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Baccarat glossary

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B

  • Banker bet A bet that the banker hand finishes closer to 9, paying 1 to 1 less a 5% commission; house edge about 1.06%.

    Banker wins slightly more often than player because it draws with knowledge of the player's third card; the commission offsets that.

    Also called banco.

    See also: Commission, Player bet, EZ Baccarat

  • Bankroll The money set aside for play, separate from everyday money.

    Also called roll.

    See also: Risk of ruin, Variance, Unit

  • Burn card A card discarded unseen, after a shuffle or before dealing.

    Also called burn.

    See also: Shoe, Cut card

C

  • Chemin de fer An older baccarat form in which players bank in turn and may choose whether to draw in some spots.

    Also called chemmy.

    See also: Punto banco

  • Commission The 5% the house takes from a winning banker bet.

    Also called 5% commission, banker commission.

    See also: Banker bet, Vig, Commission-free baccarat

  • Commission-free baccarat Baccarat variants that pay winning banker bets even money but push or reduce the payout on one specific banker win.

    One common version pays only half on a banker win with a total of 6. EZ Baccarat pushes banker wins with a three-card 7.

    Also called no-commission baccarat, no commission.

    See also: EZ Baccarat, Commission, Banker bet

  • Coup One round of baccarat, from the deal to the result.

    Also called hand, round.

    See also: Tableau, Scoreboard

  • Cut card A plastic card placed in the shoe to mark where the dealer stops and reshuffles.

    Also called marker card.

    See also: Penetration, Shoe

D

  • Deck A standard 52-card deck, or the number of such decks in play.

    Fewer decks generally favor the blackjack player slightly when other rules are equal.

    Also called pack.

    See also: Shoe, Spanish 21

  • Dragon 7 An EZ Baccarat side bet that the banker wins with a three-card total of 7, paying 40 to 1; house edge about 7.6%.

    See also: EZ Baccarat, Panda 8, Side bet

E

  • Edge The average advantage one side holds, as a percentage of the money at risk.

    In casino games the house usually holds the edge. In poker, edge is your expected win rate against the other players after rake.

    Also called advantage, player edge.

    See also: House edge, Expected value

  • Eight-deck shoe The standard punto banco setup: eight decks shuffled together and dealt from a shoe.

    Also called 8-deck shoe.

    See also: Shoe, Cut card, Coup

  • Expected value The average result of a decision if it were repeated many times.

    EV weighs each outcome by its probability. In poker it compares choices: the higher-EV play is better even if it loses this time. In casino games every bet has negative EV equal to its house edge, and the right play is the one that loses least.

    Also called EV.

    See also: House edge, Variance, Long run

  • EZ Baccarat A no-commission variant in which a banker win with a three-card 7 is a push.

    With that rule the banker bet's house edge is about 1.02%. The variant is often paired with the Dragon 7 and Panda 8 side bets.

    Also called EZ.

    See also: Commission-free baccarat, Dragon 7, Panda 8

F

  • Flat bet Betting the same amount every round.

    In craps, the flat bet is also the pass or come bet that the odds bet goes behind.

    Also called flat betting.

    See also: Unit, Odds

G

  • Gambler's fallacy The mistaken belief that past independent results change the chance of the next one.

    Five reds in a row do not make black more likely on the next spin.

    Also called Monte Carlo fallacy.

    See also: Scoreboard, Long run

H

  • Hand value (baccarat) Aces count 1, 2 to 9 at face value, tens and face cards 0, and only the last digit of the total counts.

    A 7 and an 8 make 15, which counts as 5. The best total is 9.

    Also called baccarat totals, point count.

    See also: Natural (baccarat), Tableau

  • House edge The average share of each bet the house keeps over the long run, as a percentage.

    A 1.41% house edge means an average cost of 1.41 per 100 bet. It says nothing about any one session, only about the average.

    Also called HE, casino advantage.

    See also: Expected value, Return to player, True odds

L

  • Long run The very large number of trials over which average results approach expected value.

    The long run is far longer than most people expect, often tens or hundreds of thousands of hands or rounds.

    See also: Expected value, Sample size, Variance

M

  • Mini-baccarat A smaller-table punto banco game where the dealer handles all the cards, with the same rules and odds.

    Also called mini-bac.

    See also: Punto banco

N

  • Natural (baccarat) A two-card total of 8 or 9 in either hand, which ends the coup with no more cards drawn.

    Also called natural, natural 8, natural 9.

    See also: Hand value (baccarat), Tableau, Coup

P

  • Panda 8 An EZ Baccarat side bet that the player wins with a three-card total of 8, paying 25 to 1; house edge about 10.2%.

    See also: EZ Baccarat, Dragon 7, Side bet

  • Payout odds What a winning bet pays relative to the stake.

    "To 1" means you keep the stake plus the payout: 5 to 1 on 10 returns 60. "For 1" includes the stake: 5 for 1 on 10 returns 50.

    Also called payout, to 1, for 1.

    See also: True odds, House edge

  • Player bet A bet that the player hand finishes closer to 9, paying 1 to 1; house edge about 1.24%.

    Also called punto.

    See also: Banker bet, Tie bet

  • Player pair / Banker pair Side bets that the first two cards of the named hand are a pair, usually paying 11 to 1.

    With 8 decks and an 11 to 1 payout each has a house edge of about 10.4%.

    Also called player pair, banker pair, pair bet.

    See also: Side bet, Player bet, Banker bet

  • Probability How likely an outcome is, from 0 (never) to 1 (certain), often written as a percentage.

    Probability and odds describe the same thing differently: a 25% chance is 3 to 1 against.

    Also called chance.

    See also: True odds, Expected value

  • Punto banco The common casino form of baccarat, where the house banks and players bet on player, banker or tie.

    All drawing is fixed by the tableau, so the only choice is which bet to make.

    Also called baccarat, American baccarat.

    See also: Player bet, Banker bet, Tie bet, Tableau

  • Push A tie in which the bet is returned without a win or loss.

    Also called tie, standoff.

    See also: Natural (blackjack), Bar 12

R

  • Return to player The average share of money bet that comes back, equal to 100% minus the house edge.

    Also called RTP, payback.

    See also: House edge, Expected value

  • Risk of ruin The chance of losing an entire bankroll before reaching a goal or the long run.

    It rises with variance and bet size relative to bankroll, and is certain over time for any negative-EV game played without end.

    Also called RoR.

    See also: Bankroll, Variance

S

  • Sample size The number of hands, rolls or spins in a set of results.

    Small samples are dominated by variance; they say little about whether a strategy is good.

    See also: Long run, Standard deviation

  • Scoreboard A display of past coup results, often drawn as patterns called roads.

    Each coup is almost independent of the last; no streak or pattern on the board predicts the next result, and the house edge on every bet stays the same.

    Also called road, big road, bead plate, roadmap.

    See also: Coup, Gambler's fallacy

  • Shoe A box holding several shuffled decks from which cards are dealt.

    Blackjack shoes commonly hold 6 or 8 decks; punto banco uses an 8-deck shoe.

    Also called dealing shoe.

    See also: Deck, Cut card, Penetration

  • Side bet An optional extra wager on a specific outcome, separate from the main bet.

    Side bets usually carry a much higher house edge than the main game.

    Also called side bets.

    See also: House edge, Insurance, Player pair / Banker pair

  • Squeeze (baccarat) The ritual of slowly bending and revealing a dealt card, edge first.

    It is pure ceremony: it has no effect on the result.

    Also called squeezing, peel.

    See also: Coup, Punto banco

  • Standard deviation The square root of variance, in the same units as the results.

    Over many trials, results land within about two standard deviations of the expectation roughly 95% of the time.

    Also called SD, std dev.

    See also: Variance, Sample size

T

  • Tableau The fixed rules for when the player and banker hands draw a third card.

    If either hand has a natural, both stand. Otherwise the player draws on 0 to 5 and stands on 6 or 7. If the player stood, the banker draws on 0 to 5. If the player drew, the banker's action depends on its total and the player's third card.

    Nobody at the table makes these decisions; the dealer applies them.

    Also called third-card rules, drawing rules.

    See also: Natural (baccarat), Banker bet, Punto banco

  • Tie bet A bet that both hands finish with the same total, usually paying 8 to 1; house edge about 14.4%.

    A tie happens on about one coup in eleven (9.5%). On a tie, player and banker bets push.

    Also called egalite.

    See also: Player bet, Banker bet, Push

  • True odds The real chance of an outcome stated as odds against it.

    A 7 in craps rolls 6 ways of 36, true odds 5 to 1. Any 7 pays 4 to 1; the gap is the house edge.

    Also called actual odds.

    See also: Payout odds, House edge, Odds

U

V

  • Variance How widely actual results spread around the expected value.

    High variance means big swings in both directions. Correct decisions can still produce losing sessions.

    Also called swings.

    See also: Standard deviation, Expected value, Risk of ruin

  • Vig A commission charged on certain bets, usually 5%, such as craps buy and lay bets or the baccarat banker bet.

    Also called vigorish.

    See also: Buy bet, Lay bet, Commission