Best Roulette Strategies & Tips To Win – 2024 Update

Roulette strategies often promise to tip the winning scales in your favour and lower the house advantage, but do they actually work? Well, in a nutshell, no strategy can beat the house edge, especially as roulette is purely a game of chance, but using the right strategy can give you a clear plan of how to split your bankroll. So read on to find out about the most popular strategies out there and what our experts think about them.

Getting Started: Why Use Roulette Strategies?

Whether you're playing this classic table game at a brick-and-mortar casino or at one of the top real-money roulette sites, doing so unprepared and without knowing which bets to place or avoid can lead to accruing losses. Conversely, the right online roulette strategy is designed to lower your financial risk and help you keep a more accurate score of losses and wins, while using your bankroll more effectively.

In addition, a proper roulette strategy must be adapted to your experience level. While some are better suited for beginners and easier to implement, others require a significant budget and are thus more tailored for experts and high rollers.

No Roulette Strategy is 100% Effective

No matter what anyone promises you, there’s no such thing as a roulette winning strategy or a series of bulletproof tricks that will guarantee a payout on every single spin. Roulette is a game of pure chance, so a strategy is solely efficient for limiting losses and decreasing your overall risk.

The Best Strategies for Roulette

Before you develop any casino games strategy, it’s paramount that you understand the basic rules of the title you’re playing, the betting types and limits, as well as how RTP and volatility can affect your bottom line.

Similarly, effective roulette strategies are adapted to the variation you’re playing and the number of pockets on the wheel, which are different for American Roulette and European Roulette. Furthermore, they account for the player type, budget, and risk tolerance. For instance, a low-budget gambler might not feel comfortable with the Martingale strategy, nor be able to sustain it in the long run, as it requires a substantial bankroll.

To help you tackle all the game’s intricacies with expert finesse, our team has united the most well-known roulette tactics, accompanied by in-depth explanations. This should help you compare and contrast better and make sure the final choice suits your gameplay style.

The Martingale Strategy Roulette

Martingale is one of the most popular betting systems in the world. It’s not only applicable to roulette, but also to other games where you can find wagers with a 50/50 chance of winning, like in blackjack and baccarat.

Initially, in 18th-century France, the Martingale betting system was designed for games similar to flipping a coin with two outcomes (heads or tails), in which you’d win the stake if you chose the former and lose if you opted for the latter. This also proved effective for certain roulette outside bets where your odds to win are one in two, for example odd/even, red/black, low/high.

The Martingale roulette strategy involves doubling your bet after a loss. When you register a win, however, you must reset it to the initial amount. To protect your bankroll even more, this initial amount can even be the minimum bet allowed by the roulette variation you’re playing.

The idea behind this system is that the first win would recoup all earlier losses and a profit roughly equal to the original wager. In theory, for the Martingale roulette strategy to work, you must have an extensive bankroll and a major risk tolerance, so we’d strongly advise using it only if you’re a high roller. It’s also wise to have a set betting limit that you don’t go over to sustain this style of play over a longer period.

So, how would it function in practice? If you’ve bet €5 on red and won, you now have a €10 payout, which includes the original €5 stake and the €5 profit. However, if you’ve bet on red and lost, you need to double the bet to €10 for the next round. Should the losing streak continue, you’d do the same, so you’ll have to subsequently bet €20 and €40, respectively. However, if you win, you’ll have €80, which covers all previous bets (€5+€10+€20+€40=€75) and a €5 profit. When you hit a win again, you’ll reset the bet back to the starting €5.

The main flaw of the Martingale roulette strategy is that it would require massive wealth to be successful long-term, as it creates an exponential growth for all bets. Even if applied correctly, there’s the house edge to worry about and the possibility to suffer a string of consecutive losses, which are harder to recoup with a single win.

Level: Beginner & Intermediate

The Fisher Roulette Strategy

This is a lesser-known roulette strategy, but still appreciated in certain circles of table game connoisseurs. It was created in the 19th century by Samuel Fisher — a casino owner from London. He was allegedly a professional roulette player who set out on a mission to “crack” the game before he died.

As opposed to the Martingale system, which is a progressive betting system, here you’re not required to raise your stakes so often and so aggressively. The Fisher strategy can also be used on all important roulette variations (European, American, and French). However, it’s particularly effective for the European and French versions because of the lower number of spins per hour (roughly 30 versus 50 for American Roulette).

Do keep in mind that the Fisher system was solely designed for outside bets (red/black, odd/even, & low/high).

To use the Fisher roulette strategy, you have to place even-money outside bets only, and they need to be of the same value each round (or the same base unit). When you lose four rounds in a row, you must multiply the stake amount by three. If you hit a win after raising the wager, you’ll return to the base stake for the next round. However, if you lose four consecutive rounds once more, you triple the stake size again.

The Fisher roulette strategy attempts to alleviate some of the shortcomings of the Martingale system, lower the overall risk, and better protect your bankroll, potentially leading to longer game sessions.

Level: Intermediate

D’Alembert Roulette Strategy

D’Alembert is truly the best mathematical roulette strategy, highly suitable for beginners and those with a low-risk tolerance, who want to play it as safe as possible. In contrast to the Martingale, which is a positive-progression betting system, D’Alembert is a negative-progression betting system.

That means you must increase the wager size after each loss and decrease it after each win. The goal is to safeguard your bankroll from the inherent volatility of the game and obtain a more balanced win-to-loss ratio over time. The reason why we called it a mathematical system is because it was conceived based on a complex mathematical formula by Jean Baptiste Le Rond D’Alembert in the 1800s.

This strategy, once again, can only be used on bets with even-money payouts at roulette, namely red/black, high/low and odd/even. We should also mention that it’s also effective for various other casino titles, such as craps, blackjack, and even some sports betting wager types.

To give you a more practical example, if you’ve started with a bet unit of €10, placed it on red and lost, you increase your next bet by another unit to €20. If you lose again, the next bet becomes €3. If this one is also unsuccessful, you’ll need to raise it by another unit to €40. However, if you win on a €40 bet, you decrease the next one by a unit back to €30.

Although this system yields lower returns when compared to the Martingale, you’ll have also experienced a smaller level of risk and invested less in total. The D’Alembert system is based on the (largely false) premise that you’re far more likely to win after a loss, so you need to double down on the next bet.

Level: Beginner & Intermediate

The Grand Martingale Roulette Strategy

The Grand Martingale is, by far, the riskiest roulette betting strategy of all, so we urge you to tread carefully around it and only use it if you have a large enough bankroll to sustain it.

While quite similar to the regular Martingale, there is a slight twist. With this, you must once again use outside bets that pay 1:1 only (red/black, low/high, odd/even). Then, you must choose a starting wager you’re comfortable with that serves as a baseline. Should you lose, you double your bet for the next round and add the baseline to it. If you win, you return to the starting value.

For example, if you’ve set a baseline bet of €10, placed it on a low number and lost, for the next round, you’ll need to double the wager and add the baseline. That means we’ll have (€10 x 2) + 10. If you lose again, the next bet will be (€30 x 2) + 10 = €70. Now, if you’ve won on this final bet, you return to the base value for the next round, which is €1.

With the Grand Martingale system, money will accumulate progressively much faster over a shorter time span, but you’re also at a greater risk for losses. It’s a much more aggressive strategy than the classic Martingale.

Remember that some online casinos will set lower table limits precisely to discourage players from winning too much with either the classic Martingale or the Grand Martingale strategies. Using the Grand Martingale system makes it very easy to go over the table limit. One way to perhaps counteract this is by choosing a high-stakes table and variation from the get-go.

Level: Intermediate

Paroli Roulette Strategy

Also known as the Reverse Martingale, Paroli can be considered the polar opposite of the Martingale betting system. It’s a good roulette strategy and one of the oldest around, dating to the 17th century. At first, it was used for an Italian card game called basset and, later on, for Pai Gow, craps and, most notably, roulette.

The Paroli system involves halving your bet each time you lose and doubling it each time you win. As you can see, it’s the opposite of the Martingale system, which urges players to double down on losing bets and half winning ones.

Because of this, Paroli is a low-risk option, suitable for beginners and players with smaller budgets. It only works with bets that have a 1:1 payout ratio (red/black, odd/even, high/low).

To give you an example, if you place a €10 bet as your base stake and you lose, the next bet will be €10. If this bet wins, you’ll wager €20 next. Should you win again, the next bet has to be €40. If you lose at this point, you return to the base stake of €10.

Your chances of winning using the Paroli system also vary depending on the roulette version you’re playing and the total number of pockets on the wheel. For instance, you have a 48.6% probability to win the bet on European Roulette, and a 47.4% chance on American Roulette.

Level: Beginner & Intermediate

The James Bond Roulette Strategy

Although it’s hard to tell whether this is the most successful roulette strategy, it certainly takes the popularity crown. It was named after the famous fictional character of James Bond. Per the plot of the popular Casino Royale film from 2006, the British secret agent was known for meeting people and conducting business in casinos. That’s exactly how this roulette strategy came to bear 007’s name.

The James Bond roulette strategy involves a particular distribution of bets. You have to invest 70% of the stake on high numbers (19 to 36), 25% of the stake on low numbers (13 to 18), and the remaining 5% on the single 0. As you probably suspected, this combination bet was designed for roulette games with a single 0 (European and French).

So, if we had a €200 budget, with this strategy, we’d have €140 on the high numbers, €50 on the low numbers, and €10 on the 0. Because it’s a combination bet, the idea is for the strategy to cover more outcomes, therefore reducing the overall risk.

However, there is a pitfall to consider. You won’t cover the numbers from 1 to 12, which means you have to get ready for potential losses, as this interval is quite probable for the ball to land on as well.

When employing the James Bond roulette strategy, you’ll have the following odds to win based on bet type:

• Bets on 19-36 – 48.65% probability
• Bets on six line (13-18) – 16.2% probability
• Bets on single 0 – 2.7% probability
• No bet wins – 32.43% probability

Level: Beginner

The Fibonacci Roulette Strategy

Another widely-used roulette strategy to win is the Fibonacci. It is named after the Fibonacci number sequence in Mathematics, in which each number is the sum of the previous two, for example 0, 1, 1 (0+1), 2 (1+1), 3 (2+1), 5 (3+2), 8 (5+3), 13 (8+5), 21 (13+8), 34 (21+13), and so on. The inventor of this sequence was the Italian mathematician Leonardo Pisano, who also reportedly went by the name of Fibonacci.

We highly encourage beginners to use this roulette strategy, because it’s not as aggressive or complex as the others. It’s also quite fit for pros who wish to lower their risk levels.

This system works best with even-money, outside bets that pay 1:1 (red/black, low/high, odd/even). In fact, while it can also be used for inside bets, we don’t advise it, because it’s a risky endeavour that won’t guarantee the same efficiency.

The Fibonacci is a negative-progression system, meaning that you need to increase your stake every time you lose. For every lost bet, you add up the previous numbers and use the sum to serve as your next stake. When you win, you return two positions back in the Fibonacci sequence.

So, starting with a €10 bet, if you lose, the next one will be €20. If you lose again, the next one is €30 and, if you lose again, the next one is €50. Your bets will increase progressively this way until you register a win. This means that, overall, you’re only down €10.

Level: Beginner/Intermediate/Pro

The Labouchère Roulette Strategy

In contrast to the other roulette strategies, Labouchère is a more complex one that requires a larger starting budget, which is why we would recommend it to high rollers and experienced players.

Also known as the cancellation system or Split Martingale, Labouchère is a negative progression betting system. It was designed in the 19th century by Henry Labouchère, a British aristocrat, writer, and journalist, who was reportedly also a passionate gambler.

Labouchère only works with even bets (red/black, odd/even, 1-18, 19-36) and employs complex mathematical concepts. Same as other negative-progression systems, the basic idea is to increase your bet size upon losing and decrease it when winning. However, be cautious, because you need a sizable bankroll to sustain it, otherwise you risk chasing your losses.

The first step when implementing Labouchère is figuring out how much you want to win in real money, then splitting this amount into smaller numbers. For instance, if you want to win €150, you could have a sequence of €20-€30-€50-€30-€20. This strategy allows you to adjust the desired risk level to your tolerance. If you’re a risk-adverse player, you could opt for a smaller sequence of lower numbers, but this will also dip into the overall size of your profit. Likewise, a longer sequence of higher numbers can potentially yield a bigger profit.

Then, you need to add the first and last numbers of the sequence to form your initial stake. Based on our example, you’d have €20+€20=€40. For the second bet, you’d add the first and last numbers again, so €30+€30=€60. Then, you continue until you cross off all numbers and hit the desired profit level you set initially. However, if you lose, you have to add the losing bet amount to the end of the sequence.

This roulette strategy is quite challenging, because you need to remember the sequence as you go.

Level: Pro

The Andrucci Roulette Strategy

If you’re also a reel spinner, you’re probably familiar with the concept of hot/cold slots. This classification is designed to help players determine which slot hasn’t paid out in a while (cold), and which one keeps awarding wins (hot). Some platforms even have dedicated hot/cold categories that are updated every day.

This roulette strategy follows a very similar concept. Given that both roulette and slots are purely luck-based games, the logic behind it makes sense.

According to the Andrucci strategy, players must wager 30-37 times on the roulette wheel using random even money bets like red/black, odd/even, 1-18, or 19-36. Then, they must manually record each round and write down the “hot numbers” or those that paid off most often. Then, they must double down on these hot numbers to increase their payout potential.

However, the Andrucci strategy has many flaws. The most important one is the attempt to find a pattern in a luck-based game, which is inherently incorrect. With roulette, the result of the previous round is not connected in the slightest with the current one. This is explained by the RNG algorithm and how it works.

The primary problem with the Andrucci system is that it’s based on chaos theory, a concept in mechanics and mathematics that aims to make sense of unpredictable things. In other words, it’s trying to create a logical and predictable progression where there is none.

Additionally, after identifying the hot numbers, you actually have lower odds of winning, because you’ll be forced to place straight-up bets or wagers on a single number, which have a payout of 35:1 for European Roulette and 36:1 for American Roulette.

Level: Intermediate/Pro

One To Avoid: The 666 Roulette Strategy

Did you know that the sum of all numbers on the roulette wheel is 666? That’s also why this popular table game was a source of religious controversy, legends, and myths. In certain circles, it also received the ominous name of “Devil’s Game”. We don’t know for sure if our last strategy is connected to this titbit about the roulette game but, either way, we strongly urge you to avoid it.

The idea behind this strategy is to bet on as many numbers on the roulette wheel as you can until you eventually strike a win. Straight off the bat, as you can see, the major problem with this approach is that it would require an astronomical bankroll, with no guarantees of success in store. Not only is it not a profitable roulette strategy in the slightest, but we’d go as far as to call it a losing one.

Some players prefer to use the 666 strategy on French and European roulette, because these versions have the lowest house edge — 1.35% and 2.7%, respectively. However, even if implemented correctly, it has no actual bearing on the house edge.

Here’s how the 666 strategy would work in practice. First, you’d need to have a sizable bankroll, but keep your bets small to cover the whole wheel, as such:

• First bet: red or black. This would cover 50% of the wheel
• Second bet: six split bets on the opposite colour you didn’t wager on previously
• Third bet: straight bets on three of the remaining seven numbers

Remember that these three bets would have to be placed simultaneously. In theory, you’d have a 90% chance to win, and a 10% chance to lose. In practice, however, you wouldn’t turn a big profit because only one of these bets can win at a time.

Level: Beginner/Intermediate

Which Roulette Betting Strategy Should I Choose?

Ultimately, when discussing games that rely solely on chance and random algorithms to award prizes, there are a number of factors that go into designing a clever strategy.

The bottom line is that there’s no such thing as the best strategy for roulette in general, only one that works for you, your budget, your game preferences, and your risk tolerance. Here’s what you need to look at:

• Game Type: While some strategies can be used irrespective of the roulette type, others only work for a maximum number of pockets. Moreover, there are way more French and European roulette strategies to explore compared to American roulette, and this has to do with the mathematical advantage or house edge. Typically, it’s much better to stick to French and European, because the house edge is 2.7% max, whereas the American version has a 5.26% edge.
• Betting Limits: Table limits are always an issue to consider. Whether you play the RNG or live format, there will be min/max limitations in store that typically apply to all bet types, for example €0.1 – €1,000. Make sure you keep this aspect in mind before employing any strategies, because some of them (especially the Martingale) can easily go above the table limits.
• Your Betting Choice: Most roulette strategies promise success on even-money bets only (50/50), meaning they won’t deliver the same results on straight-up bets. By definition, the first ones will create lower but steadier wins, while the latter are much riskier, but could trigger the biggest payouts of all. You should make sure the choice aligns with your gameplay style, budget, and winning goals.

How To Win at Roulette — Our Top 10 Tips

Alongside all the information we’ve presented above, we’re also here to provide you with 10 tips and tricks to increase your chances of winning at roulette:

1. Use demo play to your advantage — To test the efficiency of any roulette strategy and reduce your overall risk, always begin with the demo mode of your favourite roulette game. You won’t have any time limits to worry about, and you’ll use credits, not real money, so you won’t be subjected to the possibility of financial loss.
2. Understand the basic rules & concepts of the game — Familiarise yourself with the main bet types available at roulette (inside/outside) and how each one pays in statistical terms (e.g. 35:1 for straight bets).
3. Stick to roulette games with the lowest house edge possible — Even the best strategies rarely have any effect on the mathematical advantage the house already has on you. So, to increase your odds, stick to French/European roulette. Both have a single 0 as opposed to the double 00 pocket in American Roulette, which gives you a lower house edge overall.
4. Be conservative with your bets to stretch the duration of the session — Irrespective of your bankroll’s size, if you wish to stay in the game for longer, keep your bets small to weather any losing streaks.
5. Stick to outside bets — The best way to win more and minimise losses is to stick to outside bets on red/black, odd/even, or high/low numbers. While these wagers won’t deliver spectacular wins in terms of overall value, they’re far less risky than other bet types.
6. Practise responsible gambling — Don’t chase your losses or base your entire session on the promised success of a single roulette strategy. Instead, whatever you opt for, make sure you have a fixed starting budget that you don’t go over, whether you win or lose. You should also set deposit and stake limits from your online casino account.
7. Try different roulette strategies — Even if you’re a fan of the Martingale, it doesn’t hurt to try the Paroli once in a while. It’s best to explore as many strategies as possible and track your progress with each one.
8. Don’t try a pro’s strategy if you’re a beginner — Your experience level should also be analysed closely before you stick to one roulette strategy over another. If you’re a newcomer, you won’t have the budget or technical knowledge required to play in the top leagues, so stick to beginner-friendly strategies you can understand and implement correctly.
9. Take advantage of online casino promotions — Many operators supply game-specific bonuses lately, and this also applies to the famous roulette. You can receive deposit matches, free chips, live roulette deals, and other similar bonuses. We urge you to take full advantage of them as they can help you explore new tables and variations.
10. Know when to stop — When you’ve hit your desired profit level, end the session and cash out. This will help you avoid the temptation of getting back into the game too soon, playing for too long, or getting overconfident, which can lead to riskier behaviour down the line.

Best Roulette Strategy – Our Verdict

Since its inception in 18th-century France, many brilliant minds — from enthusiastic gamblers to pragmatic mathematicians —have tried to crack the code and find new ways to win at roulette. Whether you prefer established betting systems such as the Martingale or the Paroli, or have a custom roulette strategy chart you swear by, always exercise caution and remember that no strategy is 100% bulletproof.

Roulette Betting Strategy Sources

• LeoVegas – One of the leading iGaming brands in the UK and Sweden
• 888casino – A multi-award winning online casino and a reputable industry pioneer since 1997
• LV BET – A Malta-based licensed provider of casino and betting services