How can players test if they're experiencing real rubber banding or just variance?

To spell it out: In poker or roulette (when played on the internet), you’re always facing “variance. ” Like flipping a coin one hundred times and getting 60 heads.

If you believe you are being “rubber banded” in a particular game, then look at patterns of losses. Watch your win rates across hundreds of hands and ask if a random 50/50 split could explain a 30/70 ratio of wins/losses.

This is where it gets interesting, however – in the short term, anything can happen. You have no idea whether an unlucky streak is due to bias, or just the variance of randomness. But if you suspect something’s up, check the dealer’s position, the cards being dealt, and the bets being made. If you’re still skeptical, seek out a new table.

Online casino rubber banding is essentially the game cheating on you. It’s hard to prove, because in poker and roulette, it manifests as bad luck. Actual rubber banding would mean rigging of probabilities, which is illegal at licensed casinos. So what you’re experiencing is probably just variance – the cards or slots not running in your favor. Keep an eye on the long-term results (and I mean long term). If you are losing far more than expected, then check if the site is licensed and reputable. But nine times out of ten, variance will take care of itself.

Rubber banding involves the game purposefully causing you to lose in order to close the gap. With games of chance such as poker and roulette, it’s virtually impossible to determine whether it’s rubber banding or pure variance. So you can’t, and you have to accept it. If you see huge swings over a large sample size it’s variance. And if you believe everything seems to go against you it could be the game has been rigged. But you’re never going to find out unless you crack open code. Play, think, and believe in probability.

Casino rubber banding? No. The difference between poker and other casino games is that the other casino games all use RNG’s (random number generators). There is no rubber banding. There’s no enemy that can focus on you. When playing roulette, you will have good days and bad days. Just keep track of your average win/loss ratio over a longer period and if you get too far away from the normal distribution of possibilities, then it might be time to leave this casino and go somewhere else to continue playing.

Actual rubber banding for online casino games is rare, because most games are already random. Poker and roulette use an RNG and not a server, therefore no lag-based rubber banding exists. If you are losing at a higher rate than you should be then it is most likely due to variance. Keep track of your results in the thousands of hands or spins. Large fluctuations are normal. If the game does feel rigged, there may be some software glitch, but don’t worry about bad beats in the short term, they happen.