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. Each roulette table moves in sessions, each session is associated with a spin of the wheel and that spin's result. A session ends when the ball lands where it may, and the dealers clear the board of losing bets (and pay winning ones of course) All of your chips of the same color are worth the same amount. Most roulette sessions move at a fairly slow pace, to accommodate the number of people betting, and the variety on which they can bet. After the ball has started spinning, the dealer will wave his hands across the table and say 'no more bets'. Street bet - this is a bet not unlike a split. It allows you to bet on three different numbers with the same bet. Fiver number bet - there is only one five number bet available. When you place an outside bet your bet must meet the table minimum. There are the different types of outside bets.

We've added blue circled letters to the diagram to point out how to make the not-so-obvious bets (the sets of 2-6 numbers) Then he'll scoop up all the losing bets towards the dealer area. That way if two players bet on the same number (or set of numbers), then the dealer knows who to pay, and arguments can't arise over who bet what. That's because if you're betting only inside and someone else is betting only outside, he can give you both the same color chips and there won't be any confusion. If you're asked Inside or Outside, always answer "Both", even if you only intend to bet one or the other. There's no advantage to limiting yourself to inside or outside. For outside bets, any bet you make has to be the table minimum. 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. Black and Red still have equal chances of hitting. Here's another example: Since there are 38 slots on the wheel, we expect any given number to hit 1 out of 38 spins on average. 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. It's more important to know what the house edge is, than how to calculate it, but here's a quick analysis in case you're interested. The difference between the true odds and what they actually pay you is 2/38, or 5.26%. The European wheel has a lower house edge (2.63%) because it has only 37 slots instead of 38 (no 00) If you win the second spin, your bet is "released from prison" and you get it back.