BlackJack Strategies

Blackjack Strategies - Playing Blackjack online has a huge advantage over playing in a real casino. You can have any type of guide book next to you while playing. Sticking with a proper Blackjack Strategy will give you a real edge and increase your chances to beat the dealer.

Good Blackjack Strategies

We have put together some basic blackjack strategy in conjunction with wizardofodds.com and although it might look somewhat complicated at first, it realy is straight forward. This is how the blackjack strategy works:

Look up your hand along the left vertical edge and the dealer's up card along the top. In both cases an A stands for ace. From top to bottom are the hard totals, soft totals, and splittable hands. A "hard" hand is one that either has no aces, or has aces that are forced to count as point, lest the hand bust. A "soft" hand is one with at least one ace, which may still count as one or eleven points.

Bad Roulette Strategies

Three popular bad strategies encountered at the blackjack table are: never bust, mimic the dealer, and always assume the dealer has a ten in the hole. All three are very bad strategies for the following reason.

Never bust: For my analysis of this strategy I assumed the player would never hit a hard 12 or more. All other decisions were according to correct basic strategy. This "never bust" strategy results in a house edge of 3.91%.

Mimic the dealer: For my analysis of this strategy I assumed the player would always hit 16 or less and stand on 17 or more, including a soft 17. The player never doubled or split, since the dealer is not allowed to do so. This "mimic the dealer" strategy results in a house edge of 5.48%. Assume a ten in the hole: For this strategy I first figured out the optimal basic strategy under this assumption. If the dealer had an ace up, then I reverted to proper basic strategy, because the dealer would have peeked for blackjack, making a 10 impossible. This "assume a ten" strategy results in a house edge of 10.03%. If you want to practice your skills while your on the road, you can now also download mobile blackjack for your phone.

By: Chris Ellis, 12.09.2009