This question comes up all the time. Which is a better bet in the game of Craps, a ‘Come Bet’ or a ‘Place Bet’?

Craps Come Bet Odds Payout Chart

Both Come Bets and Place Bets play vital rolls within different strategies and based on the particular strategy you’re using, you could make the case that either is better than the other, and not be wrong.

But, if you take a closer look at the characteristics of both Come and Place bets individually, you may be very surprised by the answer.

If you’re like me, when I was learning to play craps, I was taught to remember two things;

The true odds against hitting a 6 or 8 are 6-to-5, so when placing odds behind a place or come bet, each five dollars in odds pays six dollars. This means that the player should place odds in a multiple of five dollars in order to get the maximum payout. As the shooter, a pass shall qualify as rolling a 7 or 11 and you will receive a 1/1 payout. Of course, craps allows for you to bet on don’t pass out, which is when the shooter rolls 2, 3, or 12 as the total score from the dice. For reference, a don’t pass bet wins on 2 or 3, but ties on 12. There are so many combinations of Craps Rolls, it is difficult to combine them all in one resource for players to utilize as they play. However, we’ve gone so far as to create a resource including the most common bets for beginners and advanced players, with true odds, payout and house edge for you to consider. Each bet in craps has its own unique payout. Naturally, some have higher payouts than others. However, when you pick a wager to place, it should not just be guided by the potential payout. House edge and the odds of the bet you place being correct must be factored in.

1. Always play a Pass Line Bet with 2 Come Bets and back them up with as much in Odds as you can, and
2. To win, you have to lower the house edge as much as possible and Free Odds on the PL and Come Bets are the best way to do that

To this day, when a novice player walks up to the table, that’s what the dealer, and other novice players, tell them, “Place a Come Bet and back it up with odds. So, that’s what I did. Some days, when the table was hot, I’d walk away a pretty solid winner, but when the table was choppy or cold, I would usually lose and lose fast.

After playing craps for a while, you get to know who the pros are, and I started noticing that while some of them played the Pass Line, virtually none of them used Come Bets. They were Placing Bets instead and they were winning more often than I was. How could that be? I was taught the 2 most important keys to winning, or so I thought.

Adding to my confusion, was that when my Come Bet + Odds won for the same amount as their Place Bet, the dealer was delivering a lot more chips to me than them, until I realized that almost half the chips I was getting was from my bet coming down.

It was time to take a closer look at the real differences between Come Bets and Place Bets, and I was pretty astounded by what I found out.

Craps Secrets Tip: Use Place Bets instead of Come Bets unless they’re part of a larger overall strategy.

HOUSE EDGE

The first thing to do is to check the house edge on both Come Bets and Place Bets. The house edge is the casino advantage on the bet and what you can expect to happen in the long run. The chart below shows the difference between the two.

The clear winner here is Come Bets with Free Odds and at only 1.41% for the Come, the more you back in odds, the lower you can drive the house edge.

BUT… I soon realized, there’s a number of things that the house edge on these bets doesn’t take into account.

• House edge is only calculated based on having won the bet. The Come + Odds has to win, before you can claim an advantage over Place Bets
• Come Bets are contract bets meaning once it travels to the number, it stays there until a decision is made. You don’t have the option of taking it down if you feel a Seven is coming (Odds can come down). Place Bets, on the other hand, can be taken down or turned off at any time.
• Come Bets are live during the Come-Out roll, Place Bets are not (unless you make them live). After hitting a point, if the shooter rolls a seven, your Come Bets lose.
• AND… to take advantage of the lower house edge, the number has to hit twice. First to travel to the number, then to hit the number and win.

The house edge advantage of Come Bets over Place Bets is much more cloudy when you take these factors into consideration.

PAYOUTS

Let’s take a look at the payout differences between Come Bets and Place Bets. With a lower house edge, you would expect that Come Bets would clearly outperform Place Bets in this area. WELL, NOT SO FAST… Let’s take a look.

For our example, we’ll use a $10 minimum table and use the payouts for the box number (5). The place bet on the (5) carries a 4.00% house edge vs. the Come Bet at 1.41% + Free Odds. Should be easy, right?

You’re probably as surprised as I was at the results since everything I had been told was to key on Free Odds, Come Bets and House Edge. This also explains why the pros that were using Place Bets instead of Come Bets were winning significantly more than I was.

The payout is where Place Bets take a clear lead over Come Bets in a number of ways even though Free Odds are supposed to give you the biggest payouts.

• On the first hit of the number, the Come Bet travels to the number and needs to be hit again before there is any payout. The Place Bet on the (9) pays out $14 on the first hit.
• Even when you add 4 times Odds to your Come Bet, the Place Bet still pays out more on the second hit.
  • This is due to the Come Bet itself that is only paid out at 1 to 1, so while the Odds pay out at a higher rate, it needs to make up the lesser payout on the original Come Bet
• When you get to 5 times Odds or a total of $60 in bets, the Come Bet beats the Place Bet by $1, BUT… you still haven’t made up the $14 win on the first hit.
• It takes almost 20X Odds before your Come Bet pays out more that the Place Bet including the 1st hit on the number. In our example, that would mean putting $200 behind your $10 come bet to outpace a Place Bet.
  • While you can still find casinos that offer 100X Odds, most have moved to 3/4/5X Odds and some at 10X, which keeps your Come Bets producing less than Place Bets on the craps tables.

Craps Come Bet Odds Payout

Based on the findings above, unless you’re at a casino that offers at least 20X Odds AND have the bankroll to support $200+ bets, you’re significantly better off using Place Bets to win at the casino.

When I made the switch to Place Bets, I became a lot more consistent at leaving the casino with their money in my pockets rather than the other way around.

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In the meantime…

BEST OF LUCK AT THE CASINOS!!!