Online Bonus Bowling

Online casino players looking for a different way to gamble their money, Online Bonus Bowling is a purely luck-based game based on bowling.

The name of the game is guessing how the bowler’s next roll will go, and depending on which bet you place, you can earn payouts of between 2 to 1 and 25 to 1 on your money.

The bowler’s end result is completely random, though, so on each roll, you’ll simply be guessing and waiting to see what happens.

This page will show you a walkthrough meant to introduce the game’s rules and setup, followed by a list of Playtech powered online casinos which include online Bonus Bowling as part of their menu, along with a review of strategic considerations to keep in mind before making your first bets.

Rules and How to Play

Bonus Bowling is played through a simple game interface, one which will be instantly familiar to anyone who plays slot machines or video games online.

Game Layout & Screen

The game’s main screen features a bowling alley design, with the left and center portions of the screen dominated by a single lane with 10 pins in place. On the right-hand side of the screen, you’ll find the game’s control tabs, which are used to input your wagering selections.

Winning at Bonus Bowling

The objective of online Bonus Bowling is straight and to the point: guess the result of the bowler’s next roll. After you’ve input your wagering selections, the game will prompt you to press the “THROW” button, at which point the bowler will release the ball toward the pins.

The bowler will roll twice, with the combined score of both rolls determining the final total used to judge winning and losing bets.

Bonus Bowling Payouts & Odds

The wagers available to you during a game of online Bonus Bowling, the associated payouts for each, and the probability of each outcome occurring, break down as follows:



As you can see, the game follows a similar structure to casino favorites like video poker and slot machines, as the more difficult an outcome is to achieve, the higher it will pay out.

Bets & Outcomes

The Strike bet is the rarest outcome, occurring just 3.40 percent of the time, but when you do happen to roll a perfect strike, the game pays out 25 times your initial wager. The Spare bet is the next rarest, paying out at 10 for 1 with an 8.56 percent chance of occurring.

The most likely outcome is a roll between 0 and 3, which occurs on 42.60 percent of rolls, and pays out at 2 for 1.

Notice that the payouts for Bonus Bowling are listed as “X for Y” rather than “X to Y.” This means that your initial wager is always claimed by the house, and subsequent payouts don’t return the wager. So when you bet $1 on the 0 to 3 bet, and it turns up a winner, you’ll receive $2 back while losing the original $1 for a profit of $1. Similarly, if you bet $1 on the Strike bet and it comes through, the payout will be $24 total ($25 – $1 = $24).

Multiple Bets

One of the more entertaining aspects of Bonus Bowling online is that players can place multiple bets on the same roll. This mimics casino games like the Big Six wheel, another guessing game wholly reliant on chance, as players in that game often like to spread their wagers around on several possibilities at once.

When you play online Bonus Bowling, you can also toggle the betting amounts between each wager, perhaps betting $5 on the 0 to 3 bet and $1 each on the Strike and Spare bets. Players can choose any combination of wagers they like, which gives Bonus Bowling a more interactive feel than other games of chance.

The minimum allowable bet for Bonus Bowling on most Playtech powered online casinos is just $0.10, and players can toggle that amount up incrementally all the way through to the maximum bet of $100.

Bonus Feature: Golden Frame

Finally, taking an element from the most popular slot machine models, online Bonus Bowling includes a fun feature known as the “Golden Frame.” Basically, one out of every three frames you play will become a Golden Frame, and whenever this bonus feature occurs, any strike thrown by the roller will produce a bonus of 10 times your wager.

The Golden Frame bonus is applicable no matter what bets you’ve selected, so even if you didn’t place a wager on the Strike bet, as long as a strike occurs during the Golden Frame, your wager will be paid out at 10 times the amount.

One of the best scenarios which can occur in Bonus Bowling involves placing a Strike bet during a Golden Frame and having the roller knock down all 10 pins. When this occurs, you’ll earn the 25 for 1 payout on your Strike bet, plus a bonus of 10 times the bet.

Thus, if you threw down just $1 on the Strike bet during a Golden Frame and the strike came through, you’d earn $25 for the main bet and $10 for the bonus.

Where to Play Online Bonus Bowling

Bonus Bowling online is a standard offering found under the Arcade Games menu at most online casinos powered by Playtech software. Regrettably, Playtech does not cater to US friendly casinos; so players from the United States will not have the chance to play this game.

Check out the top recommended online casinos to play Bonus Bowling.

Bonus Bowling Online Strategy

As a game of pure chance, one in which the player exerts no level of control over the eventual outcome, Bonus Bowling doesn’t offer much when it comes to strategic thinking.

Just like a game of bingo, keno, or Powerball, you have no ability to influence the results in Bonus Bowling. Once you’ve selected your wager, the game’s randomization engine simply produces a final outcome based on a complex algorithm. Your job as the player is to hope for the best, and that’s about all you can do.

One aspect of gambling strategy you can apply to Bonus Bowling involves assessing the house edge and expected return rates attached to the game. Both of these terms essentially describe the same thing: your odds of winning and losing over the long run. House edge and expected return are presented as percentages, and as the player, you want the lowest house edge possible, which in turn creates a higher expected return.

Bonus Bowling House Edge

When playing Bonus Bowling, the house edges and expected return rates for the game’s various bets break down as follows:



Essentially, for every $100 you wager over the infinite long run, you can expect to bring back $96.33 on the Strike bet, $96.93 on the Spare bet, and $96.53 on all other bets. For players who prefer the house edge construct, the house will expect to collect $3.67 for every $100 you wager on the Strike bet, $3.07 on the Spare bet and $3.47 on all other bets.

Compared to Other Casino Games

For the sake of comparison, playing blackjack according to “gut instinct,” rather than basic strategy, offers players a house edge of approximately 1.5 percent. By employing proper strategy, the house edge on blackjack can be reduced to under 0.50 percent. The average house edge is right around 3.3 percent for Bonus Bowling, which is similar to most hybrid table games, such as Three Card Poker and Let It Ride, along with roulette on a single zero wheel (2.70 percent).

Place the Spare Bet

By examining the numbers above, you can clearly see that the best value in Bonus Bowling is on the Spare bet. The difference of 0.40 and 0.60 percent between the Spare bet and the Strike or other bets, respectively, is considered to be statistically significant.

For gamblers who prefer to put themselves on the right side of variance whenever possible, the optimal play in Bonus Bowling is to always bet on the Spare. By doing so, you’ll give yourself a much better chance of generating a profit over the long run compared to alternating between the less advantageous bets.