How to Play Live Baccarat

Baccarat is simple to learn how to play: all you need to know is the basic premise of the game, and what betting options are available. And then it’s up to you to start playing!

At an online casino, it’s now even easier than ever to learn how to play the game, as live baccarat has an engaging user interface, as well as extra statistical information that you wouldn’t have if you were sitting or standing across from a dealer in real life.

Whether you’re new to the game or you’d just like to refresh your memory, we’ll discuss some of the basics of the game below, as well as some of the live versions you can try.

5 things to know when playing live baccarat

Of course, there is always more to learn about the ins and outs of baccarat. But as you get more advanced, the rules start to become second nature, and the gameplay starts to flow. To give you an overview, though, here are five things to bear in mind about the game.

1. The goal

When you play online casino games (this is also the case if you’re at a land-based casino), it’s important to know the rules and the aim of the game. In the case of baccarat, the aim is to get as close as possible to – or equal to – the number 9, with just two cards. To back things up a bit, each round starts with the dealer dealing two hands, one to the player and one to the bank (that is, the casino).

Once these cards have been dealt, the total of each hand is added up (see next section), and the hand with the value that’s closest to or equal to 9 wins; there can also be a tie of course. This goes for whether you are playing in real life or at a live casino – all the rules stay the same!

2. Understand the value of a hand

Another vital thing to know about baccarat is that the score for each hand is always rounded down to a single digit if the total is above 10. For example, if you get a hand that totals 12, your final score will be 2. All the face cards have the same value as the number you see on them, and 10, Jack, Queen and King count as zero, while an Ace counts as one. If you’re lucky enough to be dealt a hand that works out exactly as 9 – for example, a king and a 9 – it’s called “a natural”.

In some cases, depending on the value of each of the hands, the dealer might also choose to deal a third card – but this will be up to them to decide!

3. Know which bets to place

Once you’ve got your head around how the game works, you can now concentrate on what bets to place. As we’ve briefly touched on, the main bets are on the player’s hand, the banker’s hand, or a tie.

When playing the live version of the game, this is made a lot easier with all of the information available on your screen. You’ll be able to review recent statistics.

4. You can take the game further with side bets

Once you start to feel more confident about placing player, banker or tie bets, you can also try some side betting options, which add a bit more complexity to the game. You might already know about this type of bet if you play casino games such as blackjack.

There are many different side bets. What is available will depend on the version of the game you are playing, but one common option in baccarat is called pairs. You place your bet on either the banker or the player’s cards being a pair, either of numbers or suits or a pair across any of the two hands.

To clarify, perfect pairs is when you get a hand with the same suit and same number; a player’s or banker’s pair is when there is a pair in either hand and an any pair bet is a wager on there being one pair of any kind in either hand.

5. There are many live versions