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Craps Strategy – Best Craps Strategies for All Levels

Craps strategy is an often-debated topic, and there are numerous strategies around how to win at craps. Here, we will introduce you to some of the most popular craps strategies and betting methods, outlining the pros and cons of each. This guide will give you an understanding of the various strategies available to craps players, and help you choose the best craps strategy for yourself.

What is Craps Strategy?

Craps strategies come in a variety of forms, each with their own objective. Some strategies focus on managing your bank roll, others intend to secure long-term profits, while others revolve around strategic betting and cutting out certain bet types altogether. The best craps strategy for you depends on how you play, and what your priorities are in the game.

Let’s take a look at some of the factors you need to consider in order to pick the right craps strategy:

What You Should Consider When Picking a Strategy

When picking the right craps betting strategy, it’s important to consider the following:

How much bankroll are you willing to dedicate to a craps section?

Several methods involve risking large amounts in order to potentially return greater profits, if you do not have a large bankroll, some craps strategies are best avoiding.
What is your goal? Long-term profits or one-off huge payouts?

Strategies aim at either quick wins, or a long-term profit build. Your budget is important here, as is how you manage your money if you’re choosing high risk, high reward strategies.
Are you willing to bet against the shooter?

Betting against the shooter is often called a ‘wrong’ bet, as you are practically betting for them to lose, but with better odds when betting against, sometimes it can be the right choice to make.
Are you an experienced craps player?

Some strategies are not suitable for beginners, and would require knowledge of the intricacies of the game. Others are simple for beginners to follow, so be honest about your playing level and find a strategy to match.

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Optimal Craps Strategy: Best Bets

When it comes to craps strategy, it’s important to be aware of the best bets in the game and how they work. Here are the bets you need to be aware of when considering an optimal craps betting strategy:

Pass Line bets are a good starting point for beginners, and one of the most popular bet types even amongst veterans. This bet type offers a reduced house edge of 1.41%, which is quite low compared to some other bets. There are three possible results from a Pass Line bet: the player rolls a 7 or 11, and you win, rolls a 2, 3, or 12, and you lose, or another number, known as point numbers, is rolled. In the last case, the shooter (the player rolling the dice) would need to roll the same point number again before rolling a 7 for you to win the Pass Line Bet.

When a point has been established after the come-out roll, you can then place a Come bet, another often-used bet. The rules here are exactly the same as Pass Line bets in terms of winning and losing but offers variety in gameplay.

Don’t Pass bets are, as the name suggests, the opposite of Pass Line bets. You’re betting against the shooter here, so you win if 2, 3, or 12 is rolled, and lose if 7 or 11 shows on the dice. Don’t pass also comes with a relatively low house edge of 1.36%.

Don’t Come is another opposing bet to the above, working in the reverse to the Come bet. If the shooter has already come out, and a point has been established, here, however, a 12 will result in a push and your bet will be returned. Only 2 or 3 will win here, while 7 and 11 will result in a loss. If a 7 is rolled before the established point number is repeated, you will also win this bet. Don’t Come pays even money and the small house edge of 1.41% makes it another ideal bet at the craps table.

Pass and Come bets and their opposites are the most mathematically safe bets for craps players, and it is advisable to stick with these for your first few games.

Laying Odds is a simple bet with no house edge. Here you are betting against a point after a Don’t Pass bet. Laying the Odds against 4 or 10 pays 1:2, 5 or 9 pays 2:3, and 6 or 8 pays 5:6. Basically, what you are doing here is betting that a 7 will be rolled before one the point number. Most online casinos and their brick and mortar counterparts will only allow a Laying Odds bet to be a maximum of a set multiple of your Don’t Pass bet (such as 5x the Don’t Pass bet).

6 and 8 bets involve betting on the 6 and the 8, which are the two most frequent point numbers (they have the same odds of rolling as seven). A bet on the 6 and 8 pays even money and has a small house edge of just 1.5%, making this a relatively safe bet.

3 Point Molly is a craps strategy designed to allow players to keep wagers low, while increasing the potential for payouts. That isn’t to say this is a low-cost strategy and we’d recommend this to players with a decent level of craps experience and a high bankroll. This advanced craps strategy works as follows:

Bet the Pass Line

If you win, replay the bet, if you lose, replay the bet, if a point number is rolled, move on to step 2.

Bet Max on the Point

With your Pass Line bet where it is, bet maximum odds on the point.

Add a Come Bet

Placing a Come bet means that if a second point is established (a point number is rolled that doesn’t match the initial point) your bet will be placed on that section, you now have two points, bet max odds there too.

Repeat Step 3

This will give you a third point (hence 3 Point Molly).

Sit Back and Relax

Watch the dice roll, place no more bets.

This strategy can be profitable if one of your points hits, with a nice payout. If it does, repeat step 3. At some point, the shooter will roll a 7 and crap out, and all your bets will be lost. If you’ve already won a few times by then, that won’t hurt, but if the shooter craps out before any of your points are rolled, you lose everything you’ve bet. Therefore, this strategy is only advisable for those who can afford to lose big.

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Bad Craps Strategy: Bets You Should Avoid

While some bets are good bets, others are not. Here are some bets it’s best to avoid when playing craps:

Big 6 and 8

Big 6 and Big 8 bets are bets stating that a specific number (6 or 8, depending on the bet) will be rolled before a 7 is. No other numbers effect this bet, it is simply a race between 7 and 6 or 8 depending on the bet.

These bets can be laid at any stage, and payouts are 1:1 if you win, with a house edge of around 9%, making this a less mathematically safe bet than many others. These are not considered ‘good’ bets in craps and are avoided by almost all experienced players.

Hardways, 4, 6, 8 and 10

Hardway is a term for any point number made up of a pair of matching numbers, which can only be 4 (2x2), 6 (2x3), 8 (2x4), and 10 (2x5). The numbers 2 and 12 are both crap numbers so don’t count here. Payouts are good here: 9:1 for a hard 6 or hard 8, and 7:1 for a hard 4 or hard 10. However, with a house edge of over 9% for hard 6 and hard 8, and well over 11% for hard 4 and hard 10, there is little point in these bets unless you’re after a high-risk, high-reward bet, and even then it isn’t advised.

Proposition Bets

It is the job of a stickman at a craps table to entice you into proposition bets, for a simple reason: the house is most likely to win on these bets. This makes them highly unadvisable. The stickman will say something like “anybody on 8”, suggesting you bet on the next roll coming up on that number. The payout is high, at 15:1, but with a house edge of over 16% in some cases, and never under 11%, it is rarely worth the risk.

Alternative Craps Betting Strategies

Now that we’ve covered our top tips for betting strategically in craps, let’s check out some of the most popular strategies and betting systems players use at the craps table:

The Martingale system is likely to be a familiar strategy to roulette players, but it can be applied to craps too. Martingale is a simple system, but a high risk one, involving doubling your bet after every loss. Here is an example of how it would work in a craps game:

Bet $5 on the Pass Line, if you lose, bet $10, if you lose again, bet $20, then $40, then $80, and so on.

The aim of this strategy is to cover your losses, if you win on a bet, you will cover your losses from your previous bets. However, this involves an essentially bottomless bankroll and if you lose several times in a row, the risk for big losses is extremely high. Also be aware that at some point you will hit the casino betting limit, and then the ability to cover losses is immediately removed from the equation. When it works, this is a great system, but when it doesn’t, it can be catastrophic.

The Doubling Strategy is similar to the Martingale (and more similar to the so-called Reverse Martingale) but differs in ways that allow losses to stay small and keeps the chance to win big. In craps, it would work as follows:

Bet $5 on the Pass Line, if you win, leave the initial bet and the winnings, there’s now a $10 bet on the table, if you win again, you can take $20 off the table, but if you lose, you only lose your initial $5 from your bankroll.

This is a system that’s great if you’re on a good streak, especially if you keep doubling your bet for a while, but while losses are low, they are more likely statistically the more bets you take. This is a safer system than the Martingale, but will not lead to as big wins, and can still see you losing money, just at a lower speed.

The Combination Betting Strategy is popular amongst experience players and involves placing several low-risk bets.

The easiest example of this is to combine Place and Come bets or their opposites, because they both payout for the same results. You can add more bets if you choose, never betting too high, this can potentially raise the possibilities of winning, and possible raise the amount won too. Of course, combining too many bets will limit your winnings compared to your losses, and there’s always the chance you can lose all your bets, which can accumulate to a large amount.

If you choose to use Combination Betting, trial and error is the best way to find the right strategy for you but be aware you may come out at a loss.

Classic Regression is a simple craps strategy that involves placing bets only after a point has been established. When a point is set, the idea is to bet on both 6 and 8, and then go down one unit after a single hit. This means you take a little bit of profit off the table every time you win, slowly rebuilding your bankroll with a decreasing amount of the table.

This is a low-risk strategy, and you’re likely to get something out of it, but this may not be enough to make up your losses.

Anything But 7 is a pretty self-explanatory strategy which requires you to bet on anything but 7. This is a short-term strategy and should not be left on the board for more than one or two hits.

To use this method, place one unit on the Field, and twice that amount of 5, 6, and 8, this strategy is at its best if 5, 6, or 8 are the point number.

This is a high-risk strategy, and you will lose everything if a 7 is rolled, which is why it is advised to not play this strategy for more than two hits. The logic is that there is an average of five rolls before a 7 hits, but statistics are no guarantee, and it is very possible that a 7 will fall on the first roll, resulting in a big loss immediately.

Many successful craps players speak of the 5 Count Craps strategy, which is a strategy based on the gambler’s fallacy. In simple terms, this strategy involves waiting for the shooter to hit five successful rolls after the come out before you make a bet, believed to make it more likely you will win at craps.

The problem with this craps betting strategy is that it relies on the assumption of a hot streak, so if a shooter is rolling well, they will continue to roll well. However, this is not the case, a player is just as likely to crap out on their sixth roll as they are on their first. This strategy is tied up in superstitions that are best to be avoided.

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The Best Strategy for Winning at Craps

Truth be told, there is no best strategy in craps, and if there was, no other strategy would be used. Each strategy has its own advantages and disadvantages, so choosing the right option for you should rely solely on your willingness to take risk, and most importantly, the size of your bankroll and how much you can risk losing.

Our advice to you on how to win at craps in the long term is to know the game’s rules down to a T, have a good knowledge of the odds and payouts, as well as picking a strategy from this guide based on your goals in the game.

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Craps Strategy FAQ

Yes. You can apply a number of strategies to craps, depending on your goals in the game, your budget, and your style of play. Our guide on this page outlines all the popular systems used by players and provides the best craps betting strategy tips. Check it out to find the right strategy for you and start playing craps like a pro today.

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The safest bet in craps is the pass bet. This simple bet pays even money, and a low house edge of 1.41% makes it a relatively safe bet to place at the craps table. To learn more about the house advantage of certain craps bets, we recommend you check out our in-depth craps odds guide.

The gambler’s fallacy is the belief that a roll of the dice is affected by the roll before it. For example, if the dice show 6 four times in a row, 6 is less likely to come up a fifth time. This is untrue, every single roll has the exact same odds of showing 6 or any other number.

Simply put, you don’t. Craps is a game of chance and it is down to the luck of the roll. Regardless of strategy, you will not win every time. A craps strategy or betting system, however, can help you have a game plan to curb back losses. Read our strategy guide on this page to learn all about craps winning strategies, and how they can benefit you in the long run.