Nowadays, casinos are closer than they’ve ever been. You can access them from home instead of travelling long distances to reach one. Online casinos offer both virtual and live table games. If you’re a Baccarat fan, read on and explore top online Baccarat casinos.
Table games are popular worldwide. They’re available across land-based venues and on the internet alike. Roulette, dice games like Craps and Sic Bo, and card games like poker, Blackjack, and Baccarat.
What Is Online Baccarat?
Unlike poker, which requires strategic thinking, Baccarat is a card game of chance. Online Baccarat is every game of Baccarat that’s available on the internet. It can be live (hosted by a real-life dealer) or virtual (controlled by a random number generator).
Live Baccarat simulates the offline game of Baccarat. It’s streamed from a casino studio (or a land-based casino) to depict the atmosphere of a brick-and-mortar venue. It’s an interactive game — you can chat with other players and the dealer.
Virtual Baccarat doesn’t involve a dealer. Instead, it’s a random number generator that determines the outcome.
How to Play Online Baccarat?
If you’ve played Baccarat offline, you’ll quickly get used to its online version. A successful online game of Baccarat has several key factors. Firstly, you need to understand the nature of the game and its rules. Secondly, you have to choose a legitimate online casino. Lastly, if you’re a novice, you should play online Baccarat for free before you move on to real-money play. Most online casinos offer their games in demo mode. Thus, not only can you practice, but you can also have fun without taking any risks.
Speaking of modern gaming features, mobile casinos are another step forward in the industry's evolution. They’re essentially online casinos that have been optimized for mobile play. You can access them on your smartphone or tablet. So, mobile Baccarat is a game of Baccarat you can play anytime, anywhere, as long as you have your mobile device with you.
Choose the Right Casino
Real-money Baccarat is risky on its own. It’s even riskier when you play it at an unreliable casino. If a casino’s reputation is questionable, you risk having your winnings voided and your withdrawals indefinitely delayed.
Fortunately, checking a casino’s business practices isn’t challenging. When you find the one that interests you, read through its terms and conditions section. Whichever question you may have about payment terms, security, and fairness, it should provide you with the answers. If it doesn’t, or the clauses seem predatory, we advise you to continue your search.
Good online casinos are fair and secure. They generally use encryption and an RNG to meet those requirements. Additionally, they may have their games monitored by testing agencies. That’s especially important for live games since an RNG does not control them.
Good casinos also rate well on watchdog portals and among other players. Their reputation is checkable — the process calls for some time and patience.
Learn the Rules
There isn’t an actual Baccarat strategy since it’s not a strategy game. The element of chance in it is relatively strong. However, you shouldn’t dive into the game without knowing anything about it. Before you start playing, you need to know the rules, odds, and payout rates to know how to bet.
The Dealing Round
A game of Baccarat typically involves eight decks of cards. The dealer (or a random number generator) deals the cards clockwise. There are two hands — the banker’s and the player’s hand. Each of them contains two cards. You can bet on one of the three outcomes — that the banker’s hand is stronger, that the player’s hand is stronger, or that it’s a tie. For a hand to be strong, the combined value of the cards it contains has to be as close to nine as possible.
When the card shuffling is over, one card is revealed. That card indicates how many have to be “burned” (put out of play) between two dealing rounds. The rule is effective until the cards are reshuffled.
Card Values
While the card suits are important in poker, they’re irrelevant in Baccarat. There are several groups of cards, depending on the ranking. They’re all assigned a certain number of points. Tens and face cards are worth ten points. Aces have the value of one point each. All the other cards have their face value (sixes are worth six points, eights are worth eight points, and so on). When you add up the points of two cards to determine the value of a hand, you may get a two-digit number. In that case, the result will be the digit in one place. That’s why there’s no busting in Baccarat — a hand’s value can never exceed nine.
However, there can be a tie. When that happens, the hand is passed, the bets are returned, and another dealing round occurs.
Hit: What Is It and How Does It Work?
An extra card may be drawn for either of the hands. That card is a hit. It can be drawn on the following conditions:
- If one of the hands has the value of eight or nine, both of them have to stand. This is the strongest rule when it comes to hits.
- If the player’s hand is worth five points or less, they draw an additional card. Their card gets hit first in the rotation.
If the player decides to stand, the banker draws an additional card (if their starting hand is worth five points or less). However, if the player has hit, the banker’s hit doesn’t depend solely on their score - it also depends on the player’s hit card value. The following table lists all the options.
| The player’s third card | The banker draws | The banker stands |
| 9, 10, face card, Ace | 0-3 | 4-7 |
| 8 | 0-2 | 3-7 |
| 6 or 7 | 0-6 | 7 |
| 4 or 5 | 0-5 | 6-7 |
| 2 or 3 | 0-4 | 5-7 |
The Odds
Whether you’ll win your bet in Baccarat depends on luck. You bet on one of the three outcomes without knowing anything about the hands. You may say that you bet blindly. The game is unpredictable, and you can’t affect the result in any way. But that doesn’t mean you should place any bet and hope for the best. You should know every bet’s odds.
A standard game of Baccarat (with eight decks) has a house advantage of 1.06% if you bet on the banker. If you bet on the player, the house edge is slightly higher — 1.24%. The tie bet that pays eight to one has the highest house edge — 14.4%. If it pays nine to one, which is the case in most casinos in the United Kingdom, the house edge is 4.85%.
Live Dealer Baccarat vs. Virtual Baccarat
As you already know, there are two versions of online Baccarat — live and virtual. You may like the former better if you’re an old-school gaming fan. It resembles the offline game much more than virtual Baccarat does. A random number generator controls virtual Baccarat, while in a live game, the dealer deals the cards. They also dictate the pace of play. However, if you play a virtual game, you decide how fast or slow you want to play.
Another difference is the nature of the game. A live game of Baccarat is interactive — you can communicate with the dealer and other players. Live games are perfect for social gamers — they simulate the experience of being at a land-based casino, yet they’re more convenient.
The choice between the two is yours. Both versions can be fun and lucrative. Although live Baccarat is more dynamic, you may like the virtual version better.
Parting Words
Baccarat is a popular card game, so it’s available at many online casinos. However, you should be careful when it comes to real money play. Not every casino is secure and fair. Instead of risking your money more than you already do, you can explore our selection.