Sweepstakes Casino Games

Since sweeps casinos offer real cash prizes, you can have fun and earn some money at the same time, provided that you know how social casino games work and which ones pay the best. Whether you’ve just dipped your toes into the vast world of sweepstakes gaming or are an experienced veteran, SweepsKings’ got your back.

We’ve prepared a comprehensive list of all types of games you can expect to find at online sweepstakes casinos. Use this guide to learn how to play slots, table games, live dealer games, and other types of games and which titles offer the highest returns.

How Sweepstakes Casino Games Work

Sweeps casinos usually offer the same games you’d find at online casinos – slots, table games, arcade games, fish shooters, live dealer games, and various other categories. Gameplay-wise, these games are usually the same as real slot machines, save for Originals that are exclusively available in certain sweepstakes lobbies. You get the option to play all games for free or real prizes, without necessarily making a purchase.

The most notable element of sweepstakes casino games is that players use Gold Coins and Sweeps Coins when placing their wagers. Gold coins are awarded for free and can only be used to play for fun. Sweeps Coins, on the other hand, are often awarded in much smaller amounts via sign-up bonuses, but they hold monetary value and can be redeemed for real cash prizes.

After creating an account and claiming your bonus, all you have to do is select a game you want to play. We recommend playing with gold coins first until you learn the basic mechanics of your chosen games since sweeps coins are harder to come by.

If you’ve never played any casino-style games before, we’ve prepared this guide to help you understand each category, as well as its draws and flaws.

Best Games at Sweepstakes Casinos By Category

You can take your pick or learn more for each category below. We provide a quick overview of the most popular gaming options at sweepstakes casinos, our favorite titles from each, and the best platform to access them.

Pulsz – Best Sweepstakes Casino to Play Slots

Pulsz has a library of over 740+ slots sourced from some of the most popular providers in the industry. Having allied with Pragmatic Play, NetEnt, Playson, BGAming, Habanero, Booming Games, Slotmill, and several other “prime movers” in the i-gaming space, Pulsz brings a broad spectrum of popular slots to the table, most of which are games with massive RTPs.

US players love Pulsz because its slot library covers virtually all gaming categories. Besides the ones we just reviewed, you may also like Twin Spin Megaways, Fruit Super Nova, Book of Sun Multichance, and Buffalo Hold and Win – each representing a popular slot category.

While Pulsz is a go-to spot for slot lovers, our team would like to recommend several other sweepstakes casinos that also offer comprehensive slot libraries filled with games from reputable providers, including:

• WOW Vegas: 1,000+ slots from Pragmatic, Besoft, Playnova, Booming, and Habanero.
• Stake.us: 800+ slots from Pragmatic and Hacksaw, as well as numerous originals.
• High 5 Casino: 800+ slots, most of which they’ve built themselves. Also features the most popular Pragmatic Play titles.
• McLuck: 460+ games from Relax Gaming, Fantasma, Slotmill, Spade Gaming, Pragmatic, and NetEnt.

2. Roulette

Roulette is one of the oldest games of chance. It’s more than just a ball rolling on a wheel; the table where you’re placing wagers requires a tactical approach, as you can bet on anything from numbers to brackets, colors, or specific numbers.

Not all roulette games are the same, even though their basic principles may be similar. The two most popular versions of casino-style roulette include:

• European Roulette: features a wheel with 37 pockets with a single “zero”. Due to its high RTP and simple rules, it’s preferred by beginners.
• American Roulette: features a regular zero (0) and a double zero (00), increasing the house’s edge. Typically supports larger wager limits than European Roulette.

Sweeptastic – Best Sweepstakes Casino to Play Roulette

Classic roulette is available in most social and sweepstakes casinos, but Sweeptastic stands out with a variety of games with special rules, larger bet limits, and gorgeous graphics. Besides classic American and European roulette games, we enjoyed testing some of Sweeptastic’s most popular titles in this field.

Betsoft’s Zoom Roulette is an excellent game for newcomers since it features a host of preset wagering templates like Oprhelins and Odd/Even.

If you’re a true roulette connoisseur, I recommend Belatra’s Lucky Roulette, boasting a unique RNG system with “lucky numbers” that pay up to 500x instead of the usual 29x of your wager

3. Blackjack

Blackjack games you’ll find at social casinos are slot-based adaptations of this popular table game genre. It’s a single-player game where you’re competing against a computer to score more points.

Named cards are worth 10 and aces can count as 1 or 11. You’re given two cards at the start, and if you happen to draw 21 from the start, you instantly win. With the “hit” function, you can ask for an additional card, but if your total exceeds 21 points, you instantly lose. “Hold” if you’re confident that your score is high enough to end the round. Typically, you should draw more when you’re under 12-13 points and hold if you’re at 17-18.

Blackjack games at social and sweeps casinos aren’t played against other people (except for live versions), you can “occupy” additional spots by placing multiple wagers each round, or by “splitting” your hand.

Similar you roulette, the two most popular Blackjack versions include:

• European Blackjack: the dealer only receives one card at the start, making drawing an instant Blackjack impossible. They draw additional cards when the player finishes.
• American Blackjack: the dealer receives two cards from the beginning, just like the player. To reduce uncertainty, one of the cards is shown face-up.

WOW Vegas – Best Sweepstakes Casino to Play Blackjack

WOW Vegas is hailed as the most versatile social casino with cash prizes around. The SweepsKings team has been testing its game library filled with 1,000+ games for months, and we’re beyond impressed with its gaming variety and quality.

While most alternatives offer dozens of classic blackjack games with different graphics, WOW Vegas covers blackjack titles with different rulesets, such as Multi-hand Blackjack, Single-deck Blackjack, American Blackjack, and more.

Other noteworthy sites where you can find similar games include Sweeptastic, Chanced Casino, and Golden Hearts Games.

4. Poker

While blackjack and roulette hail from Europe (France, more specifically), Poker is an all-American invention and a staple table game in dozens of social casinos. It’s usually played with a deck of 20 cards while the rules vary greatly between different versions.

The most iconic part of any poker game relates to its multi-step wagering system. Players are asked to place “blind” bets before receiving cards; after seeing your hand, you can back out by “folding”, continue by “calling”, or up the stakes by “raising”. All bets are put on a pile called “the pot”.

While Blackjack is scored in points, Poker uses a more complex scoring system based on the combination’s “value”:

Global Poker – Best Sweepstakes Casino to Play Poker

A Poker-mostly social casino featuring competitions, tournaments, and a variety of free-to-play poker games, Global Poker is a popular spot for enjoyers of these card games. The SweepsKings gaming experts were particularly fond of its exclusive Bounty Poker challenges and Jackpot Sit’n’Go events.

Its most popular games include:

• Texas Hold’em: players receive two hole cards, and five community cards are lined face-up. The player with the highest combo wins.
• Omaha High/Low: players receive 4 hole cards, and three community cards are lined face-up. The two lowest hole cards in the player’s hand are used to determine the “Low Hand” winner, and the two highest for the “High Hand” winner. High and Low pots are typically distributed 50:50, although the same player can win both.

Global Poker’s gaming library is modest, so if you prefer alternating between poker and classic slots, you may also like social casinos with real prizes like Pulsz, Stake, or Fortune Coins.

5. Fish Table Games

Action-packed games where you hunt sea monsters like hulking crabs, oversized sharks, and whales are called Fish Games. Unlike slots, you’ll use wagers to load up your harpoons, cannons, or whichever weaponry your game provides to point and shoot at fish.

Accuracy and a tactical approach are rewarded, since you can miss your shots (and lose your wager), not to mention that each fish has a certain amount of “health points” that need to be depleted for you to claim your prize.

Despite being so engaging and fun, fish games are nowhere near as popular as slots or table games, but more and more social casino sites are onboarding trendy games like Emily’s Treasure, Fishing Kingdom, and Mermaid Hunter.

Fortune Coins – Best Sweepstakes Casino to Play Fish Games

Fortune Coins pioneered fish games in the i-gaming industry, so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that their library features all the heavy hitters.

From Golden Dragon and King Octopus to Fish Hunter and the all-popular Emily’s Treasure, this casino brings all the latest adaptations of fish shooter machines to an online platform with real money prizes. Titles here are powered by KA Gaming and Blazesoft.

After testing 60+ sweepstakes casino platforms, I can guide you to a few other respectable ones that offer fish games, including Funrize, TaoFortune, and NoLimitCoins. Each features 4+ fish shooter games from NetGame.

6. Skill Games

When you play slots, your luck is tested. At table games, your luck and strategy are tested. When playing skill games, luck plays a tiny role while your dexterity is usually the determining factor.

From driving and climbing to shooting and jumping over obstacles to simpler types like minesweeper, dominoes, and old-fashioned pool, these games are all about technique and finesse.

Skillz – Best Sweepstakes Casino to Play Skill Games

Skillz Games is unrivaled in the field of skill-based games, featuring over 500+ unique titles created by thousands of independent developers. Even though it offers real money prizes via tournaments, it’s more of a social gaming platform than a sweepstakes casino.

When you register, you’ll get to play a broad spectrum of skill games from categories like action, arcade, bingo, board games, bubble shooters, chess, mahjong, puzzle, sudoku, trivia, and more.

7. Keno

In keno, players choose up to 10/20 numbers from 1-80 based on the variant, and the machine draws a list of winning numbers. Unlike bingo, you get paid based on how many numbers you guessed correctly.

The slot adaptations of keno may feature flashy graphics and fanfare, but the rules are the same. More importantly, the pacing is quicker, and you can stick with the same combination virtually forever.

Funszpoints – Best Sweepstakes Casino to Play Keno

Even with just one keno game, we’ve had a good time playing Paintball Keno at Funzpoints. It’s a simple game where you can choose one of the four ticket colors, and the numbers matching that color will count toward your wins.

8. Scratch-Offs

Scratch-offs are virtual adaptations of traditional scratchcards. After peeling the gray film away, the symbols reveal what you’ve won, which could be a reward as small as a retry, as huge as thousands of sweeps coins, or nothing at all.

Instead of placing a wager, you can purchase any amount of scratch tickets you wish with your GCs or SCs. Although it would defeat the purpose of playing scratch slots, most games feature an option to instantly reveal the entire board.

Golden Hearts Games – Best Sweepstakes Casino to Play Scratch-Offs

Golden Hearts Games is a small sweeps casino with a great selection of scratchies. From Scratch Classic and Cash Cow to Cash Mania, these games feature different payouts and vastly dissimilar visuals.

SweepsKings experts also recommend checking out Stake, Pulsz, and SweepSlots if you’re looking for sweepstakes casinos with bigger i-gaming libraries filled with popular scratchcard slots from Hacksaw.

9. Originals

Original games are slots, table games, progressives, and any other games developed either “by” the casino or “for” the casino. If you’re bored playing the same few games over and over on every site, give originals a shot. They sometimes feature unique graphics and gameplay elements, but they more or less have the same rules as other games in the same category.

Stake.us – Best Sweepstakes Casino to Play Original Games

Stake.us impressed our casino experts not only with its eclectic library of original titles but also with a special promotion exclusive to these games. Stake “Originals” is a mix of classic arcade games, slots, table games, and video poker with modern visuals and old-school mechanics. Some of the most popular ones include Hilo, Blackjack, and Mines.

The “Originals Challenge” is a recurring weekly tournament that awards free Stake Cash to players who score the highest on the leaderboard.

Other famous sweepstakes casinos for Originals are Chanced, Vegas Gems, Luckybird.io, and Moonspin.us.

10. Live Dealer

A real person shuffles and deals cards in land-based casinos. To emulate an authentic casino-style experience, some sweeps sites have on boarded “live dealer games” – roulette, baccarat, Sic Bo, poker, blackjack, and other games that are broadcasted from a live studio to the player’s screen.

While live dealer games are remarkably popular at online casinos, only a handful of legit social gaming sites offer them, most of which are powered by Beter Live, Atmosfera, and Evolution.

High 5 Casino – Best Sweepstakes Casino to Play Live Dealer Games

High 5 Casino is a huge name in the i-gaming industry not only because it produces fantastic games but also because it has a live dealer segment comparable to online casinos.

With a variety of live roulette and blackjack games mixed with the fan-favorite Casino Hold’em Poker, it covered the three main live table game categories. We’d love to see a few titles with custom rules like Lightning Blackjack or Pineapple Poker, but so far, they’ve done a great job.

We’d like to recommend a few trustworthy sweeps sites with live dealer lobbies to our players, including Stake.us, Chanced, and Spree Casino.

11. Social Betting

Sports betting is yet to become a thing at social and sweepstakes casinos, but the second-best thing that casual sports fans can look forward to are social sportsbooks. Unlike real money online sportsbooks, their social counterparts are free-to-play venues with virtual currencies.

The “no purchase necessary” element of social sportsbooks makes them an appealing alternative to real money online sportsbooks, although their coverage of betting markets is usually slightly inferior.

Fliff – Best Social Sportsbook

Fliff is a social sportsbook app that offers real cash payouts and easy access to sports betting with its streamlined interface. What makes it the ultimate spot for sports fans is the fact that it’s legal in all US states except Washington.

This site covers virtually all major sports markets, with the most popular being American football, golf, hockey, baseball, and soccer.

After thorough market research, our team did not find a worthy alternative to Fliff, at least in the social sportsbook with prizes space. BetRivers.net and SugarHouse4Fun do offer similar options but exclusively for entertainment purposes.

12. Progressives

Progressive jackpot slots or “progressives” are games where every wager contributes to the total jackpot prize. This includes all bets in that game, including those from other players. Many slot games have inbuilt jackpot mechanics (e.g. most Hold & Win games), but they’re typically substantially lower than full-fledged progressives.

More importantly, you don’t have to meet a certain condition, such as playing at a high wager or hitting a specific combination, to trigger a progressive jackpot since every spin can activate it.

McLuck – Best Sweepstakes Casino to Play Progressives

Our team has been testing McLuck since its launch earlier in 2023, and we’ve had ample reasons to stay – some of our favorite slot games like Gates of Olympus and The Dog House Megaways are included in its formidable library of 460+ titles.

When it comes to progressives, McLuck offers 10 of the best-paying games in this field, all of which come from Pragmatic Play. Sugar Rush, Big Bass Bonanza, Starlight Princess, and a few other titles typically feature massive jackpot pools measured in millions of SCs under the McLuck Progressive Network.

In our expert opinion, the second-best spot to play progressives is Fortune Coins, but there are a few other sites that offer games of this type like High 5 Casino or Stake.us.

13. Bingo

Experienced bingo players know that this game is all about the group playing it. Close to a dozen players receive tickets with random numbers, and as the balls are being drawn, their numbers are called out. The first who completes a 5-number row in any direction wins.

Bingo games at sweepstake casinos work similarly, but there’s an important distinction to be made between the following:

• Bingo Slots (Slingo): you buy bingo tickets instead of placing wagers, aren’t competing against human players, and the balls aren’t drawn in real-time. Functions the same as regular slots, albeit with different rules.
• Virtual Bingo Rooms: in other words, live bingo. The game starts when sufficient players have entered and placed their tickets, and the balls are drawn in real-time.

Pulsz Bingo – Best Sweepstakes Casino to Play Bingo

Pulsz Bingo is among the few legit social casino venues with cash prizes where our team had a blast playing live bingo games. Finding a match is a breeze since all bingo rooms feature a countdown timer when a fresh game begins.

Moreover, you can choose between games that utilize different bingo rules. For example, Big Apple and Bubble Blast use European Bingo (90-ball) rules while Golden Gate, Route 66, and The Strip use the classic American Bingo (75-ball) rules.

Our SweepsKings game reviewers would also like to recommend a bingo sweepstakes specialist site called Bingoport. Even though it doesn’t have any slot games like Pulsz Bingo or Chumba Bingo, it offers 12+ live bingo rooms.

Do Sweepstakes Casino Games Pay Real Money?

Sweepstakes casino sites offer real cash prizes, but to claim them, you’ll have to jump through several hoops.

Unlike land-based and online casinos where you deposit money, play games, and withdraw your winnings, you’ll also have to meet the wagering requirements and the minimum redemption threshold before you can claim your prize at sweeps casinos.

Sweeps coins used by these casinos are treated as “bonus funds”. You’ll usually have to wager them at least once to make them redeemable. As for the minimum redemption threshold, you’ll have to ensure you have the prescribed amount of redeemable coins to grab the prize, which is usually around 50-100 SC.

Summary

There are tens of thousands of casino games at social and sweeps casinos, and more are coming in daily. We understand that choosing the right one from such a massive pool can be a bit difficult, and so our team has made this guide to help you enjoy the ones that play the best and pay the most.