Game Contribution Rates: How 5% Turns 40x Into 800x

What game contribution is

Game contribution is the percentage of each stake that counts towards a wagering requirement. In almost every case it is published as a small table in the bonus terms, and it is the clause most likely to make a bonus impossible rather than merely expensive. It is one of the ten clauses covered in our casino bonus terms guide, and the only one that can reduce an offer to zero without any figure on it changing.

For clarification, a 100% contribution means staking 1 clears 1 of the requirement. At 20%, staking 1 clears 20 cents. At 5% it clears five cents, and at 0% it clears nothing at all, forever, regardless of how much you stake.

What each game contribution rate actually costs

Here is the whole of the arithmetic, on the most common bonus in the market: 100 deposit, 100 bonus, 40x on bonus funds, which is 4,000 of turnover.

Expected cost is the stakes multiplied by the house edge, using a 96% return as a working figure. Table games often return more than 96%, which softens the last column without changing the first two.

Read the 5% row against the 100 bonus that started it. Clearing that bonus on a game contributing 5% means staking 80,000, and the expected cost of doing so is many times the bonus itself. The bonus is not worth less on those games; it is worth negative.

Here is why the 40x on a banner tells you so little on its own. Our wagering requirements guide explains what the multiplier means; this page is why the answer only holds if you play the right games.

The game contribution rates six casinos publish

For our reviews, we have read through the complete bonus terms of fifteen casinos. Six of them publish a contribution table detailed enough to compare. Here they are side by side.

Each rate read from that operator's published bonus terms during its review, dated on the review page. Sportbet.one additionally counts qualifying sports bets at 300%.

There are three things that can be stated directly from that table.

• Slots are 100% at every one of them. Six out of six, without exception. If a bonus can be cleared, it is cleared on slots, and treating that as the default costs you nothing.
• Everything else is a lottery. Table games range from 20% down to barred across six casinos. Live casino ranges from 50% at CoinCasino to outright prohibition at two others. There is no market convention to fall back on, so the table has to be read each time.
• Only one casino rewards anything above slots. Sportbet.one counts sports bets at odds of 1.4 or higher at 300%, which is why its sports rollover reads 12x where its casino rollover reads 35x. The two are the same requirement expressed against a different rate.

Why the rates differ by game type

The rates correlate with the house edge, and once you recognise that, the numbers stop looking arbitrary.

On average a slot gives back around 96%, so 4,000 of staking costs the player about 160 and earns the casino about the same. Blackjack, played correctly, gives back over 99%, so the same 4,000 of staking earns the casino a fraction of that. If both of these counted equally, a bonus cleared at a table would cost the casino far more than one cleared on slots.

Weighting the low-edge games at 5% or 20% restores the balance. It is not a trick; it is the same calculation the wagering requirement is based on, applied to each game. The effect on the player is simply that the games with the best odds are the ones a bonus cannot be cleared on, and that is important to know before accepting one.

The same logic applies to the clauses that sit alongside the table: the prohibition of feature buys with bonus funds, the prohibition of betting on both sides of a roulette table, and the max bet rule. All of them stop a bonus being converted through a route the requirement was not priced for.

Live casino is the category to check first

For live blackjack, roulette and game shows, the contribution table decides whether a bonus can be used at all, before any other clause matters.

Across the six casinos whose contribution tables we have read in full. Only one of the six leaves live casino genuinely playable with a bonus.

Understanding the difference between 0% and barred is important. At 0% the games open but the stakes count for nothing, which is a quiet way to lose a bonus window. Barred is more honest: the game flat out refuses to load with bonus funds, and one of the casinos in our reviews displays a message explaining that.

The situation in the middle is the most awkward. A 5% live rate is not a ban, so a player can spend an entire bonus period at a live table thinking they are making real progress when in reality they are doing very close to nothing against the requirement.

Crash and dice games at crypto casinos

This is the best example of a contribution rate going against the lobby it sits in.

In every casino in our sample that publishes a rate for them, crash games, dice and arcade titles are weighted at 0%. On the other hand, several of those same casinos run Crash Games as a top-level navigation category, put crash titles front and centre on the home page, and build a brand around them.

Two concrete cases from our reviews. TG.Casino weighs dice, arcade and roulette at 0% and separately excludes all Spribe games, which removes Aviator and the crash catalogue altogether, while placing Crash Games in its main navigation. CoinCasino weighs crash at 0% while running the same category in its own menu.

Neither is concealed and neither is dishonest. It is simply two departments writing two documents, and the reader is the one who has to reconcile them. If crash is the reason you chose a casino, the bonus is a separate product from the games you came for, and our crypto casinos page records the wagering terms next to each operator to assist with exactly that comparison.

The list underneath the game contribution table

The percentage table is only part of the clause. Underneath it, most casinos publish a list of individual titles excluded from bonus play entirely, and these are separate from the category weightings.

The lists will definitely surprise you. One casino on this site publishes 741 excluded entries. Nineteen of them begin with the word "All" and remove a whole studio or category with a single line, including sixteen named studios and the operator's own branded games. The remaining 722 are individual titles.

An excluded game contributes nothing, whatever the category table says. A slot listed in a 100% category can still be on the exclusion list, and you can never be certain unless you cross check. In practice the only workable approach is the reverse: pick two or three slots, check those specific names against the list, and stick to them.

Some casinos do this better than others. A message reading "this game cannot be played with bonus funds" when you go to open a title is worth more than a list of 741 names, because it appears at the moment the information is needed.

What happens if you mix game types

Contribution is evaluated for each individual bet, so mixing game types is allowed and simply produces a blended rate.

Four thousand staked, and the requirement is only 60% complete. The remaining 1,600 needs another 1,600 on slots or another 8,000 at the table.

The most important thing to take away is that a detour to a low-contribution game is never neutral. It burns through both the balance and the clock while adding very little to the requirement, and on a short bonus window that is the difference between clearing it and forfeiting it. Our low wagering casino bonuses page ranks offers by what they need in turnover, and the contribution table is what converts that number into a real number of spins.

One last clause to consider alongside this: several casinos void a bonus if a player is judged to be betting on both sides of a table to generate turnover at minimal risk. Betting red and black together, or player and banker, is named specifically in the terms we have read.

What to check before your first spin

1. Open the bonus terms, not the promotion. The contribution table is never on the offer page.
2. Find the rate for the games you actually play. If your category is 5% or 0%, the bonus is not for you, and no amount of play will change that.
3. Read the list underneath. Then check your two or three usual slots against it by name.
4. Divide the requirement by the rate. The result is what you actually have to stake.
5. Check the rate again for free spin winnings. They are usually bonus funds, so the same table governs them.

Game contribution questions

What is game contribution at an online casino? Which games contribute 100% to wagering? How does a 5% contribution affect a wagering requirement? Do live casino games count towards wagering? Do crash games count towards a casino bonus? Where do you find the game contribution table? Can a casino exclude specific games from a bonus?

About the author

Ana Petrescu

Bonus terms editor, CasinoFinderHub - Bucharest

I maintain the bonus data behind this site, which means reading terms documents in full. The six contribution tables on this page came out of that work, and each is cited in the review where it was first recorded.

The rates surprised me when I put them side by side. Slots are 100% everywhere, which suggests a settled market, and then every other category is different at every casino. There is no convention to rely on below the top row, which is exactly why the table has to be opened each time rather than assumed. The reading routine behind every figure here is set out in how we check bonus terms.

Play safely

A bonus that forces you onto games you did not choose is a worse deal than no bonus, whatever the headline says. So the plainest advice on this page is this: if the games you enjoy contribute 5% or nothing, decline the bonus and play without one.

Set a deposit limit before you claim anything, and consider the contribution table to be a filter on whether an offer suits you at all. Free, confidential help is available from BeGambleAware, Gambling Therapy and Gamblers Anonymous.