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A 17% House Edge Explained

A house edge of 17% means the casino keeps 17% of every amount wagered, on average: 170 of every 1,000 you stake, with 83% coming back to you.

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What a 17% edge costs

Wagered	Expected loss	Expected return
100	17	83
1,000	170	830
10,000	1,700	8,300
100,000	17,000	83,000

These are averages over a long run of bets. Any single session can end well above or well below them, but the more you wager, the closer the result sits to these figures.

What it does to the payout

A fair game pays exactly the reciprocal of the win chance, so a 50% chance pays 2 for 1. A house edge shaves every payout by 17%.

Win chance	Fair payout	Pays at a 17% edge
50%	2x	1.66x
25%	4x	3.32x
10%	10x	8.3x
1%	100x	83x

Are you ahead after a lot of bets?

Take an even-money bet at this edge: it wins 41.5% of the time. This is the chance of being ahead, meaning more wins than losses, after a number of bets, which is the best case for the player.

Bets	Chance you are ahead
10	19.24%
100	3.461%
1,000	2.54 × 10^-6%
10,000	4.05 × 10^-64%

The more you play, the closer your result gets to the expected loss and the less likely it is that you are ahead. A house edge feels harmless over ten bets and decisive over ten thousand.

Which games have a 17% edge?

Edges differ from game to game and from site to site, which is exactly why it is worth checking the figure before you play. A site that publishes it makes comparison easy.

How to check a site’s house edge

Look for a stated return-to-player (RTP) or house edge on every game, and check that the payouts match it: win chance multiplied by payout should equal the return. If the figure is missing, or the payouts do not add up to it, you cannot compare that game with anything. On Cryptoflip the Wheel states its chance as a formula and every result can be verified on the provably fair page.

Other house edges

Every spin can be checked. The roll for each Wheel spin comes from an HMAC of a server seed committed in advance, your client seed and a nonce, so the result cannot be chosen after you bet. How to check one is on the provably fair page.