How Online Casinos Differ to In-Person Play

One of the major selling points that we hear discussed all the time when companies are advertising their online casinos is that the experience is basically the same as being at land-based casinos. Live dealer games are specifically mentioned as the closest thing to actually being seated at the same table as the dealer and the other players.

While it’s true that there are several similarities between online and land-based casinos, they do differ in many ways as well. Let’s take a quick look at some of the ways in which online casinos are an improvement on their land-based counterparts.

More choice

While it’s true that some of the biggest casino brands have seen that iGaming is the future of the industry and opened their own online casinos, many others are still lagging behind, clinging to an outdated model. SkyCity – skycitycasino.com for those interested – is a perfect example of a major gambling company that has experienced first-hand the need to embrace the future. These major brands are able to offer the best in gambling at both their land-based and online casinos.

Most land-based casinos are limited by the amount of floor space they have, so they can only offer a fairly limited selection of games. Each of those games needs to be popular enough to justify the space it takes up, which can lead to a limited and fairly generic range, so you’re not likely to find off-the-wall gems such as Karate Pig or Egg-O-Matic.

Online casinos don’t have to work within these same constraints and this means that even the smallest online casino can have hundreds of unique games. The same is true for online table games.

Easier to navigate

Casinos are specially designed to make finding your way around a little difficult. While there are two different schools of design that disagree on how best to make a casino inviting, their end goal is the same – bring people in and keep them playing. Casinos rarely have clocks or windows so that players don’t know what time it is, and twisting paths through rooms filled with nearly identical slot machines so that it is impossible to get from one end of a casino to the other quickly or directly.

Online casinos, on the other hand, are as easy to navigate as any other website. Instead of aimlessly wandering around trying to find the perfect game, you can simply enter the name or genre of a game into the search bar – and voila!

Just like their land-based counterparts, online casinos also want players to stay longer and spend more. Instead of achieving this through maze-like layouts, they go the opposite route. They make their user interfaces as user-friendly as possible, which encourages people to stay and play.

Better for new players

Research has shown that being distracted leads to bad decision-making. Traditional casinos know this and take advantage of it. By having the casino floor packed with games, waitstaff walking around offering drinks and food, loud noises and tons of other distractions, they are able to keep players from fully focusing on what they are doing and – most importantly – how much they’re spending.

Experienced players can tune these distractions out, but for the new player, they can be completely overwhelming and seriously impair their ability to make smart decisions. Online casinos don’t have any of these disruptions so players can focus on playing and not on everything else that’s going on.

Personalized experience

Going to a casino can be a great way to spend the day but like with any outing, you’re basically stuck with the limited options they give you. Some casinos do have world-class dining establishments but many others will simply have a small restaurant and bar on site. You’ll be lucky to find more than one or two craft beers on tap.

Playing at an online casino means you can customize the experience exactly how you’d like it. If you’re making a day of it, you can order your favorite takeout or have the best snacks on hand. If you want to pair your play with a punchy IPA or a seasonal milkshake ale, you can. You can also listen to whatever kind of music you want, and play with the game volume set to your preferred level. It’s little things like this that make the experience just that much better.

Going to the casino is still a great experience that has its own charm. However, there are some things about playing from home at an online casino that make it that much more enjoyable and practical.

Photo Courtesy Flickr/Marco Verch