s called RTP, It’s published on every game, in the info panel, before you stake anything.
Here’s what the figure actually means, what it doesn’t mean, and the maths behind it.
What RTP is
RTP is return to player. It’s the share of everything staked on a game that the game is built to pay back over the very long run.
A slot with 96% RTP returns £96 for every £100 staked and keeps £4. That £4 is the house edge, which is just RTP subtracted from 100%.
The number isn’t a guess or a marketing claim. It’s a mathematical property of how the game is built, calculated from the reels, the paytable and the bonus features, and tested before the game is allowed on a UK-licensed site.
What it costs you per £100 staked
The useful way to read RTP is as a price. This is the expected cost of putting £100 through a game, across the long run.
| RTP | House edge | Expected cost per £100 staked |
|---|---|---|
| 98% | 2% | £2 |
| 97% | 3% | £3 |
| 96% | 4% | £4 |
| 95% | 5% | £5 |
| 94% | 6% | £6 |
| 92% | 8% | £8 |
The word doing the work there is “staked”, not “deposited”. Put £20 in, win some, lose some, keep spinning, and you can easily stake £200 off a £20 deposit. The house edge applies to all £200.
So at 96% RTP, £200 staked has an expected cost of £8. Your £20 lasts a while, which is exactly what a well-tuned RTP is designed to do.
What RTP doesn’t tell you
RTP is a long-run average across every player and every spin ever made on that game. It is not a forecast of your session.
Play 100 spins on a 96% RTP slot and you might double your money. You might lose every spin. Both are entirely normal. The percentage only becomes reliable across millions of spins, which is the operator’s timescale, never a player’s.
This is why “high RTP” is a weak reason to pick a game. A 97% slot is marginally cheaper per pound staked than a 95% one, and that is the entire extent of the advantage.
Volatility is the other number
Two games can share an identical 96% RTP and feel completely different to play.
A low-volatility slot pays small amounts often. Your balance drifts down slowly with frequent small wins. A high-volatility slot pays rarely and large: long dead runs punctuated by the occasional big hit. Same expected cost per £100, wildly different experience, and a much wider spread of outcomes on the high-volatility game.
High volatility is the riskier choice for a fixed budget. It’s more likely to empty a balance quickly, and more likely to produce the big win people remember. Many games label their volatility in the info panel.
Table games have a house edge too
Casino table games work on the same principle, and the maths is simpler to see. European roulette is the clearest example.
The wheel has 37 pockets: 1 to 36 plus a single zero. Bet on red and there are 18 winning pockets and 19 losing ones. Over 37 spins of £1 you’d expect to win 18 and lose 19, leaving you £1 down on £37 staked.
That’s 1/37, or 2.70%. The house edge on every standard European roulette bet is the same 2.70%, whichever way you bet.
| Game | Typical house edge | Equivalent RTP |
|---|---|---|
| Blackjack (good rules, optimal play) | around 0.5% | around 99.5% |
| Baccarat, banker bet | 1.06% | 98.94% |
| Baccarat, player bet | 1.24% | 98.76% |
| European roulette (single zero) | 2.70% | 97.30% |
| American roulette (double zero) | 5.26% | 94.74% |
| Online slots | varies by game | check the info panel |
Two things worth pulling out of that table. Blackjack’s low edge depends entirely on playing every hand correctly; play on instinct and it rises sharply. And American roulette costs almost twice as much as European for an identical-looking game, purely because of the extra zero.
Where to find the number
Open the game’s information or help panel, usually behind a menu or an “i” icon. The RTP is listed there, often alongside the volatility rating and the paytable.
UK-licensed operators have to make it available before you play. Ours is there on every game.
The honest summary
RTP tells you the price of the entertainment. It doesn’t tell you whether you’ll win, and no RTP figure available anywhere makes a casino game a way to make money, because every single one is below 100%.
What it’s genuinely useful for is understanding that a session has an expected cost, that the cost is driven by total stakes rather than your deposit, and that the number is knowable before you start.
Playing safely. Casino games are designed to make money for the operator over time, including ours. They should be entertainment you can afford to lose, never a way to make money or chase a loss.
DragonBet offers deposit limits, reality checks and self-exclusion tools to every customer. If gambling is causing you problems, free confidential help is available from GambleAware on 0808 8020 133, and you can block yourself from all UK-licensed online operators through GAMSTOP.
18+.
More explainers
Read the UK rules on online slots, live casino explained, or browse everything in our Explained section.
House edge figures are standard published calculations for these games. Blackjack varies with house rules and player decisions. Correct as of 13 August 2026.
