A lot of people use the term slot online to refer to any type of casino game, regardless of whether it’s live or virtual. This makes sense, as there’s no real difference between a slot machine in a brick-and-mortar casino and one that can be played on a desktop, laptop or tablet.
In both live casinos and virtual ones, the main concept of slots is that players will wager cash or credits to activate games for each spin. The earliest electromechanical machines required bettors to physically drop coins into them for each spin, but this became less important once bill validators and credit meters were introduced, which enabled players to think of their wagers as credits rather than money.
All modern slot games have random number generators (RNG) that determine which symbols will appear on the reels after each spin. These are tested for fairness by gambling regulators to ensure that results cannot be manipulated by either the operator or players.
The vast majority of slot online games are video slots, which typically have five or more reels and offer a wide range of features. These can include free spins, bonus rounds and scatter symbols. While some of these games will resemble classic fruit machines, others have themes like crime zones and outer space, and feature creative bonuses such as mystery chases in NetEnt’s Crime Zone or cluster payoffs in ReelPlay’s Cosmic Convoy.
