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. If you haven't read up on the rest of the site I'll quickly go over the different colors of chips and how they relate to the rest of the roulette rules. You trade in your checks (which most people think of as regular casino chips, but they're actually called checks) for roulette chips when a new session starts, and the dealer assigns you a number and denomination. Most roulette sessions move at a fairly slow pace, to accommodate the number of people betting, and the variety on which they can bet. 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. Split bet - you can place a single bet on two individual numbers if those numbers are beside each other on the table layout. The outside bets on a roulette board are simply the bets that reside 'outside' of the main playing area of 38 numbers. When you place an outside bet your bet must meet the table minimum.

now, let's see how to play roulette. Making a bet is easy - you just place your chip(s) on the number(s), color, or sets you want to bet on. 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. 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) Here are the different bets you can make. The house edge is the same whether you make one bet per spin or several. In most games players can continue making bets even while the ball is still spinning. Don't reach for your winnings until the dealer removes the marker, or the dealer will scold you. In other games the color of the chip denotes the denomination, but in Roulette the color denotes only which player the chip belongs to. Roulette games have minimum bets, which will be posted on a placard at the table. Remember that you can bet inside or outside if you like; there's no requirement to bet both on a given spin. All the bets on the layout carry the same house edge, with the exception of 5-number Line Bet (0, 00, 1, 2, 3), which carries a whopping 7.29% edge! The wheel has no memory. On an American wheel, there are 38 spots - numbers 1-36, plus 0 and 00. Atlantic City has a special rule which reduces the house edge to 2.7% on even money bets (Red/Black, Odd/Even, 1-18/19-36): If 0 or 00 comes up on on even money bet, you lose only half your bet. 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. On even money bets when 0 comes up, instead of losing right away, your bet is "imprisoned" and rides again for the next spin.