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Probability of Blackjack. Probability 1 4.827% 2 4.780% 3 4.764% 4 4.757% 5 4.752% 6. A natural blackjack is only 4.8%, which essentially is an ace dealt with a ten card straight off the initial deal. Normally the odds are 3 to 2 and you would win $3 for every $2 wagered. It's a small percentage but it's the most desirable hand to get. The lowest hand you can get is two points (two aces).

Blackjack odds are percentage figures which represent your probability of losing or winning a hand. They can also represent the house edge or their profit margins as well. Usually probability odds don't mean much on the short term, but they clearly average out in the long term and this is why the casinos always win over the long term.

We decided to make a few tables and charts of the most common blackjack probability odds for various scenarios and situations found while playing blackjack. The most important odds percentage represents the dealer's edge in the game. This is the long term advantage that they have which will eventually take your money away. Blackjack is actually one of the most popular games in the casino and also has some of the lowest odds of all the casino games, except casino craps of course. Generally their edge ranges from 1% to 15% depending on what variation of blackjack you are playing.

How to Beat the Casino House Odds

There is one feature that makes blackjack more desirable than any other casino game. There is actually a way to beat the house edge by increasing your odds. In fact, your probability odds in blackjack can be increase to the point where you would actually be making the profit in the long term, essentially turning the casino into a personal ATM. This practice is known as card counting and casinos don't like this because they know they will be losing money.

Before you start card counting, you should learn 'blackjack basic strategy', which is the mathematically correct way to play every move in blackjack to get the best odds. This can lower the house edge to less than 1 percent. When that percentage goes to a negative number such as -1%, then it is you who has the edge over the casino. This is when you complement basic strategy with card counting to get the highest efficiencies.

Odds vs. Dealer Up Card

The first odds chart shows what kind of advantage the player has vs. the dealer based on what his up card is showing. The first column in the chart is what card the dealer has showing after the cards have been dealt. The second column of the table shows the dealer's probability of going bust based on each card. The last column shows the advantage the player has and the probability of winning based on the basic strategy theory. As you can see, the dealer has about a 43% chance of going bust when he has a 5 showing as an up card. At the same time, the player has about 23% advantage as well. Notice that the player advantage goes negative when the 10 cards and ace start showing up. This means the player is more likely to lose.

Blackjack odds of Busting While Taking a Hit

This chart shows the probabilities of going bust after taking a hit. Busting means that your card total would go over 21 points and would be a hard total as well. The highest score you can get when being initially dealt two cards is 21 points so you can never go bust. This means if you took a hit on a hard 21, you would have a 100% probablity of going bust, which is common sense. Also, if you have 11 points or less, it is impossible to go over 21 points on the next hit and your odds of going bust would be 0 percent.

House Advantage with Multiple Number of Decks

The number of 52 card decks in a game of blackjack influences the house edge. In some cases, the odds increase in favor of the casino when more decks are used. The advantage edge can be as much as 1% towards the casino and this is a big number in terms of odds over the long term. As you can see here, a single deck of card gives the lowest edge for the casino and gives the player better odds. Multiple decks such as eight decks increases the house edge almost 18 times more than it would for the single deck!

Two Card Frequency Odds

The next odds table deals with the first two cards being dealt or the 2 card frequency odds. Every player is dealt two cards at the beginning of a round of blackjack so this chart tells you the percentage of getting different categories of hands. A natural blackjack is only 4.8%, which essentially is an ace dealt with a ten card straight off the initial deal. Normally the odds are 3 to 2 and you would win $3 for every $2 wagered. It's a small percentage but it's the most desirable hand to get. The lowest hand you can get is two points (two aces). This is part of the decision hands group where players are usually dealt soft hands and can make decisions without going bust. This group is the most common.

The other category is the hard standing hands. These hands are somewhat desirable because of the high scores likely to beat the dealer. These are the second most frequent two card blackjack hands. Finally there is a no bust two card hand. No bust means any two card hand that won't bust on the next hit, such as any soft hand or hard hand that is 11 points or less.

Probability Edge for Each Card Removed from Deck

The next table shows how much your odds improve after when certain cards have been dealt and removed from the deck. Certain cards taken out of the deck and increase or decrease your blackjack odds percentage and the house edge.

This is very important for card counting. If you want the absolute perfect odds in card counting, you have to acount for each small change in the odds whenever a card is dealt. As you can see from the table, when small cards are taken out of play, the odds increase in your favor overall. This is a paramount property of card counting. The opposite happens when large cards are dealt. Your odds begin to decrease. When you are counting cards, you will notice your count decreasing when large cards are dealt.

You can imagine how complicated it would be to be adding these numbers in your head while card counting at the same time. If your mind was a computer, it would be easier to keep track of the percentage. Some people can do this, and this is the way to become a perfect card counter! It is easier to keep track of the odds when playing with a single blackjack deck. For example, when five cards are seen on the table, they offer a 0.67% increase in your advantage. In fact, when a lot of fives are used up, your odds will be much higher than if any of the other low cards were used up, even the six point cards. Also, these effects are cumulative so you always need to keep track of the odds after every card is dealt. This data is actually quite amazing!

Dealer Final Hand Probability Odds

This next table shows the odds of what the dealer's final hand will be. Usually in blackjack, the dealer must hit on 16 and stand on 17. These rules are slightly different for other variations of twenty-one. So generally, the odds of the dealer's final score being 16 are 0% because he must hit. This table will show the probability of the dealer busting or getting a non-bust hand as well as natural blackjacks.

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Understanding the odds is a major factor in becoming a successful player at blackjack. Blackjack is one of the only casino games that is beatable, meaning that by acquiring the right skills, players can swing the advantage into their favor.

Article Highlights:

Gaining The Advantage Strategy Event Frequency House Rules Summary

Gaining The Advantage

An important step in mastering blackjack is learning how to play using basic strategy. Players who rely solely on hunches and gut feelings to play will likely give up a much greater edge to the house. Basic strategy is relatively easy to learn and anyone can do this with a little practice online. Learning to play blackjack using perfect basic strategy will reduce a casino's edge to a mere 0.80% - the second lowest among all table games - and slightly to far better odds than those offered at roulette tables and slot machines, respectively.

Blackjack is a dependent variable game, meaning that as each card is dealt from the deck(s), the odds of any remaining card - like an Ace or 10 - coming up next is constantly changing. If you're playing a single deck game, before any cards have been dealt, you know that the odds of any Ace being dealt are 4 out of 52. If the first two cards dealt are both Aces, then there is only a 2 out of 50 (or 1 in 25) chance that the next card will be another Ace. Over time, experts have used computer simulations to determine that high cards like Aces and Tens are beneficial to the player, and conversely, small cards are good for the dealer. If you are able to keep track of which cards have left the deck, you would obviously stand a better chance at knowing which cards remain, hence which ones are most likely to be dealt on the next draw. This is where the house edge is nullified, and the player begins to build a small, yet sizable edge over the house. Such is the advantage of becoming a skilled blackjack player.

While there are some differences between online blackjack and blackjack at land-based casinos - perhaps most notably the use of continuous shuffle at some online casinos - this article focuses mainly on the basics, which can be applied to most versions of the game.

Adjustments In Strategy

Once you have learned basic strategy, and then how to track the count while playing, the next step is to vary your playing strategy to account for the current game odds at any given moment. If you know that the deck is loaded with face cards, you might not want to hit on 12 against the dealer's up card of 10, knowing that there is an increased likelihood that you will bust. If the deck has lots of tens, you may decide to risk doubling on 11 against a dealer's Ace, even though basic strategy says not to. It is small modifications in play that will cut into the house's edge and put those percentage points on your side.

Other variations in play include changing your betting level. If the odds favor the player, bet bigger. If they favor the dealer, bet smaller. This is common knowledge, but mastering the art of knowing when and how to bet is a key factor in becoming a skilled player. Something to keep in mind is that while adjusting your bets according to the odds at any given time, do so in a reasonable manner. This means avoiding the rapid escalation of bets when the odds shift into your favor. Regardless of whether you're playing real money blackjack at the Borgata in Atlantic City, or a game of multi-player at your favorite online casino, if you jump from 10 to 100 units a hand, chances are someone will notice. Pit personnel are trained to keep an eye out for exactly this sort of thing, so you will need to moderate or disguise your betting. If the odds are in your favor and you win a hand, double your next bet, or raise it by one unit. This is a very natural betting pattern that any player might use, and much less likely to draw unwanted attention. Also note that many online casinos' software employ mathematical algorithms that are programmed to detect wild swings in betting. So, since there is no pit boss to give you the boot at your own computer, the odds of many blackjack games at online casinos do not favor the player when making a large escalation in bet from one hand to the next. Stick with a similar raising strategy to what you'd use at a land casino, and you will be better off.

Event Frequency

Another important factor in blackjack mastery is knowing how often certain events occur. Maybe you've wondered how often blackjacks come up, or what the win/loss/tie breakdown is between players and the house. On average, a player will win 44% of the time, the dealer 48% and 8% of hands will result in a tie. With these odds, you might logically deduce that a player will lose more money than he or she will win. However, you must also take into account the built-in player advantages that blackjack offers like doubling down, splitting, and the fact that blackjack pays out at 3 to 2. While you will likely end up losing more hands than you win, you should just about break even monetarily, because you win more when you do win. If you win a double down, you get twice what you would expect than for winning only one hand, but it still counts as a single win for the player. Also, if the dealer gets a blackjack, you lose only your initial bet, instead of 1½ times the bet, which is what a player wins by getting a blackjack.

The event frequency chart to the right shows us that both the player and the dealer can expect a blackjack at a rate of 1 out of every 20 hands, or 5% of the time. An important thing to remember is that when a dealer shows an Ace, odds are that he or she will make a blackjack 32% of the time, meaning there won't be one the other 68% of the time. If the dealer has an Ace showing, you will be asked if you would like to take the insurance bet, which pays 2 to 1. Since the dealer will not have a blackjack 68% of the time, that's about how often you can expect to lose this bet, thus reinforcing why basic strategy says never to take the insurance bet. So when should you take the insurance bet? Only when you're an expert card counter, and the plus count is sky high, letting you know that the odds are actually in favor of the dealer having a ten card under that Ace. Even then, it is still a risky proposition, so, as a wise guy might say: 'fuhgeddaboudit'!

House Rules' Effect For Players

Odds Of Winning A Blackjack Hand

If you've played blackjack in more than one location, odds are the rules of the game had slight variations. Las Vegas Strip rules are different from Downtown Las Vegas rules which are different from Atlantic City rules which are different from online blackjack rules and so on. So why is there no international standard for blackjack table rules? Basically, casinos like to be able to make small changes in their games to either attract or deter certain types of players. While probably more than half of the tourists and other recreational players only bother to look or inquire about a game's rules as far as the table minimum, smart players know that particular rules have direct relationships on the player's edge. Certain rules impact the edge favorably for players, others add to the house advantage. Looking for a game that has good rules is another important factor in improving your odds.

The house rules chart (to the right) shows us what percentage (positive or negative) different rule variations commonly found at today's casinos will have on a player. Starting at the top, definitely avoid all games where the dealer wins ties. This gives the house a big edge. Next, the lower the number of decks being used, the better the odds for players. Regardless of whether you're playing basic strategy, counting cards, or just guessing, single and double deck games give you better odds of winning. When you play multiple deck blackjack games dealt from a shoe, a blank card (usually colored red or yellow) will be inserted towards the end of the stack. All cards up to this card will be dealt during the game. Once the card is reached, it is time to shuffle. Depending on where the card is placed, the odds will improve or decrease for players. This is known as 'penetration'. Closer to the end of the stack (deeper penetration) is good for players because more cards will come out of the shoe during a game, meaning you have greater chances of predicting the remaining cards as the game progresses. Shallow penetration is bad for the player for the opposite reason. If the marker card is left only halfway into the stack, the odds of predicting what will be drawn next is greatly reduced. Taking it a step further, by playing single and double deck games, you can eliminate this scenario almost entirely as all the cards are usually dealt out.

Going back to the chart, you can see that being able to double on only 10 and 11 has a negative effect for the player, while being able to double on three or more cards and doubling after splits has a positive effect. Look for games where the dealer stand on all 17s - which are pretty common at most land casinos. Avoid games where the dealer does not take a second card until after the players are done. While surrender has a positive effect for players, it is rarely found these days, and even more rarely utilized properly. For more information on surrender, see our blackjack frequently asked questions section. Lastly, try to find games where you are allowed to re-split aces. Most games give you but a single card on each Ace when you split them, and do not allow resplitting of Aces. If you get an Ace on top of your split Ace, naturally you would want to split again, rather than stand on a 12, so this rule can have a big impact on player odds.

Odds Of Getting A Blackjack

Summary

Blackjack is a fun and exciting casino game that is popular with players largely because it is beatable. Become a skilled player and the odds will shift into your favor, giving you a positive expectation of winning. This means that over time, playing blackjack will result in more winning sessions and less losing ones. Understanding basic strategy and counting techniques are critical to your success, but also having good betting strategy and knowing how rules impact the odds is equally important. Little things like these help players. Be sure to at least learn basic strategy, and then you will likely be better skilled than 80% of all blackjack players worldwide. All it takes is a little practice.

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