Craps Bets Explained: What Every Bet Really Costs
How to play covered the four bets a beginner needs. This page covers everything else on our table: what each bet is, why people play it, and what it costs you.
The one idea behind every bet
Every bet has true odds: the payout that would make it perfectly fair. The house pays a little less than that. The gap is the house edge, and it's the price you pay to make the bet.
Example: Place 6. It wins on a 6 (5 ways to roll) and loses on a 7 (6 ways). A fair payout would be 6:5. The table pays 7:6, a bit less, and that gap is a house edge of 1.52%.
A house edge of 1.41% means that for every 100 coins you bet, the house keeps about 1.41 on average. Any single roll can go either way; the edge is what wins out over hundreds of them.
Every bet, ranked
Cheapest first. Tap a bet to jump to it.
| Bet | Pays | House edge |
|---|---|---|
| Odds (behind Pass or Come) | true odds | 0% |
| Lay odds (behind Don't Pass or Don't Come) | true odds | 0% |
| Don't Pass / Don't Come | 1:1 | 1.36% |
| Pass Line / Come | 1:1 | 1.41% |
| Place 6 or 8 | 7:6 | 1.52% |
| Place 5 or 9 | 7:5 | 4% |
| Field | 1:1 · 2 & 12 pay 2:1 | 5.56% |
| Place 4 or 10 | 9:5 | 6.67% |
| Hard 6 or Hard 8 | 9:1 | 9.09% |
| Hard 4 or Hard 10 | 7:1 | 11.11% |
| Any Craps (C) | 7:1 | 11.11% |
| Eleven (E, or the Eleven box) | 15:1 | 11.11% |
| Ace-Deuce | 15:1 | 11.11% |
| Snake Eyes or Boxcars | 30:1 | 13.89% |
The house edge counts each bet once, from the moment you place it until it wins or loses. A tie (like Don't Pass on a 12) counts as a bet made.
Come and Don't Come
A Come bet is a Pass bet you make after the point is set. The next roll is its own come-out: 7 or 11 wins, 2, 3 or 12 loses, and any other number becomes that bet's own point. The chip then moves onto that number and wins if the number comes again before a 7.
Don't Come is the same thing turned around, with 12 as a tie, exactly like Don't Pass.
- What it costs: the same as the line bets, 1.41% on Come and 1.36% on Don't Come. They're among the cheapest bets on the table.
- Why people play it: more numbers working at the lowest price there is. A popular way to play is a Pass bet plus up to two Come bets, each with Odds behind it. Players call it the "three-point Molly".
- Odds work here too: tap 🎯 Odds in the tray, then the number. On our table, Odds behind a Come bet are off on the come-out roll (you get them back, win or lose), while lay odds behind a Don't Come bet are always working.
- Watch out: once a Come bet has moved to a number it can't be taken back, just like Pass. And one 7 takes every Come point on the table at once.
Place 4, 5, 9 and 10
The same bet as Place 6 and 8, on the other numbers: each wins if its number comes before a 7. They pay more because they're harder to hit, but not enough more.
| Number | Ways to win (vs 6) | True odds | Pays | House edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 or 8 | 5 | 6:5 | 7:6 | 1.52% |
| 5 or 9 | 4 | 3:2 | 7:5 | 4% |
| 4 or 10 | 3 | 2:1 | 9:5 | 6.67% |
- Why people play them: bigger wins and more of the table covered, so more rolls pay something.
- Predicely tip: bet the 5 and 9 in multiples of 5 and the 4 and 10 in multiples of 5, so every win comes out in whole coins (our table rounds down).
- Like the 6 and 8, they stay up after a win, can be taken down any time, and don't work on a come-out roll.
The Field
A one-roll bet: the next roll wins on 2, 3, 4, 9, 10, 11 or 12. Seven winning numbers sounds like a great deal, but they're mostly the rare ones. They cover 16 of the 36 possible rolls, and the four losing numbers (5, 6, 7 and 8) cover 20.
- What it costs: it pays 1:1 · 2 & 12 pay 2:1. The double on the 2 and 12 narrows the gap but doesn't close it: 5.56%.
- Why people play it: every roll settles it, so it feels like constant action. That's also why it adds up fast.
Hardways
A hardway wins if its number is rolled as a pair (Hard 6 is 3 + 3) before it's rolled any other way, the "easy" way, or a 7 comes. There's only one way to win, and many ways to lose.
| Bet | Ways to win vs lose | True odds | Pays | House edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hard 6 or 8 | 1 vs 10 | 10:1 | 9:1 | 9.09% |
| Hard 4 or 10 | 1 vs 8 | 8:1 | 7:1 | 11.11% |
- Why people play them: a big payout from a small chip, and the whole table cheers when the pair lands.
- On our table hardways are always working, even on a come-out roll, and stay up until they win or lose.
One-roll bets: C, E and the long shots
These win or lose on the very next roll. They pay the most on the table, and they cost the most.
| Bet | Ways in 36 | True odds | Pays | House edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Any Craps (C)2, 3 or 12 | 4 | 8:1 | 7:1 | 11.11% |
| Eleven (E)5 + 6 | 2 | 17:1 | 15:1 | 11.11% |
| Ace-Deuce1 + 2 | 2 | 17:1 | 15:1 | 11.11% |
| Snake Eyes1 + 1 | 1 | 35:1 | 30:1 | 13.89% |
| Boxcars6 + 6 | 1 | 35:1 | 30:1 | 13.89% |
- Why people play them: a big win from one roll, and the fun of shouting "Yo!" for an eleven.
- The "insurance" myth: some players bet Any Craps on the come-out to protect their Pass bet from a 2, 3 or 12. It doesn't protect anything. It's a second bet with an edge of 11.11%, and it loses on the other 32 rolls. You pay more to lose less often.
Bets you won't find on our table
Some casino tables add more: Big 6 and Big 8 (a worse-paying copy of Place 6 and 8), Any Seven (one of the most expensive bets in the casino), Horn and Hop bets (bundles of one-roll bets), and Buy and Lay bets on the numbers. We left them off. Everything on our table is on this page.
The bottom line
The cheapest bets are the ones a beginner already knows: Odds, Pass and Don't Pass, Come and Don't Come, and Place 6 and 8. After that, the bigger a bet pays, the more it costs you. Play the rest for fun, with chips you're happy to lose, not as a way to win.
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