Online casino bonuses are a great way to pad your bankroll with extra cash. However, there are always terms and conditions for any bonus that have to be met before you can withdraw the bonus and any money won with it. When you’re on any online casino’s promotions page, you can click on the bonus offer to see the terms and conditions.
However, that’s not always the case. Sometimes it will just show a few things such as the wagering requirement. However, it is vital that you read all the terms and conditions, so you know everything about the bonus. You may have to check the Terms and Conditions link or check out the FAQ section to get all the bonus info.
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While the wagering requirement and time limits are the two most important conditions of a bonus, there’s more that players are often unaware of. We will go over two of these as well as maximum wins, game exclusion, and game contribution percentage.
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Wagering Requirement
The wagering requirement for a bonus is the number of times you have to play through the bonus in order to withdraw money. So, if a bonus offer has 100% up to $200 with a wagering requirement of 30x it means you must wager $6,000 (30 x $200) before you can withdraw the bonus money and any money won from it.
It’s common for online casinos to offer bonuses, especially a welcome bonus, that not only match your initial deposit but also offer a certain number of free spins. If this is the case, you need to find out if there are two wagering requirements, as there often are. For example, if a casino offers a 100% match deposit up to $500 and 100 free spins there may be a 30x wagering requirement for the bonus and 40x for the free spins.
Time Limits
The time limits are easy to understand. The online casino will set a limit that you have to fulfill the wagering requirement by. So, if the time limit is 10 days for the example above you have to wager $6,000 within the 10 days to withdraw the bonus money and money won from it.
Maximum Win
Often an online casino will put a cap on the maximum win you can receive using bonus money. If the max win is $500 you cannot win more than $500 when using the bonus money. This can be frustrating if you get bonus money and then hit a big win. If there is a max win of $500 and you are using bonus money on slots while Lady Luck is on your side and you hit a big jackpot in the thousands, then the max you will get is $500 because of the cap.
Game Exclusion
When you read the terms and conditions of an online casino bonus you’ll often see a list of excluded games. These are games that you can’t play to fulfill the wagering requirement. Many times, the excluded games are in fine print but you need to know them, because why sign up for a bonus and then play games that don’t contribute to the wagering requirement? If you like to play a certain title or titles, then make sure you check the excluded games to see if you can play them towards the bonus.
Game Contribution Percentage
The game contribution percentage is the percentage of what the game fulfills to the wagering requirement. This is something that is often overlooked by beginners and can end up disappointing them, especially if they like to play other games besides slots. For nearly all online casinos, slots will contribute 100% to the wagering requirement. However, you will sometimes see slots titles that don’t contribute 100%.
Other games such as table games and video poker will contribute much less. For example, it’s not uncommon to see video poker contribute 25% to the wagering requirement with table games only contributing 10%. It’s nearly always the case that table games, such as blackjack, roulette, and baccarat have very low contribution percentages. It’s also typical that live casino games don’t contribute at all. If blackjack is your game of choice and it only contributes 10% to the bonus, that means you’ll have to spend a lot of money in order to fulfill the wagering requirement.
It goes without saying that if slots aren’t your game, it will usually take much longer and cost more money to fulfill the wagering requirement. It’s also a good idea to use a casino bonus calculator in order to see if any bonus is worth your time.
