Best Keno Strategies That Work In 2024

Playing Keno online will give you the freedom to choose games with better payouts, try new versions of the popular lottery game, explore new themes, and generally find the best online Keno websites where you can play the game and try your luck and win. However, it’s important to equip yourself with the best keno strategies so you increase your chances of winning.

Want to learn how to win at keno? Read all our strategies and tips below to bolster your chances of winning big!

How to Play Keno – A Simple Walkthrough

Keno’s popularity is definitely owing to its simple and engaging concept. While the odds of winning aren’t necessarily the highest, the logic of the gameplay is easy to follow. Online casinos have long been featuring the title as a popular choice that appeals to players.

The way the game is played is very simple. You choose some numbers and hope they turn out to be the winning numbers. Most Keno games are played with a pool of 80 numbers, and the most popular version is called a 20-spot Keno, where you pick 20 numbers and hope that the draw will get as many of your lucky numbers drawn. 

You can participate by paying $1, $2, $3, $4, $5, $10, or $20, and your payout will be calculated based on how many winning Keno numbers you get and also what your bet size is. While state lotteries have a fixed number of draws, you can play Keno online as many times as you wish, betting an amount that you feel comfortable with per game.

This is essentially how the game works. You choose how much you want to bet, how many spots you want to play, and hope for the luck of the draw. Yet, there are some statistically relevant facts that you ought to know.

Tips and Strategies to Win at Keno Online

Winning at Keno is a matter of luck as well as some skill. You ought to take the term “skill” with a grain of salt – if not the whole bag. All Keno games are based on a Random Number Generator. There are no clever patterns you can spot and no best Keno strategy that you can leverage. 

However, there is a general pace and style of play that will allow you to make the most out of your online Keno sessions and play the game in a way that minimizes losses and boosts your chances of success. For convenience sake, we may call it a “strategy,” but the following tips are based on player experience more so than cold-hard facts, so always keep this in mind. 

Of course, there are a few exceptions, such as the odds, which are mostly fixed when you choose to play specific combinations. In other words, you can mathematically know what the chance of a specific strategy, or rather a combination of numbers, working out is.

#1 Want to Win at Keno Every Time? Know the Odds!

Most of you are probably new to the idea of odds in Keno. Look, the game doesn’t offer the best odds, but this doesn’t mean that you should not be aware of what is going. After all, you are betting on real money in the hopes of winning something back.

In a 20-spot Keno, and any version of the game for that matter, the higher the percentage of numbers you get, the better the payout. A 20-number hit would mean a seven-figure payout. However, have you ever wondered what your actual chances of winning that much are? Let’s take a look at the odds:

Number of Hits	Odds
0	1 in 843.380 (0.11857057%)
1	1 in 86.446 (1.15678605%)
2	1 in 20.115 (4.97142576%)
3	1 in 8.009 (12.48637168%)
4	1 in 4.877 (20.50318987%)
5	1 in 4.287 (23.32807380%)
6	1 in 5.258 (19.01745147%)
7	1 in 8.826 (11.32954556%)
8	1 in 20.055 (4.98618021%)
9	1 in 61.420 (1.62814048%)
10	1 in 253.801 (0.39401000%)
11	1 in 1,423.822 (0.07023351%)
12	1 in 10,968.701 (0.00911685%)
13	1 in 118,084.920 (0.00084685%)
14	1 in 1,821,881.628 (0.00005489%)
15	1 in 41,751,453.986 (0.00000240%)
16	1 in 1,496,372,110.872 (0.00000007%)
17	1 in 90,624,035,964.712
18	1 in 10,512,388,171,906.553
19	1 in 2,946,096,785,176,811.500
20	1 in 3,535,316,142,212,173,800.000

As you can see, a 20-spot Keno game usually gives you the best chances of success, around five hits. You have an almost one-in-four chance to win five-number selections on a 20-spot Keno. Therefore, it may help to know what the actual payout for five numbers on a 20-spot Keno is and try to find the game that pays the most.

These odds will give you guidance in how you approach different Keno games and how you make your selections. Odds are not all there is to be better at Keno, but they will be a good starting point for you to explore other opportunities later on. 

#2 Leverage Your Knowledge of Keno Odds

To truly get a headstart, you will probably want to stick with the odds that offer the best return. When you play Keno, the odds of hitting anything above seven spots are already not looking great. You are mostly going to look and try to win 4, 5, and 6-number combinations because of the slightly better odds there.

There are inherent benefits in trying to focus on the numbers that offer the best chances of success. For starters, you have to worry about fewer numbers and fewer things going wrong. You clearly have a better chance of landing a win.

Sure, some players will still try and chase ten or even 20-number wins, but those are one-in-a-lifetime opportunities. Aiming at the middle numbers will give you a better and more sustainable pace of play which we think is better as it makes it more likely to win. 

Pick 4, 5, 6, or 7 Keno games simply tend to be the most popular among skilled players who know that chasing seven-figure payouts is in the realm of sheer, blind luck.

#3 Don’t Change Your Numbers Too Often

Many players get tempted by the odds. Now that you know Keno odds, you are probably thinking, well, here is my chance of really making a difference. Hold your horses as Keno remains a game of pure chance. There are no patterns in how the numbers are drawn.

The casinos use a Random Number Generator (RNG), and land-based casinos already have video Keno machines that draw numbers on a randomized principle. Now, a machine cannot really do a “random” outcome, but it uses a special algorithm that is unfathomable and, as such, allows it to produce outcomes that are unrelated.

To put it this way, unless you know the so-called “seed number,” your chances of winning aren’t going to improve. Because all drawn numbers are based on chance, you don’t have an inherent benefit in changing your numbers for each game you play. 

Surely, you may still want to try a few different options, as replaying the same selection of picks will soon feel a little drab. Don’t worry about “missing out” on a number. There is no mathematical evidence that suggests you missed anything!

#4 Cold and Hot Numbers, Do They Really Work?

The debate about lucky numbers is as old as lottery games themselves. Fate must somehow influence the outcome of casino games, mustn’t it? Well, as it turns out, playing Keno is a game of pure chance, and fate may as well have something to do with it, but it certainly doesn’t leave any clues.

How viable are hot and cold numbers, then? As we mentioned before, there is really little you can do to influence the outcomes of the game. The best Keno strategy out there will tell you that predicting too much on hot or cold numbers will likely end up distracting you from the game.

Because there is no way of predicting the next numbers a game of Keno is going to produce, you should stick with the basic wisdom behind winning numbers – they are random. You may often hear about Keno players winning on their birthday numbers, but this is a coincidence those players themselves have no influence over. 

Keep a clear head about these more chance-oriented aspects of the game, and you will always have your focus where it matters, and that is on the things you can actually influence.

#5 Pick a Trusted Keno Casino

One of the things you can actually influence is your choice of a trusted website. There are many online casinos out there, but you really want to focus on those that provide a Keno game to your taste and liking. 

There are many trusted casinos to pick from, and you should, as they guarantee fair outcomes for each Keno game and offer various other incentives that will make your gameplay and stay with any given casino a much better overall experience. 

Players who expect to win more frequently will do so by finding the right Keno games, and that often means sticking with an online casino that ticks all the right boxes. Game variety is also important, so make sure to give the search option a quick cursory flick before you commit to any casino.

#6 Have a Limit on Your Keno Losses

It’s easy to get so obsessed with the idea of winning Keno that you may overlook how much you have been spending. Most strategies will always advise you the same thing – always keep track of your losses. 

Keno is a fast-played lottery game, and while betting on 20 numbers with Quick Pick feels effortless, your account balance will reflect how lucky you have been over the past several games. It’s always best to have a loss limit set so that you don’t cross a specific real money limit per game or session and make the most out of each sit-down. 

Generally, this loss limit should be an amount that would not bite into your budget and only touches on your money allocated for casino gaming. If you struggle with determining what this amount is for you, get in touch with a responsible gambling expert to assist you.

#7 Jackpot Keno? It Could Work

You probably remember how hard it is to hit a seven-figure payout in a Keno with 20 numbers. To put it this way, the odds of you dying from a localized meteorite strike are put at 1 in 1,600,000.

In contrast, the chances of winning all 20 numbers are 1 in 3,535,316,142,212,173,800.000. One way to influence the odds or to at least tempt fate – outside of hoping for an overhead meteorite strike – is to play a keno game that has a progressive jackpot.

After all, slot games offer real money jackpots, so why wouldn’t Keno, right? Does a jackpot mean you have a better chance at win playing Keno? We hardly think that is the case, but you at least have another win condition to look forward to, and this is something that appeals to players.

Only, the word “progressive jackpot” is not exactly accurate here. Keno games offer jackpots, which are fixed, and they drop randomly. How much money they are worth will depend solely on the game, but every time a Keno jackpot drops, there is another one fixed and waiting for you.

#8 Why Not Play Keno for Free?

Many Keno games out there are actually available for free. That doesn’t mean you can win real money playing them, but it surely means that you can find out a lot about the feel and pace of the gameplay. You can even try and test strategies, set a limit on how much you want to spend, and try to set a goal of how much you want to win.

Playing demo Keno games will actually give you a sense of accomplishment and help you rein in any impulsive behavior, or at the very least become aware of it. See how the 80 numbers treat you on any given day and try to determine if that is your day to play Keno.

So, That’s It? Keno Is Only Luck?

You may be thinking – thanks a lot as if I didn’t already know that Keno has a lot to do with random chance. Well, you may as well have, but Keno players often have to be reminded that games of chance will indeed not budge no matter how much you exhort the fates.

In fact, as gamblers ourselves, it’s easy to get a little sidetracked and try to spot patterns where there are none. Some players believe they have lucky numbers in Keno, and others will swear on “hot numbers.” 

Whatever you do, it’s best to take Keno numbers for the random outcome they are with little in the way of actual “skill” elements able to influence them. Does this mean that the game is any less fun? No, not at all. You can set the right budget for yourself, try different versions, and use your odds knowledge to influence the game’s outcomes as much as realistically possible.

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