Last updated: January 01, 2024
Live dealer games have become increasingly popular in recent years. From blackjack and roulette to craps, baccarat, and poker, there are lots of fantastic options to choose from at live casinos, but which online games offer the best and most authentic experiences that mimic the thrills of land-based casino gaming?
Live dealer casino games are bridging the gap between online casinos and land-based establishments by giving players the opportunity to play their favorite games in a social environment that doesn’t require them to be at the venue in person. Instead, players get to experience the glamor of real-life gambling by playing games that are live-streamed in 4k directly to their desktop or mobile device. A real human dealer or croupier hosts these games, and players can interact with them as well as other players via a chat box.
This new form of social gaming was a godsend during the pandemic, but even though players have had the option to revisit brick-and-mortar casinos for well over a year now, many are still choosing to indulge in the speed and convenience of live dealer casinos over the latter. After all, who truly wants to fork out hundreds of dollars for hotels, cab fares, and expensive drinks when they could be digging into a kebab, sipping cheap Prosecco, and having a few rounds on Texas Hold’ Em in their pajamas for a fraction of the price?
If you’re in the same boat but aren’t too sure about where to find the best live dealer games or which ones are trending right now, we’ve saved you the hardships of having to figure it all out by listing the best live dealer games of 2023, complete with what you can expect when you play at the best live dealer casinos for real money and how to choose the best sites.
Blackjack is the most popular table game in the world, both online and offline. The live dealer version offers just as much excitement as playing at the live felt tables in Las Vegas, giving players the opportunity to make some quick wins as they interact with a real human who shuffles and dishes out the cards.
But while you might be having fun laughing at their bad jokes, don’t forget you’ve still got to beat their hand! This is where you can utilize the options of splitting pairs, doubling down, or taking insurance. Some live dealer blackjack games even allow you to surrender, where you can forfeit half your stake if you know your hand has little chance of winning.
In terms of wagering options, most live dealer blackjack games let you bet as little as $1, but the games with the biggest returns will be around the $5 mark. The most popular live blackjack variants you can choose from include Blackjack Diamond, Blackjack Infinity, Salon Prive Blackjack, and Blackjack Party, which all offer an average RTP of 99.29%.
Roulette is one of the oldest casino games in the world, but what’s more interesting is the fact the game was created entirely by accident. A French physicist and mathematician called Blaise Pascal was the genius behind the invention, who, at the time, was trying to invent a perpetual motion machine. Instead, the end product was the world’s greatest gambling tool: the roulette wheel.
If you don’t already know the drill of this game – a ball is dropped into a spinning wheel that houses 37 individual pockets (or 38 if it’s the American version). Your job is to bet where the ball will land, which can be a color, a number, or a group of numbers. There are several other betting options in this game, and the potential to make a heap of money if you guess correctly.
The live version of roulette offers just as much fast-paced action and excitement as any wheel in a land-based casino can offer you. Some of the versions you’ll find at the best live dealer sites include French Roulette, American Roulette, European Roulette, La Partage, En Prison, Speed Roulette, and even Live Roulette with Progressive Jackpots.
Poker is like the Dungeons and Dragons of card games, only thankfully, it’s nowhere near as complex or time-consuming. Players need to pit their wits against each other and try to literally get “the upper hand” by using a combination of hole cards (the ones in their hand) and community cards (the ones on the table).
There are a few different variations of live poker to choose from, some of which require more patience and skill than others. The most popular versions include Texas Hold’Em, Casino Hold’Em, Caribbean Stud, and Three-Card Poker. Live Casino Hold’Em is a particularly good choice for people who want the chance to win a life-changing sum of money because these games tend to house progressive jackpots. But if those aren’t your thing, you can make plenty of cash with some of the side bets that the other variants offer.
Baccarat is a known favorite of celebrities like Toby Maguire, Phil Ivey, and even fictional characters like 007. Just like in a traditional game, the live dealer version requires players to wager on who they believe will have a hand that is closest to 9. The choices are the player, the banker, or the tie bet.
Before the game begins, both the player and the banker receive two face-down cards. Both parties must then look at their hands and decide whether they want to accept another card or stick to their current total. Cards are combined together and the first digit is eliminated if the total given is higher than 9. For instance, if you take away the 1 from a hand of 9 and 3, that totals 12, giving you a hand value of 2. Face cards, i.e., Jacks, Queens, Kings, and Aces count for nothing.
The game has a number of rules that can be used, and different casinos may play in different ways. Before you place your bets, make sure to review the game rules of the variation you want to play. The live variations you can play online include Single Player, Multi-Player, Speed Baccarat, Mini Baccarat, Baccarat VIP, Baccarat Squeeze, and No Commission Baccarat.
Unlike online craps, where CGI is used to simulate the dice rolls, and the game can only be played between you and the computer, the live dealer craps experience goes the full nine yards to bring you a genuine table, real dice, and a live dealer operating from a real gaming floor. Each roll of the dice is live-streamed in HD to your computer or smartphone in real time, and players can share in the excitement with others via the chat feature while they anticipate where the dice will land.
So far, Evolution is the only provider of live dealer craps, and it’s not yet available to residents in the US. However, some players on Reddit have managed to get past these restrictions using a VPN that shares their location from Finland. Of course, we’re not condoning this, as there may still be consequences if you get caught; therefore, it’s probably best to wait until Evolution or another software provider makes the game available to the US.
We’ll post an update as soon as we hear anything!
Not every live casino game involves playing with cards or a roulette wheel. One of the most well-known online games nowadays is Evolution’s Dream Catcher live game, which involves neither.
Featuring a live dealer to spin the wheel, Dream Catcher is surrounded by a cutting-edge multi-camera studio with light and sound effects that automatically coordinate with the game. In order to give players a fully immersive gaming experience, a variety of dynamic camera angles and close-ups of the wheel add to the excitement as the player awaits the result.
While the wheel is spinning, the live dealer spins and engages with the players, asking them to bet on one of the following numbers before it stops. The numbers are 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, or 40. The player receives a reward if they wager on the right number (e.g., 1 to 1, 2 to 1, 5 to 1, and so on).
Like any game-show-style casino game, Dream Catcher gives players the chance to win some enormous amounts of cash if their number selections are on point, especially when the wheel lands on 2x or 7x bonus spin multiplier segments.
Another live game-show-style game that’s a huge hit with players at the moment is everyone’s favorite TV show, Deal or No Deal—and yep, it’s another one straight out of Evolution’s whacky games lab. If you’ve ever watched the show, you’ll know that there are some whopping amounts of cash hiding in some of the briefcases.
The prizes you can win in the live casino version are no different, and instead of being a mere spectator, you now get to be the one in the spotlight, potentially taking home a massive 500x your bet. But before that happens, you first need to spin the three-reel bank vault to qualify.
The amount of money in the greatest prize bag is increased by 75x to 500x with each spin. The prize money in one or more of the 16 briefcases of the player’s choice is increased by random multipliers ranging from 5x to 50x once they have qualified for the prize top-up round.
Then, the live hosted Deal or No Deal action begins. The goal is simple: to bet on whether the amount of money in the briefcases that are left will be higher than what the banker is offering. At this point, he or she will ask you “Deal or No Deal,” and if you go with your intuition and it happens to be correct, you’ll win whatever amount is hiding in the mysterious briefcase—which, in the worst case scenario, might only be a few bucks. In an ideal world, however, you’ll have picked the case that’s stuffed with hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars!
So there we have it—a bona fide selection of the latest and greatest live dealer casino games to try your luck on in 2023. The best part about playing live dealer games is how they give you the singular option to play in real time with actual dealers, regardless of your location. No more need to endure the drunk idiot next to you who can’t decide whether to split his Aces, no more waiting in long lines to cash in your hard-earned winnings, and no more expensive 4 am taxis to get you 5 blocks back to your home. Everything you could possibly need to have a great evening at the casino is right here, ready to enjoy right now. Good luck and happy gambling!
There are a few things to consider when choosing any type of casino, not just live dealer sites. First and foremost, you should make sure the casino is licensed and regulated by an approved gambling authority. You should also make sure it deploys proper security encryption measures to make sure your details and activity are safe whenever you log in. Other things to consider are the games on offer: do they have all the games and variations of the game you want to play? What about bonus deals and payment methods? Ensuring a casino has all of these things are going to set you up for having the best possible experience.
There are plenty of options to choose from if you pick the best live dealer casinos to play at. These include popular table games such as blackjack, baccarat, craps, poker, and roulette, plus game show-style games like Money Wheel and Deal or No Deal. Just note that some of the games aren’t available to players in the USA as of yet.
Live casinos are the same as online casinos. The only difference is that instead of a computer generating the outcomes through Random Number Generators, live dealer game results are determined by the actions of a real human. These games are also streamed and played in real time, and allow you to socialize with the dealer and other players.
Absolutely, you can. In fact, it’s not possible to play live dealer games unless you’re willing to play for money. This is because the games normally include other players and because these games cost money to run. If you want to play casino games for free, you’ll need to stick to traditional online casinos that allow you to play their games in demo mode.
As mentioned, live dealer casinos feature games that are streamed from a real-life casino environment, complete with a real human being managing your bets and winnings in real time. This is all achieved through the use of HD cameras, light settings, and crystal-clear audio, designed to emulate the look and feel of a real gaming floor.
Jerome oversees our editing and content team and absolutely loves blackjack. So much so that he was a professional player for more than a decade before joining us at Casino Today. He’s written several books, mostly on the subjects of card counting and the different blackjack systems he employed over the years. He also runs a successful YouTube channel where he showcases different blackjack scenarios with beginner tips on how to beat the dealer.
