When playing slot machines it’s not unusual to notice streaks of wins or losses. Many gamblers will refer to the slot as hot or going through a hot cycle when it’s paying, or a cold cycle when it’s not.
But Do Slot Machines Really Have Hot or Cold Cycles?
Slot machines only have hot or cold cycles in that sometimes there will be noticeable strings of good or bad luck resulting in wins or losses.
Mar 09, 2015 But where do these old slot machines actually go, and why do some machine disappear so quickly while others seem to stick around forever? Anyone who regularly visits a casino knows that slot machines are changing all the time; fancy new machines are rolled in while old favorites are quietly removed from the floor and disappear from view. Do slot machines have a hot and cold period. Slot Machines do not have hot and cold periods even though most gamblers would argue that there are hot or cold periods. The truth of the matter is that this belief was born out of noticeable strings of bad luck or good luck resulting in several wins in a row or consecutive losses. Aug 19, 2015 It seems that spins on the slot machine change when I put my money in the machine. Say, for instance, I get $5 free play. With 10 spins at 50 cents each, I don’t seem to win anything.
The problem is that many slot players will declare their machine on a hot or cold cycle (based on how they’ve done) and then decide whether to continue playing based on that belief.
That’s a big mistake.
As explained in our How Slots Work article, every spin of a slot machine is a random, independent event. Slots have no memory of past wins when determining the result of the next spin. Win or lose cycles aren’t programmed into slot machines.
How Can a Slot Feel “Hot” or “Cold” if Every Spin is Actually Random?
Because random data can still have trends. If you flip a coin 1,000 times and record the results, you’ll likely find groupings of several heads or tails in a row. Just because an event is random doesn’t mean it won’t have repeated or grouped results. In fact, flipping a coin and expecting it to alternate perfectly wouldn’t be random at all.
Plus the human brain is exceptional at spotting patterns (even when they don’t exist), and that leads to people thinking slot machines have hot or cold cycles. This is known as the clustering illusion.
The Bottom Line on Slot Machine Cycles
Slot machines only have cycles if you look back and declare a string of wins or losses to be a cycle. The terminology is misleading though because it leads slot players to believe they can predict future outcome based on past results, which is impossible with random data like slot machine spins.
Slot machines aren’t programmed to be hot or cold – all that matters is that they meet the programmed payout percentage over their lifetime (many millions of spins, many more than any one person could play). It’s inevitable that some players will experience seemingly impossible luck with a slot machine, but attempting to predict the slot’s random number generator results based on prior wins or losses is not a wise bet.
Further Reading
- Slot machines are programmed to have “hot streaks” and “cold streaks”.
- Slot machines are programmed so each individual spin is random.
Slot machines can go on hot streaks and pay out consistently for a period of time, and also cold streaks where they barely pay out at all. However, they are not programmed thisway.
Each spin is entirely random, and such streaks are simply a result of a short-term deviation from what is statistically likely. Anything can happen in the short term, just as you may see a runof 10 blacks in a row at a roulette table, but in the long run the results will always equate roughly to the expected payout rate.
- Slot machines that haven’t paid out for a while are due to pay out soon.
- The chances of winning for each individual spin are always the same.
This is really just an extension of the previous myth. A slot machine will always pay out eventually, but there is no way of telling when that will happen because of their random nature.
Again, it is important to recognize that each individual spin is entirely random. There is no point at which a machine suddenly becomes “due” to spin a winning combination.
- A machine that has just paid out a jackpot won’t pay out again for ages.
- The chances of winning for each individual spin are not connected to previous spins.
You can probably see a theme developing here, and it will continue throughout the whole article. Many slot machine myths are related to some kind of theory that the chances of winning aresomehow influenced by things that actually have no effect whatsoever.
We’ll say it again – every single spin of a slot machine is a random event. There is actually no reason at all why a slot machine wouldn’t pay out another big win withinminutes of paying a jackpot.
- You can’t do anything to improve your chances of winning when playing slot games.
- You can improve your chances of winning at slot games.
This might seem to somehow contradict what we’ve already said about slot machines being random. However, while it’s true that you can’t do anything at all to affect the outcome of any givenspin of a machine, there are a couple of things you can do to improve your overall chances of winning when playing slots.
First of all, not all slot machines pay out at the same rate. Slots can have a payout rate as low as 85% or as high as 98%. You always have a chance of winning regardless of the payout rate,but the higher the rate the higher your overall return is likely to be in the long run.
Secondly, you can increase the overall value you get from your slots play by using a player’s card at land-based casinos and by taking advantage of the bonuses and rewards available at onlinecasinos.
Slot Machines Free Play
This won’t directly affect your chances of any given spin being a winner, but it can effectively give you extra money to play with. This extra money then gives you additional chances to get awinning spin.