The first thing you should know before you learn anything about the bets you can make, is when and how you can make those bets. At this point the dealer will say 'place your bets' and everyone at the table will start throwing chips down like crazy. Just sit back and let the ball fall where it may. On inside bets, the total of all of your bets must add up to at least the table minimum. Straight-up bet - this is the classic roulette bet. Choose any one of the 38 numbers and put your chips down on that number for the chance to win back at 35 to 1. Corner bet - lets you bet on four adjoining numbers. Placing your chips at the point where four numbers meet will indicate you want a corner bet. Fiver number bet - there is only one five number bet available. This is different than inside bets, where the total of all of your inside bets must meet the table minimum. Low or High - this bet lets you predict whether you think the next number to come up will be part of the range from 1 to 18, or part of the range from 19 to 36. Columns - at one end of the set of 38 numbers are boxes with the words '2 to 1' written in them.

For most bets it's fairly obvious - you can't miss the Red diamond for Red bets, and things like Even, 1-18, and 1st 12 are written out in plain English. You don't have to make just one kind of bet for each spin, you can make several, and you win if the ball lands on any of your numbers. Then he'll scoop up all the losing bets towards the dealer area. New players often have to be told this repeatedly the first time they play because they kept forgetting and because they're excited about collecting their winnings. There's no advantage to limiting yourself to inside or outside. When you buy in, tell the dealer what denomination you want. Minimum bets work differently for inside and outside bets. Inside bets can usually be as small a you like, as long as the total of all your inside bets is the table minimum. Remember that you can bet inside or outside if you like; there's no requirement to bet both on a given spin. It most other games a bet usually wins only even money, but Roulette gives you the chance to win 35 times your bet (a winning bet placed on a single number) In this way, Roulette is more like slots - one single bet can win a lot. The wheel has no memory. You can certainly switch to another number if you want, but that won't improve or worsen your chances. The chances of #27 coming up on a given spin are the same, whether it just come up on the last spin or not - 1 in 38. European games have an option called en prison which reduces the house edge to 1.35%, but it's generally not available in the U.S., even in casinos that use the European wheel. You don't get paid for the win, though, but it's better than losing it outright. In effect, this variation has the ability to turn a loss into a tie.