Social Casinos

Social casinos and gambling have become very popular online, but what exactly are they? 

You can play games like free slot machines, scratch and win lottery tickets, blackjack, or poker through your Facebook account or on social casino websites. This article will give you a comprehensive guide of how social gambling works, and what the pros and cons are of gambling socially. 

What Is Social Gambling?

Social gambling is gambling on social media. Over the last years, more and more operators of gambling have been launching social media games on platforms like Facebook, Google+. Bebo, and MySpace in order to reach even more potential players. To start with, all of the social gambling apps on social media were free to use. However, in 2014, that changed when Zynga launched real money poker on Facebook for players in the UK. Social casinos have become popular as you can often play for free, play in your browser, play wherever you are on your phone, and win real prizes. 

Where Can I Find Social Gambling?

Facebook is currently the most popular social media platform for online games, but there are games on most social platforms now. 

Out of all the people who gamble on social media, 61% of them do it on Facebook. If you’re not a Facebook user, you could do the 17% of players on Google+, 15% on MySpace, or the 7% of players on Bebo. Wherever you have social accounts, you can find some kind of gambling offered. 

According to Facebook’s own guidelines, real money gambling on the platform is only allowed in specific countries, and the games must have prior authorization from Facebook to do this. Only a small handful of countries currently meet these criteria, so most games are free. It’s likely that these free games and apps are here to stay and will continue to dominate the market for social gambling. 

There are lots of social gambling and casino games and apps available on Facebook, but some of the most popular are free slots, free Texas Hold’em poker, and free blackjack. You can play these games on your own, with your Facebook friends, or with strangers who are also using the app. 

Currently, social gambling is an industry worth $2.7billion. This is impressively high, especially when you take into account that the vast majority of the casino games that are available on sites like Facebook are free casino games that don’t need any actual real cash to play. Instead of making money through cash deposited by players, the gambling operators of these online games make their money by offering the players a variety of different in-game benefits, currencies, and virtual goods that can be bought with real money or Facebook credits, which also have to be bought with real cash. 

These social casinos attract millions and millions of users from Facebook every single day. Around 20% of these users, which still works out to be hundreds of thousands of people across the world, have paid real cash for things like in-game goods, benefits, and currencies. The demand for social gambling is always rising, keeping the market booming. In fact, the market for social gambling is only getting bigger and bigger, as more and more big names from the gambling industry are joining in and offering games on social media platforms. 

Who Uses Social Casinos?

There are some interesting statistics about social gaming that gives us a good idea of the sort of person who enjoys social casinos, and the way that they play. 

• 14% of social gamblers spend at least an hour every day playing while at work. 
• The average age of a social gambler is 39 years old. 
• 46% of those using social gambling are women, and 54% are men. 
• The top four reasons that people give for choosing social gaming are relieving stress, mental stimulation, social interaction, and relaxation. 

These are stats are interesting, as it shows us that social gamblers are different from those who gamble in real casinos. Fewer women tend to play in physical casino locations or in online casinos but seem to be more comfortable with playing online, although there are still more men than women playing. Perhaps the reduced risk of free play is appealing to women, especially if they are choosing these social casinos to relax, socialize, and stimulate their minds, rather than with the aim of making any money. 

What Are The Pros Of Social Casinos And Gambling?

There are lots of advantages to choosing social casinos and gambling over a more traditional physical or online casino. Here are a few of those pros. 

• It’s free. Casino players can often have a hard time looking for free casino games that they can play with their friends. However, social gambling will allow players to enjoy free games like poker, blackjack, lottery games, and slots. This kind of free gaming will let you practice and brush up on your skills in gambling too. 
• You can play against your friends. When you play at a regular online casino, you would usually find it almost impossible to find your friends, never mind manage to play the same table as them, in part thanks to the sheer volume of players online at the same time. When you play through Facebook, you can very easily just invite your friends to join you when you’re in the mood to play a game and can be playing together very quickly and simply. You can also then easily compare your results against the results of your friends./
• It’s a good way to practice online gambling or to learn a new game without having to spend or risk losing any money. 
• You can brag about your wins. When you win big at a social casino, you can very easily share the good news with your Facebook friends. These games almost always have a share button for you to share news of your success. You can also see what your friends are sharing about their own successes. 
• There are lots of different games to try. A lot of the online slot machines that you will be able to find on Facebook have been made by independent developers, which means that most of these games aren’t ones that you could find in any physical casino location. The sheer volume of games available gives you lots of choices, making it very likely that you can find something that you enjoy playing without much effort. You can play a range of games to stop you from getting bored with playing the same one all the time too. 
• You can review the same social gambling apps with your friends on the same social media platform that you are using to play. By leaving reviews, you can encourage your friends to join you in a game, and by reading reviews left by others, you can find other games that you might like to play. 

What Are The Cons Of Social Gambling?

There are some disadvantages of social gambling too. As with any form of gambling, even when it’s free, you should go in with your eyes open and an understanding of any potential problems, so you can keep play as something fun and enjoyable, not a source of stress. 

• It can be quite hard to find really good slot machines. As we’ve said before in this article, the slot machines that will find on Facebook have mostly been created by independent developers. While this can be a good thing for game variety, it also means that pretty much any developer can make an online slot machine game to be played on Facebook. This means that the social gaming market is flooded with mediocre, boring, or copycat slot machine games. If you enjoy slot machines, you might need some time to find a good one to play. 
• You can’t win any real money. While not being able to lose any real money either is a big part of the appeal of social gambling, it can be a bit of a sting if you manage a big win at a game, and don’t actually get that money. 
• If you spend real money on benefits for in-game, currency, or other goods to help you win at a game, there is no way for you to get that real money back. If you’re spending money on these games and play a lot, you can quite easily end up spending more than you intended to and find yourself out of pocket. If you do choose to buy these in-game benefits, keep a close eye on what you’re spending, and be careful. 
• It’s not really that social. Most of the casino games that are offered on Facebook are games for single players, like slots. This might change, as poker is becoming very popular on Facebook, but at the moment, it might be harder than you expect to find a game to play with friends. 

It’s important to always gamble sensibly, even if you aren’t playing for real money.