Bingo Guide Online – Learn How to Play

online bingoCalling all bingo amateurs! Bingo might at first appear like that game only old people play, right? Wrong! There are entire swaths of bingo enthusiasts filling bingo cards out online all the time.

In fact, there’s simply so much demand that there’s a veritable market saturation of bingo sites. There’s just so many of them that it’s difficult to know which one to choose if you’re only just deciding to take to online bingo.

Online Bingo Guide: What is Bingo

First of all, for all the first-timers who might be reading this bingo guide online, let’s take a look at bingo as a game itself:

  • Bingo is a lottery-style game of chance. Players buy one or several bingo cards that have rows of numbers on them, usually 5×5.
  • In real-life bingo, numbered balls are shuffled around in a big ball before popping out at random. The result is then called out.
  • In online bingo, this randomized system is replaced by a random number generator (RNG) which produces random numbers (sometimes animated as balls or other gimmicks) for their players.
  • RNGs are what most chance-based online games use to arrive at a fair, unrigged, randomized result. Usually these RNGs are audited to make sure that they are indeed entirely randomized.
  • Players then mark or “daub” numbers that are called out on their bingo cards. The point of the game is to mark your numbers in a specific pattern.

bingo patterns

In the beginning of the game, the winning pattern is announced. This pattern is usually one of these:

  • A diagonal, vertical, or horizontal line across your card
  • An X shape across your card
  • The full card

Each card, of course, has different numbers in a different arrangement on them, so that’s where the chance element comes in. The first player to cover all the numbers in the winning pattern shouts “Bingo!” as soon as possible.

You have to shout quickly to limit the chances that someone else shouts bingo before you even if you finished ticking off your numbers at the same time.

Once you’ve shouted bingo, you’ll receive your earnings. In online bingo, the way to shout “bingo” is a bit different: you have to click the “Bingo!” button, and then usually you’ll have animated or vocal features to celebrate your victory.

Registering and Playing at a Bingo Site

You can pick your bingo site according to what kind of bingo games they have on offer. According to your preferences, you can choose between:

  • Instant play bingo (no download required, Flash needed)
  • Downloadable software to play bingo

Once you’ve picked your site, you should pick what kind of bingo game you want to play. You can do this by sorting through game features or what your deposit bonuses can be used on.

You’ll have to make an account, provide personal details as well as the banking method you want to choose in order to buy bingo cards.

online bingo

Once you’ve registered, deposited and claimed your bonus, choose a game to play. After the game has loaded, the site will provide you with random bingo cards. You can often choose how many to buy.

Indeed, you can sometimes play with up to 50 cards per game in online bingo. One big advantage of playing online is that you can choose to have your cards automatically filled.

While you play, this is what you’ll have on the screen:

  • The pattern you’re meant to be filling
  • The randomized numbers
  • The number of bingo cards you’ve bought for this game
  • Screen names of other players in your session
  • A chatbox to talk with them

Variations of Online Bingo

The features that differ in bingo variations are usually these: the number of balls used in game, the size + layout of the bingo cards, and whether the card has blank spaces (often marked by a star).

  1. 30 Ball Bingo Cards

The bingo cards here are 3×3. During games, only 30 numbers will get called out, so this can be a faster game than most. You’ll have to match 9 numbers total, in the pattern that will be predetermined.

This one’s the choice game for those who chase progressive jackpots because of how many games you can get done in very little time.

  1. 75 Ball Bingo Cards

These are your usual 5×5 cards. The randomized numbers are arranged in specific ways under the “B-I-N-G-O” letters heading the card. It has a blank centre square that counts as a marked number, a bit like a joker.

  • Under B: random numbers between 1-15
  • Under I: random numbers between 16-30
  • Under N: random numbers between 31-45
  • Under G: random numbers between 46-60
  • Under O: random numbers between 61-75
  1. 80 Ball Bingo Cards

Cards here have a 4×4 grid. The sectioned numbers, instead of being under letters, are grouped in colours. For instance, if numbers between 1-20 would be in the “red group”, then that’s where you’d daub your numbers.

  1. 90 Ball Bingo Cards

This one’s quite similar to the 75 ball game. The cards a larger, with a 3×9 grid. Only 15 have numbers on them, the other squares remaining blank.

There are no specific sections here, and players have to mark off all their numbers to win. Sometimes, players will still be awarded something if they end up daubing a specific pattern before filling up their card.