Casino glossary: 25 terms in plain English

Bookmark this page. Every term below appears somewhere in our reviews.

Accounts and rules

• ADR: alternative dispute resolution, an independent service that handles complaints a casino could not resolve.
• GAMSTOP: free self-exclusion across gambling sites licensed in Great Britain.
• KYC: “know your customer”, the identity checks casinos must run.
• Licence: permission from a regulator to offer gambling. In Great Britain that is the Gambling Commission.
• Time-out: a short, fixed break from your account.

Bonuses

• Match bonus: bonus funds as a percentage of your deposit.
• Max bet: the stake limit while a bonus is active.
• Expiry: the days you have to use a bonus.
• No wagering: winnings are paid as cash.
• Wagering: how many times bonus funds must be played through. Capped at 10x in the UK.
• Game weighting: how much each game counts towards wagering.

Slots

• RTP: return to player, the long-run percentage of stakes paid back.
• Volatility: how wins are spread; high means rarer, bigger wins.
• Paylines: the lines a winning combination must land on.
• Ways to win: wins on adjacent reels, with no fixed lines.
• Cluster pays: wins from touching groups of symbols.
• Cascade: winning symbols removed and replaced in the same spin.
• Hold and win: a respin round with sticky coin symbols.
• Sticky wild: a wild that stays in place for several spins.
• Max win: the cap on a single round, as a multiple of stake.
• Demo mode: play with credits that have no cash value.

Payments

• E-wallet: a stored-value account such as PayPal or Skrill.
• Open banking: paying straight from your bank account.
• Pending time: how long a casino holds a withdrawal before processing it.
• Source of funds: a check on where your money comes from, sometimes requested at higher spending levels.

Demo article created to show the AffKit platform. Brands, games and test results are fictional.