Bingo is a great pastime and should not be something that puts you in debt but provides entertainment if you play within your bingo budget. The adage that you should never bet more than you can lose is so very true.
Bingo is a social experience as much as it is a game, and it can become very addictive. While the premise is simple – buy a bingo card, watch the numbers being drawn, and wait for your numbers to be drawn. It doesn’t look very interesting, but it can soon become entertaining, especially with all the side-action going on. Many players can quickly get hooked and forget themselves in playing. Often, the newer players especially have difficulty setting up a budget and sticking with it.
To keep the game fun and entertaining, you should strive to stay within the bingo budget you’ve set before the game starts. All of this is why today I’ll talk to you about ways you can maximize your bingo budget. I’ll also provide vital advice on how you can stretch your bingo budget and get to play bingo for the fun of it.
Quick Jump ⇣
Set Up An Actual Budget
You may be thinking that you are playing for fun and therefore should not limit the amount of money you can spend on bingo. But you would be wrong, as having no control over the funds you spend on bingo or any other gambling game is a certain way to end up in debt.
Another vital thing to note here is that you can probably lose all your money, as bingo is a game of chance. Temptation can be heady, and you can lose your sense of perception and spend money you cannot afford to spend. For this, you should set up an available budget that you can use for bingo. This amount should be what you can afford and will not hurt your overall budget.
Also, it would help if you keep track of the budget you’ve set up for bingo. Make sure you stay within the financial limits you’ve set up for yourself, as this way, you will protect yourself from doing something you may come to regret later on.
Learn How to Play Bingo
Even though it seems straightforward, there are some things you need to note about the bingo games. Before you go into betting with money, you should learn how to play bingo. The different varieties of bingo have different rules, and you can quickly get drawn into the lure of the possible win, forgoing reason and spending more than your available bingo budget.
The different bingo games have different rules with different winning probabilities. Here is a short overview of the different bingo varieties (I’ll cover these in more detail in a future article):
90-ball bingo
The 90-ball bingo is the most popular bingo variety in the UK and Europe. This type of bingo has a ticket card with 27 spaces in three rows of nine columns. There are strips of six tickets with all the numbers from 1-90. To win at 90-ball bingo, you need to cross over all 15 numbers on the bingo ticket.
80-ball bingo
The 80-ball bingo has a bingo card with a 4×4 grid with a total of 16 numbers. The first column has numbers from 1-20, the second from 21-40, the third from 41-60, and the fourth from 61-80. To win, you need to get the winning pattern that depends on the actual game.
75-ball bingo
The 75-ball bingo is also known as American bingo, and the bingo card has a 5×5 grid. BINGO is spelled on top of the columns. The B column has numbers from 1-15, the I column has numbers from 16-30, the N column has numbers from 31-45, the G column has numbers from 46-60, and the O column has the numbers from 61-75. The winning combination is announced at the start of the game.
52-ball bingo
52-ball bingo is considered a combination between 90-ball and 75-ball bingo, but the players get playing cards instead of numbers on the cards. Each hand uses five cards from the pack of 52 cards. The caller announces the cards randomly, and the first player to cross over all the cards on their ticket wins.
30-ball bingo
The 30-ball bingo is often known as speedy bingo, as it has a card with a 3×3 grid, with a total of 9 numbers. The games are short, as the players need only nine numbers to win, and this game usually has one winner with a bigger prize.
Know the Free Bets and Wagering Requirements
If you have ever played bingo at an online bingo betting platform, you’ve probably seen the many available bonuses and promo deals. But another thing that you need to take note of is the wagering requirements related to the bonuses.
To get access to your bonus, you will need to wager a certain amount of funds on the site. The wagering requirements can be detrimental to a player’s budget, especially on inexperienced players. For example, you may need to spend x10 your initial deposit to be eligible to withdraw your wins. Thus, if you are not careful, you may spend a lot more than you’ve planned.
If the wagering requirements are much higher than you can afford, you don’t have to accept the welcome bonus or promo deal. Instead, you can deposit what you can afford, buy your tickets and play within your budget without having to spend much more.
How to Keep Count of Your Bets, Wins, and Losses
When you immerse yourself in the online bingo game, it becomes easy to lose track of the bets and losses and only focus on the wins. But this will not give you a genuine feel of how much you’ve spent gambling. For example, you can deposit $20 to your online bingo account and wager and lose $10; you will have $10 left. You then decide to spend $5 on a matched bonus, lose the entire lot, and bet with your remaining $5 and win $3 and $4. The overall tally says that you’ve spent the entire $20 deposit and only won $7.
That is why I recommend you check your user account with your bingo platform. Here you will see directly how much you’ve deposited on the site and how much you’ve won. Checking this status will give you an accurate representation of the overall amounts you spend and win on bingo.
How to Use Free Bingo?
Many online bingo betting platforms have free bingo and several other free options. The free bingo offer was an incentive to join a specific site, as newbies in most sites get to play bingo for free for a couple of days after initial registration. However, this has changed, and now many bingo platforms have free options on their regular roster.
While the free bingo games do not offer some massive prize, the tickets here don’t cost anything, so anything you win, you get to keep anything you win. It is maybe one of the best ways you can improve your bingo budget. The downside to playing free bingo is that many other players have the same mindset as you, and you are all competing for a small prize.
Are these really free?
Depending on the platform, there are bingo sites that indeed offer free bingo games for their members. However, there is also the implication that not all the members can get access to the freebies. Instead, many sites stipulate that only players who are members of the Loyalty program can access the free games.
Other platforms have other stipulations, like providing free games for players who have made a certain weekly deposit. As you can see, even though many of these are advertised as free games, the related terms and conditions don’t make them entirely free.
Types of Play Schemes According to Budget
Are you wondering how you can create a bingo budget and make it last longer? Well, you can make plans and stretch your budget, and you can employ strategies that will help you play longer. Here are some strategies and play schemes to maximize your budget:
A $10 deposit with most bingo sites will get you a first-time bonus starting from 100% upwards. Let’s say you get a 200% bonus, which will give you a total of $30 available gambling budget. To stretch this amount, you could:
- Play Free Bingo Games – by playing free bingo, you get the chance to win some cash and add to your winnings or choose to reinvest these into purchasing tickets. Always check if the platform you select has a free bingo option.
- Choose the Low-Cost Games – opt to play bingo games where the tickets cost $0.01 to $0.1. Your available budget will allow you to buy more tickets, and you’ll increase your winning chances.
- Play Chat Games – almost all bingo rooms with a chat option have some sort of chat game going on. It can be a simple trivia game or a guessing game that bingo chat moderators run to keep the players entertained. However, the chat games usually bring small prizes for the winners, most often in monetary bonuses or free bingo tickets for upcoming games. Even though these are free, low-value games, if you win enough of them, you’ll raise your bingo budget.
Now that you know how to play bingo with the usual initial bonus, let’s talk about how you can maximize a slightly bigger bonus, for example, a $20 deposit. You can opt to get a bonus, and let’s say you get a 300% bonus, which will give you a total of $80. To stretch this budget, you need to apply the advice I’ve shared above to play free bingo, choose low-cost games, and play chat games. Of course, the bigger budget means you can also mix things up, and you can also:
- Play Fixed Games – the fixed games have a guaranteed prize amount. Because these don’t sound enticing, many people overlook these and instead opt for the games with bigger prizes. If fewer people play at these games, you have a better chance of winning, which will add to your bingo budget.
- Don’t Forgo The Free Games – the free bingo games are always welcome, as these are free (or very low cost). You can even pre-purchase your tickets and have them play for you without you being online.
Now let’s talk about ways to stretch a larger bingo budget, for example, playing with a $30 deposit. If your bingo platform has a deposit bonus of 300%, you automatically get a whopping $90 of playing money. Here is what you can do to stretch this amount to the max and get the best winning chance:
- Play Free Bingo – as you’ve noted, I’m a fan of free bingo, primarily because the free bingo games have different prizes at different times of the day. Follow the free bingo offer on your bingo platform and see the schedule and available prizes.
- Enter Jackpot Games – if you have a larger bingo budget, you can partake in a bingo room with a progressive jackpot. Be sure to check the requirements of the various sites; for example, some websites have lower jackpot limits of up to 33 numbers, while others have higher limits.
- Play Different Value Games – to stretch your budget and make it last longer while maximizing your winning chances, you should play games with differently priced tickets. Play low-cost games, and mix them up with higher value games; this way, you increase the shots of improving your balance.
- Enter Promotional Games – most bingo platforms have promotional games that are very similar to the fixed prize games. However, these have more significant guaranteed prizes and run for a limited time.
Final Advice on Maximizing Your Bingo Budget
Whether you are playing with a $10 or $100 bingo budget, as I’ve covered above, there are ways you can make it last longer and maximize your winning chances. To wrap up, I’ll round the article in several points that I believe will help you have a better chance at winning and using your bingo budget longer:
- Set a bingo budget that will not hurt your financial condition
- Be prepared to lose everything you put on the bingo platform
- Play smart and plan your games ahead, checking bingo schedules and possible prizes
- Enter free bingo games whenever possible
- Play cheap (penny) games to get more tickets and more winning opportunities
- Enter fixed games or guaranteed jackpot games
- Chose less popular rooms with fewer people to get a better chance at winning
- Partake in the Loyalty Program to earn extra perks
- Don’t play bingo every day, and you’ll make your bingo budget last longer
Online bingo is a fun pastime, and it can provide hours of entertainment. The real problems begin when you stop considering it a game and start thinking of it as addiction or a means to earn a living. To ensure you are not doing something damaging to you and your family, start small and stick to your allotted budget, and of course, good luck.
FAQs
What is a bingo budget?
The bingo budget is the money you have allotted to play online bingo. You should focus on setting a fixed budget for your bingo games and stick to it. It is a sure way only to spend what you can afford and not get lured into spending money you can’t afford to lose.
What is free on a bingo card?
The US version of bingo or 75-ball bingo has five columns and five rows of numbers but has only 24 numbers on the card. The central field is marked with a star or has the logo of the particular bingo platform. This field is counted as already crossed, and is considered a free pass on the bingo card.
Do columns count in bingo?
Depending on the bingo variety and the winning pattern of the particular bingo game, some 75-ball games count columns as wins. This rule does not count in 90-ball bingo or the other bingo varieties.
How does bingo for money work?
Simple, the bingo for money is where the players deposit money to their accounts, purchase tickets at a set price, and partake in a particular game. The various online bingo betting platforms have different monetary requirements, either in the initial deposit, the price of the tickets, and the available prized and jackpots.
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