Craps guide
Craps looks hectic from across a casino floor, but it is a simple game with a handful of ideas: one person rolls two dice, everyone else bets on what the dice will do. This guide explains those ideas in order, using the same rules and payouts as the Smart Craps game, so you can read a page and then try what you learned at the table with free play chips.
Start here
- How to play craps
- The come-out roll, the point, the shooter and a full round told step by step. Ten minutes to read, and you will understand what everyone at the table is cheering about.
- Every bet at the table
- Pass Line, Come, odds, Place, Field, hardways and the one-roll proposition bets, each with what it pays and its exact house edge.
- The dice odds
- Why 7 is the most common roll, how many ways each total can be made and how likely a point is to repeat before a 7 shows up.
- Bankroll sense
- What actually helps (low house-edge bets, sensible bet sizes, stopping rules) and what does not (betting systems that promise to beat the odds).
- Strategy lab and roll analysis
- Put the theory to work: test a betting plan on the game engine, see the exact house edge behind it, and compare your own rolls and results with what the odds predict.
- Craps glossary
- Come-out, point, seven out, yo, hard way and the other words you will hear, explained in a line each.
- About Smart Craps
- Who makes the game, how it is built and tested, and what free play means here.
About the rules in this guide
There are several games called craps. This guide, and the Smart Craps table, follow standard casino "bank craps" with common Las Vegas house rules: everyone bets against the house, one shooter rolls at a time, and free odds are offered at up to 3x, 4x and 5x on the 4/10, 5/9 and 6/8. If a casino's printed rules differ from the table in this guide, the casino's rules are the ones that apply there.