Slot Machine Payout Percentage by State: What an Hour Costs

Slot machines in the US pay back about 90 to 93 cents of every dollar bet on them. We found 17 states whose regulators report enough to work out the slot machine payout percentage. In the latest year, it ranged from 89.5% on Ohio’s racetrack machines to 93.5% on New York’s lottery-run machines. Nevada’s casinos paid back 92.9%.

The casino keeps the rest, usually 7 to 10 cents of each dollar, on every spin. That cut is the house edge. A spin takes only a few seconds, so the cut adds up quickly. At a dollar a spin and 600 spins an hour, that’s about $43 an hour on an average Nevada machine and $59 in Pennsylvania.

What is the slot machine payout percentage in each state?

Between 90% and 93% in most of the states that report it. The figures below come from each state’s gaming regulator. Each is what the slot machines paid out in winnings over a year, as a share of all the money bet on them. The fourth column is what the machines kept of every $100 bet.

Figures are for 2025, except Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Pennsylvania and West Virginia (the year to June 2026), Delaware (the year to June 2025) and New York (the year to March 2026). Where a state reports month by month, we added up all 12 months. Illinois reports the money bet only for the video gaming terminals in its bars, restaurants and truck stops (49,450 machines at the end of 2025), not for its casinos. New York’s lottery-run machines are mostly at racetracks, and Ohio’s racetrack machines are run by its lottery too.

Casinos also hand out free play, credits you can bet but not cash out. Florida, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia subtract it from slot revenue, so a payout worked out from that revenue overstates what the machines paid by up to 2 percentage points. Ohio’s own reports put its casinos at about 92%, for example. Counting only the winnings paid, as the table does, gives 90.8%. Some states’ reports don’t say how they count free play, so don’t read much into a gap of a point or less between two states.

Why some states aren’t in the table

Several states, including Michigan, Maryland, Kansas and Louisiana, report what their casinos earn but not how much was bet on slots, so there’s no payout to work out. Tribal casinos are missing too, apart from Connecticut’s two, which report their slot numbers to the state. The National Indian Gaming Commission (opens in a new tab) publishes tribal gaming revenue only as totals by region, so in states where tribal casinos are the only places with slot machines, such as California, Arizona and Washington, no payout figure is public.

How much does an hour on a slot machine cost?

About $43 at a dollar a spin on an average Nevada machine, and $59 in Pennsylvania, if you play 600 spins an hour. The cost is the money you bet in an hour times the share the machine keeps. Six hundred one-dollar spins put $600 through the machine, and Nevada’s 7.1% of $600 is $42.60.

Six hundred spins an hour is one every six seconds. If you play faster, the cost rises with it. A spin every four seconds is 900 spins an hour, which costs 50% more.

Across the country, commercial casinos’ slot machines kept $37.1 billion in 2025, more than sports betting and online casinos combined, as we found in our guide to how much Americans lose gambling.

How far $100 goes

Say you start with $100 at a dollar a spin and keep betting whatever the machine pays you. At Pennsylvania’s 90.2%, the machine keeps 9.8 cents a spin, so your $100 runs out after about 1,020 spins on average, around an hour and 40 minutes at 600 an hour. At Nevada’s 92.9%, it lasts about 1,400 spins, or 2 hours and 20 minutes. Some sessions end much sooner and some last much longer.

By the time it’s gone, you’ve bet 10 to 14 times the $100 you started with. That’s why a 90% payout doesn’t mean you’ll leave with $90 of your $100. The machine takes its share again every time your winnings go back in.

A slot keeps less of each dollar than a scratch-off, which pays back 60 to 80 cents in Texas, as we worked out in our guide to which scratch-off has the best odds. But a scratch-off is one bet, and a slot takes a new one every few seconds. Keno pays back about 48 to 75 cents per dollar, depending on the state, and in most states it draws every 3 to 4 minutes. Our guide to keno odds and payouts by state has the numbers.

Do penny slots pay back less?

Yes, per dollar bet. In Nevada and Connecticut, penny machines paid back less in 2025 than any other kind, and the payout rose from quarters to dollars to $5 machines. But a bigger bet costs more per hour, so a machine that pays back more can still cost you more if you bet more on it.

From Nevada’s Gaming Control Board (opens in a new tab) and Connecticut’s Department of Consumer Protection (opens in a new tab), for 2025. The pattern doesn’t hold all the way up. Nevada’s $25 and $100 machines paid back less than its $5 ones.

On a penny machine, a penny is one credit, and a spin can use dozens of them. Multi-denomination machines, where you pick the credit size, make up about two-thirds of the slots in Nevada’s casinos, 85,301 of 126,040.

At 600 spins an hour, 50 cents a spin on a Nevada penny machine costs about $27. Three dollars a spin on a Nevada dollar machine costs about $115, even though it pays back 93.6% against the penny machine’s 90.9%.

Are slot machines rigged?

No. Each result comes from a random number generator, and every spin is independent of the ones before it, so a machine is never due to pay. What’s built in is the casino’s cut. Every game is set to pay back a fixed percentage of what’s bet on it over its lifetime, and state law sets the lowest percentage allowed.

Arizona’s Department of Gaming (opens in a new tab), which oversees the state’s tribal casinos, says a machine’s random number generator runs constantly, even when nobody is playing, and that pressing Spin “only begins the visual display, which is purely for show.” It adds that “one pull is completely independent of the previous or succeeding pull.”

The legal minimums sit far below what machines actually pay. Nevada’s regulations (opens in a new tab) require each game to be set to pay back at least 75%, the lowest floor we found. Illinois (opens in a new tab), Iowa (opens in a new tab) and West Virginia (opens in a new tab) set 80%. New Jersey (opens in a new tab) sets 83%, Pennsylvania (opens in a new tab) and Ohio (opens in a new tab) 85% for their casinos, and Delaware (opens in a new tab) 87% on average over a year. Maine (opens in a new tab) requires a casino’s machines, taken together, to pay back at least 89%. Arizona’s compact with its tribes sets 80% to 83%.

How much does the state matter?

Less than your bet does. The highest and lowest payouts in the table, 93.5% and 89.5%, are 4 cents of each dollar apart. That’s about $24 an hour at a dollar a spin and 600 spins. Going from $1 to $3 a spin triples what an hour costs in any state.

In Canada? Our guide to VLT and slot payout percentages in Canada runs the same numbers for each province.

Can you play for prizes without losing money?

Yes, if the prize comes from saving instead of betting. Lodavo is a prize-linked savings app that gives you free tickets in weekly cash prize draws for the money you save. You still get the part of a slot machine that’s fun: finding out whether you’ve won. There’s no bet, so no house takes a cut, and a week without a win leaves your savings where they were.

Lodavo is live in Canada and coming to the US. No purchase necessary. Void where prohibited.