Are Online Casinos Rigged or Legit?

When it comes to identifying trustworthy online casinos, the best thing that you can do is stick to playing at regulated sites in legal states. This refers to legally licensed platforms, meaning you should always confirm the legitimacy of an online casino's gambling license.

Most legitimate casinos will clearly display their licensing credentials. If you come across a site where this information may be hard to find, it doesn't automatically mean it's rigged or a scam. That said, it will serve as a reminder to double check if they're licensed by a reputable gaming commission prior to registering or making any form of deposit.

The most secure online casinos in the United States are the ones that are state-regulated, meaning a casino that's licensed to operating in one of the seven states that permits legal online gambling.

Each of these states has strict regulations in place to protect players, as licensed casinos are required to undergo regular audits covering numerous factors including game fairness and financial transaction security.

Look to the table below for a full list of our top legitimately regulated real money online casinos.

Are all offshore casino gambling sites rigged? Technically, no. Some offer fair casino games on a secure platform. On the other hand, many offshore online gambling casinos do rig games and/or cheat players out of earned winnings.

Overall, fraudulent casinos and unlicensed casinos are much more likely to engage in unfair practices and manipulate games, putting players at greater risk. The biggest issue with playing at an unregulated offshore casino gambling site is that you can’t know for sure, and you don’t have any legal recourse if something goes wrong.

Positive reviews and international gambling licenses may decrease the likelihood that an online casino is rigged, but there is always an element of risk involved when using an unregulated site. At the end of the day, it's often not worth it when there are several legitimate options at your disposal.

Always verify if an online casino has an official gambling license. Not having a gambling license may not necessarily mean the casino betting site is rigged, but the odds of it being fair are greatly reduced.

Most regulated casinos will clearly display its gaming license and other important credentials, which is how you can ensure you're only using safe casinos.

Before you register with an online casino, make sure it is reputable by conducting some research. You can learn more about the website or application by reading reviews from independent, reputable online sources, as well as checking player reviews and browsing online forums for firsthand experiences from other users.

At The Action Network, our main goal is to provide unbiased reviews of top casinos, in order to help our readers such as yourself make informed decision. Peer reviews from sites like Trustpilot can be helpful as well, but keep in mind that some users who lose money will use reviews to voice their frustrations as opposed to legitimate criticisms.

In some cases, they will even accuse the casino of being rigged. By reading and cross-referencing third-party reviews with user reviews, you'll get an accurate idea of whether an online casino is truly legitimate or not.

Simply put, most reputable online casinos will have consistently positive feedback across multiple sources.

While the top casinos rely on house edge to make legitimate profits over time, less reputable sites will take shortcuts like rigging games and lowering payout speeds. Read on for a full breakdown of unethical techniques used by rigged casinos.

Rigged casinos alter some of the key components that generally make games fair to play. Essentially, the algorithm has been changed to lower the true percentage of a game's Return to Player (RTP).

The RTP is a number that indicates how much money (on average) has been returned to players based on how much they've wagered overall. If a casino game has an RTP of 97%, for example, that means that players are likely to make $97 back for every $100 wagered.

Since this is an average, results may differ between players depending on nothing but luck. The odds of casino games always favor the house, but not to the point where you should ever feel cheated — if you are playing a fair game, of course.

Even a one percent RTP variation can mean the difference between winning and losing. Rigged online casino games typically have an RTP so low that they are no longer worthwhile. Winning is practically impossible, and any wins you may secure will likely be small and hard to withdraw as real cash.

RTP is calculated using a Random Number Generator (RNG). A reputable online casino developer will include an RNG in each game to ensure that the results are always completely random and legitimately fair. If anything looks or feels off about a game's RTP or RNG, always dig deeper, and choose another game if you're still unsure.

Some casino games, such as online slots or video poker, may use RTP as a selling point. For example, online slots with a listed RTP of 99% would be very likely to entice players, as they are promising an impressive theoretical return of $99 back on every $100.

In the previous section, we outlined how software providers could tamper with the RNG of online casino games, resulting in lower win rates than the game theoretically should. By simply advertising or listing a game's RTP as much higher than it actually is, players are being encouraged to try certain games under false pretenses.

Depending on the payment method that you use, There are sometimes fees involved when you make a deposit or withdrawal at a real money online casino, often depending on the payment method you're using.

On a reputable site, these fees will be in line with the actual cost of these transactions. In most cases, there are free and low-cost options available as well. Unfortunately, that likely won't be the case at an untrustworthy online casino.

These sites may add exorbitant processing fees to standard payment methods like credit card deposits or bank transfers. In some cases, these fees may even be hidden in the fine print or not disclosed at all.

Legitimate casinos accept that sometimes players win big, and have no problem quickly processing withdrawal requests to uphold their legal responsibility to winning players. 

Unfortunately, rigged online casinos take random outcomes out of the gambling equation, guaranteeing themselves a win most times while simultaneously refusing to pay out players who manage to win anyways.

Further to this, any attempts to reach out to customer support may result in shady excuses as to why your payout speed is so slow, if answered at all.

Some players get frustrated with these payment delays and end up cancelling their withdrawal request, often leading them to continue playing and sometimes losing all profits.

While that may not sound smart, it sadly makes sense when the only alternative seems to be having an account balance with frozen funds. As mentioned previously, this is one of the risks of playing at an unlicensed casino, since you wouldn't have any legal recourse.

When you sign up for a new account at an online casino, you are required to fill out a registration page with personal information including your full name, email address, and sometimes even your mailing address and/or phone number.

The registration process is safe and secure at a trusted online casino. but providing this sensitive info to unregulated casino sites puts you at risk for data breaches, leading to future vulnerabilities like theft or phishing scams.

We've discussed some of the ways to identify a trusted online casino, such as verifying it has a legitimate gambling license and cross-referencing reviews from multiple sources. Read on for more on other potential warning signs to look out for before you start playing at a new casino.

Welcome bonuses are used by the greater majority of real money online casinos to attract new customers. These are great offers that are typically awarded in the form of free spin bonuses, deposit match bonuses, and even no deposit bonuses.

While this is the standard among top casino sites, always proceed with caution. Now that you have an idea of what welcome bonuses usually look like, you'll know to look elsewhere if you stumble on a site with a suspiciously good offer.

For example, a 500% match on your first deposit or a site advertising 100% RTP on new slot games. Unregulated offshore casino sites offering amazing promotions aren't all rigged, but if something seems too good to be true, it often is. Always proceed with caution.

All of the best online casinos have outstanding site interfaces, highlighted by compelling game graphics and other aesthetically-pleasing elements that result in an elevated user experience. 

Casino apps and mobile desktop sites even allow you to play slots and other casino games from most smart devices such as phones or tablets. These are polished products that typically function well, which is why many iPhone casino apps will be well reviewed.

Some Android casino apps that are legit may not have as many reviews, which isn't necessarily a reason for alarm. That said, it doesn't hurt to use an Apple device to double-check an Android app's rating and vice versa.

Overall, be suspicious of casino sites that don't look right or function as they should. Some rigged casinos steal game elements from other sites to use on their own site, and the result isn't always polished or professional.

The same goes for the games themselves. Casino games with altered logos or glitching graphics may have been tampered with. Knock-offs exist in several areas of life, and online casinos are no exception.

Most offshore casinos offer cryptocurrency as a payment method. There isn't anything inherently wrong with this, but it's worth noting that crypto payments are difficult to trace. As such, there is often no recourse for retrieving lost cryptocurrency in the event that fraud has taken place.

This makes crypto a popular option among rigged online casinos. It's also important to note that some sweepstakes casinos like Stake.us Casino legitimately offer several different crypto payment methods, but this isn't standard practice for real money online casinos.