How to pick a winning slot machine could be the oldest question regarding online casinos, and is one that really has no perfect answer. The simple fact of the matter is that online slots in South Africa are essentially a game of chance, meaning that there really is no guarantee or certainty that you will always win when playing online slots. However, we can certainly analyse a few prudent aspects that go into choosing an online slot that will give you a better chance of winning, or at least, an altogether superior online gaming experience. This guide to how to pick a winning slot machine should serve as your reference while going about choosing the best slots to play, at our recommended SA online casinos.
Choosing the Right Online Casino
Vukani Gaming Corporation (Pty) Ltd (the VGroup), is the leading supplier of Limited Pay-out Machines (LPMs), and an operator of both VSlots and Luck@It LPMs in South Africa. The Group is 100% South African owned and operated, with a presence in all nine provinces in the country.
Before you can begin to look at slots, and decide which ones could yield more wins per spin, you first need to find an online casino to play them on. In fact, choosing a good online casino is an essential step in the process. After all, there really is not much point in finding the perfect online slot if you are still going to have to deal with an online casino that is unsafe, unreliable, or simply refuses to pay out your winnings. Let’s take a closer look at the key factors that go into selecting the perfect SA online casino to play at.
- Industry recognised licensing and regulation: All top SA online casinos must be able to show proper accreditation. Top licensing regulators include Malta Gaming Authority, Gibraltar Gambling Commission, Curacao eGaming, UKGC, and others. All legitimate, licensed SA online casinos will display their licensing body’s logo on their homepage. A good tip is to click on the logo, which should then take you to the licensing body’s homepage, a sure sign that that casino is legitimately licensed.
- Online reputation: While licensing and regulation is a key aspect, so is the actual online reputation of the casino. You can find out if an online casino has a good reputation via online casino review sites such as this one, or through various online casino forums. Look out for online casinos that delay payouts, are not transparent in their gaming practices and so on.
- Bonus offers and promotions: SA online casinos are beginning to compete for your Rands more and more. One of the most effective ways to grab your attention is through the offer of juicy bonuses and related promotions. Signing up with an SA online casino is a good way to boost your bankroll and even grab a few free spins to try out some of their top slots.
- Gaming Variety: Of course while this specific guide is about how to choose winning slot machines, we also know that having a great gaming variety is paramount. Top SA online casinos are able to offer an eclectic variety of quality casino games, including online roulette, blackjack, baccarat, craps, poker, and more, as well as slots, progressive jackpot games, video poker, and even live dealer casino games.
- Top SA casino payment options: The best SA online casinos are often marked by their list of SA-friendly payment options. These include convenient e-wallets with fast payout times and low fees, credit or debit card options, online bank transfers, prepaid cards and more.
- Great mobile casino version: Top SA online casinos are able to offer a great mobile version, either of the best selection of their most popular games, or the entire site via HTML5. Being able to play on the go, get customer support, top banking options, bonuses and more on your mobile, is fast becoming the number one consideration in South Africa.
- Quality customer support: Getting stuck with a game, payment option, or being confused about some terms and conditions, is never fun. This is why you should be able to access quality online casino support at any time of the day or night, via your desktop or mobile device. Top SA online casinos include email support, live chat, and telephonic support.
Choosing the Best Online Slots
When it comes to choosing the best online slots, there are a number of factors and features worth considering. To make the process easier for you, we’ve divided these into objective considerations, and subjective considerations.
Technical Considerations
RTP (Return to Player)
Every online casino slot comes with its own RTP or return to player. The RTP is essentially a metric which is a very helpful way of visually identifying how much any slot will payout on average, which is expressed as a percentage. The majority of online slots will display an RTP of around 93% to 95%, with some coming in a bit higher at around 96% to 98%. Basically what this means is that, for ever R100 that spend playing them, you can expect to get back around R93 to R95, or in the case of slots with a higher RTP, around R96 to R98.
Variance
With slot machines, the term ‘variance’ is used to describe the size and frequency of the wins you can expect while playing. For instance a slot machine that is described as have a low variance will award wins often, although your prize total per win will generally be fairly small. On the other hand, a slot machine with a high variance will not offer frequent wins, although when a win does occur, the prize value is usually very high.
Both low variance and high variance slot machines are preferred by slots players and it all depends on what your personal goals and objectives are regarding wins. Some players prefer to make small gains more often, while other players are more interested in pursuing that elusive mega jackpot. If you are new to online slots, it may be a good idea to try both out and see which you prefer. Of course it is also possible to find slot machines that fall in the middle, offering a medium variance that combines both extremes.
Top Slots Tips
We’ve shown you how to pick a top SA online casino based on certain key features that every top casino should have. We’ve also highlighted some of the most important technical aspects that you should be using when picking a winning slot machine. To further increase your chances of not only picking a good, winning slot machine, take a look at some of our top tips when playing online slots. These tips are gleaned from experienced online slots players, who have shared their experience to create this top slots tips list.
- Consider taking advantage of the casinos bonuses and promotional offers: Most top online casinos in South Africa will offer a range of bonus offers, with their main bonus offer usually the welcome bonus. In most cases, this welcome bonus will include free spins, which can be used to play top slots, essentially for free. Other ongoing promotions can include free spins offers which you can use to enhance your bankroll and increase your playing time and, by extension, your chances of winning more.
- Play slots with higher RTP’s: As we touched upon earlier in this guide, picking a slot machine that offers a higher RTP is a good way to get more returns on your investment. Playing slots that offer a higher RTP will help to keep you in the game longer as there is more coming back to you over a longer period.
- Always test slots in the demo or ‘play for fun’ mode: Most top South African online casinos will offer all of their slot games in a demo or play for fun mode as well as a real money mode. By playing every slot first in the demo mode, you will be able to test all of the games features and see if you enjoy playing it. The real beauty of playing it in this way is that you will be able to test the game without worrying about losing any of your own money. In other words, test the game under a zero pressure environment.
- Be your own accountant: Keeping track of your bankroll is one of the best playing tips you will ever hear. One of the biggest reasons why players fall at the last hurdle, is because they failed to keep track of their bankroll and ran out of funds too quickly.
Things to Keep in Mind
While these tips and guides are designed to offer you the best possible chance of winning more often than not, there is never going to a situation where you will win 100% of the time. However, as long as you follow the basic advice that this guide to picking the best online slots at top South African casinos, you will be able to enjoy your slots gaming experience and perhaps, pick up some money along the way too.
Slots are perhaps the simplest of all games you can play at a casino. The fact that they are easy to play, and can also help the gambler win big, make them highly popular across the world. South Africa is one of the many countries where people enjoy playing online slots. Here is more information about online casinos and about how you can play online slots in South Africa.
Finding Online Slots in South Africa
If you are in South Africa, there are a number of real money Rand casinos where you can play slots for money. In spite of the National Gambling Act, a number of online slot players in the country indulge in slot machines. The reason is that the laws focus mostly on the operators and not the individuals.
So, the next time you wish to play online slots, all you need to do is look for online casinos that accept players from South Africa, register with them, and make a deposit. Some sites also let you play for free. So, in case you are not comfortable with real money slot games, you can always try the slot game website and see if it is safe, by playing the free slot games it offers.
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Some online casinos also offer mobile slots, which you can access through your smartphone. If the casino offers special apps for its slots, you may not be able to download them or use them due to the legal restrictions. But, if it has a mobile optimized page, you can access it through your mobile phone's browser and still be able to play your favorite slots for real money on your phone.
Alternatively, Google Play Store and the iTunes store also have a few play money mobile slots that you can try, to have fun while you are travelling.
Playing Real Money Casinos in South Africa
Playing slots at a real money casino in South Africa is easy once you find a site that is open to the SA people. Once you are registered with the site, be sure to check its credentials - its reputation in the market, its license and regulation details. Once you are sure that the site is secure, you can make a deposit through one of the many options it offers, to start playing your favorite online slots for real money.
Check if the online casino also accepts payments in South African currency. If the casino you choose is a reputed one, it is possible that you can use your credit card or an e-wallet account to fund your casino account. In that case, even if the casino processes deposits and withdrawals in USD or euro, you can play online slots for real money in South Africa by paying a little extra for currency conversion.
But, if you wish to avoid any extra charges, it is worth finding out how to play in South African rands.
Depositing to a Casino to Play Slots Online in South Africa
Once you find an online casino that accepts players from South Africa, and are certain that it is a safe site to wager real money, you can make the deposits into your casino accounts to play real money slots. Most of the online casinos that accept South Africans have a huge range of secure and reliable deposit options that you can choose from. However, not all of them are available for depositing money from South Africa. Among the options that are commonly available are Visa and MasterCard debit and credit cards, ewallets like Neteller and Skrill, check, and bank wire transfer.
One of the safest ways to fund your online slots account is to use an e-wallet, which is safer than using a credit card, or a check. In any case, it is also important to see if the casino has the needed security and encryption in place to prevent misuse of your account or card details.
Customer Support
When looking for a South African online casino that offers online slots for real money in SA, make sure you choose one with a reliable support team that is accessible 24/7. That way, if you have any technical or financial issues with the site, they would be able to clarify them and help you enjoy your favorite slots for real money.
Legality of Gambling in South Africa
Gambling has been a highly restricted activity in South Africa since 1673. In 1965, a law was passed to legalize betting on horses, making it the only accepted gambling activity in the country. After that, a string of illegal casinos opened across the country and the situation was getting out of hand, due to which, authorities decided to institute a system that licenses and oversees the activities of casinos in the country. The result was the National Gambling Act of 1996, which led to the establishment of legal casinos, and also a National lottery.
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In 2004, the National Gambling Act was revised to prohibit any form of interactive gambling in the country, covering video game operators and other online gaming operators. Four years later, the government tried to revise the law to legalize online gambling by regulating the markets. However, that did not happen, and in 2010, the government banned online casino providers entirely, including those with servers outside South Africa, from offering their services to the citizens.
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The latest was a ruling by the South African Supreme Court (1) in 2011, which made it very clear that online gambling is illegal in South Africa. According to the new law, online casino operators are forbidden from doing business with the citizens of the country, and any breach of this law could result in a penalty of 10 million RL or 10 years of imprisonment, or both.
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The law against online gambling has been very harsh on the market, and on the many online casino enthusiasts in the country. But, on the bright side, there are several offshore online casinos that are still catering to slots players in South Africa. As the laws are introduced to mainly prevent online casino operators from doing any business with the citizens, South African slots players are not at any kind of legal risk by opening an account with online slots sites, or by depositing or withdrawing money from their casino accounts.