The pandemic has seen exponential growth in the number of players at online casinos worldwide and that is hardly surprising. Apart from the regular land-based punters, new casual players joined due to the boredom of being stuck at home from lockdowns everywhere and playing online became an easy way to pass the time and overcome the boredom.
Playing baccarat online is quite enticing nowadays with some online casino websites offering multiple casino operators all within one login. Each of these operators can offer between 6 to 12 or more baccarat tables at any one time, 24/7!
In some of these online casinos, baccarat dealers are dressed scantily in just bikinis and dancing to the beat of whatever music is blaring in the background. Interesting and yet distracting, to say the least.
Online Baccarat vs Land-based Baccarat
There are obviously significant differences between playing baccarat online compared to playing in a land-based casino.
Firstly, there is a distinct lack of casino atmosphere when you play online unlike when you walk into a land-based casino, you can really feel the excitement in the air right from the entrance to the gaming floor.
There is just no comparison and this is what most online players find lacking, and the reason why land-based casinos will undoubtedly continue to exist.
However, in some casinos, things have changed because of the pandemic. In trying to cut operational costs, some casinos have replaced tables with machines and that has significantly affected the overall atmosphere you would expect in a casino.
The excitement seems to have somewhat faded and the casino floor seems strangely quiet with people sitting at their terminals unlike before when you can expect noisy crowds at baccarat tables shouting for the next card to be a picture card and so on. This move by some casinos to replace tables with machines is not a good one and may impact patronage negatively in the long run.
When playing baccarat online, you are mostly on your own and you don't have an opportunity to see what other players are doing as you gauge the next hand to be dealt.
Some players often look around the table to see who is losing and then bet against them! With online baccarat, the only indication you have is the size of the overall bets on BANKER and PLAYER as an indicator as to what others are thinking and what the next hand might be.
Online baccarat is also extremely fast with less than 30 seconds in-between hands. This is a huge disadvantage for players as you are left with little to no time at all to record results for analysis before you place your next bet and it is quite easy to miss a bet which can impact your game plan if you were applying some sort of progression. Playing at a table is far more relaxed and more fun!
The other negative aspect of online baccarat is that you are at the mercy of your internet connectivity and also the online casino's server capacity. It is not uncommon to be disconnected in the middle of a game and often at critical junctures which can lead to frustration and breakdown of your discipline.
One of the positive aspects of playing baccarat online is that the minimum bet is far lower than playing at tables in a land-based casino. This allows players at all levels to participate whereas table minimums at land-based casinos have increased tremendously due to the limited number of players allowed per table in order to comply with safe-distancing measures and the casinos have thus raised the table minimums in an attempt to drive revenue.
Another positive aspect of playing baccarat online is that you can utilize a tool like BART to help you track and gauge the shoe. Land-based casinos will not be too thrilled for you to use anything like BART at the tables and you will likely get yourself banned from the casino if you attempted to use any software.
BART is only suited for online because of the display space which is suited for desktop computers or laptops only. The screen on a smartphone is simply too small to use BART effectively.
If you have not tried BART make sure you sign up for the 3-Days Free Trial while it is still available! You will be amazed by the accuracy of BART's forecasting capabilities and once you have mastered how to utilize BART effectively, you will find that you cannot live without it when playing baccarat online!
But don't take our word for it - try it for yourself!