Bonus Buy Slots Explained The Real Cost Per Spin Ireland
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When you buy a bonus on a slot machine, you generally pay 100 times your bet. If you’re betting €0.50 per spin, that means you’re spending €50 with a single click. More and more players are choosing the Bonus Buy option, but is it really worth it? That’s what we’ll find out today in this article. Together, we’ll discover whether or not it’s worth spending your money on.
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What Bonus Buy Actually Does
Bonus Buy is a payment option found in many modern slots. This option allows you to purchase a bonus feature directly. You no longer have to play the regular rounds and wait for the bonus to appear, instead, you buy it directly by paying a fixed multiple of your bet. Generally, it’s 50x or 100x, and that’s it you’re in the bonus round.
Keep in mind, though, that each provider sets its own price. If you’re playing a slot with a bet of €0.50, you’ll have to pay €50 to enter the bonus round. That’s pretty much how it works. Be careful, no one guarantees that you’ll actually win; you might not win anything at all. And don’t confuse this with an ante bet, which only increases your chances of triggering the bonus feature. They are two completely different things.
The RTP Catch Most Players Miss
Many players assume that the bonus buy feature lowers the game’s RTP. Let’s take a look at a few actual titles that you can find at any casino right now. I’ll choose Big Bass Bonanza and Gates of Olympus. For both of them, the RTP remains unchanged, whether you’re lucky enough to trigger the free spins or choose to buy them. The only thing that changes is the volatility.
On the other hand, Medusa Megaways works differently. The provider displays a separate total RTP for the bonus buy, which is even higher than the game’s RTP! The bottom line is that buying the bonus feature really is a better option.
The Catch
However, there’s a small catch. The same slot can be sold by the provider to multiple casinos, but with different RTPs. If you end up at a casino running the version with the lowest RTP, you’ll come out ahead. That’s why we always recommend checking a game’s RTP before actually playing it.
That’s exactly what we do before recommending a casino to you. We compare the RTP displayed on the game’s information screen and include all the data in the reviews on our website. It’s part of how we verify the RTP and fairness of the games. If you skip this step, it could cost you dearly.
What You’re Really Paying for a Bonus Buy
Let’s say you’re playing a slot with a bet of €0.50 and you purchase a bonus buy that costs 100 times the bet amount. That means it costs you 50 euros to enter the bonus round directly.
If you don’t pay directly for a bonus buy and play the classic way on a slot with medium to high volatility, the bonus generally appears after 150 spins. If we use the same bet size, that means you’d have to pay over €75 to reach the free spins, so more than if you bought the bonus directly.
Keep in mind that we’re talking about an average this rule doesn’t always apply. Maybe you’ll get lucky and the bonus will appear after just 30 spins.
| What are your options? | How much does it cost? | What it means? |
|---|---|---|
| Bonus buy | €50 (100x €0.50 bet) | You pay €50 upfront and go straight into the bonus |
| Organic trigger low end | €75 (150 spins) | You’ll get the bonus faster if you’re lucky |
| Organic trigger high end | €150 (300 spins) | It takes longer for the bonus to appear |
Why Bonus Buy Can Seem Better Than It Is
When you have a Bonus Buy, you feel secure because you know you’re guaranteed bonus spins, you don’t have to wait for them to appear. However, this doesn’t eliminate the house edge.
The risk arises the very moment you purchase the bonus, since each round lasts less than a minute. So you might be tempted to take another bonus, and another, and so on especially if you’re trying to recoup what you lost earlier. If you take 10 Bonus Buys on a slot with a €0.50 bet, you’ll end up spending €500 in just a few minutes.
The Bottom Line for Players
Bonus Buy slots aren’t rigged but they also can’t guarantee you a big win. The fixed price is almost equal to the average cost of triggering the bonus under normal circumstances. This means you might be able to trigger it more cheaply on your own.
We recommend that you check both RTP values and only then decide whether a Bonus Buy is right for you.
How We Verified This
We, the experts at KingCasinoBonus, have verified the current RTP data and paytable for Bonus Buy slots using multiple data sources. This is what we always do. We carefully verify every piece of information before publishing it on our website. We then compared the information with Ireland’s Gambling Regulation Act 2024 and the official GRAI recommendations.
All information regarding the national helpline for gambling-related issues was verified directly through GamblinCare and the GRAI’s recommendations.
If you feel that Bonus Buy is no longer just for fun and you’re starting to play more and more to recoup your losses, you can ask for help. In Ireland, you can call the national helpline directy. There’s someone on the other end of the line ready to help you.
