Introduction of Blackjack insurance
The largest bet permitted is often half of the player’s primary wager, and blackjack insurance odds pay out at 2/1.
If the dealer has blackjack, this can give the player a chance to tie the hand even if they lose their initial bet.
Insurance is offered before the dealer checks their hole card, which is the card that is initially hidden from players. If the hole card has a value of 10, resulting in a two-card 21, it is paid out.
How does Blackjack insurance work?
You now have your hole cards. The dealer is holding an ace. It’s time to make a decision on insurance. A bet on the insurance that is worth half of your primary bet and pays off 2:1. An example of how it works:
- You bet $20 on a blackjack hand.
- You get a 9-6, for a final score of 15.
- An ace is the dealer’s upward.
- In addition to your initial $20 bet, you deposit a $10 insurance bet.
If the dealer has blackjack in this case. You will lose your $20 main bet. However, you win a 2:1 payment on your insurance bet, making a break-even bet. You will lose your $10 insurance bet but still have the ability to play the handout normally to try to double your $20 main bet if the dealer does not have blackjack.
When to use blackjack insurance?
If the dealer’s up card is an ace. Taking insurance can be a good idea. Since there’s a nearly one-in-three chance their other card will be worth ten.
However, unless you are a highly skilled card counter. Chance shows that insurance is probably going to be a losing bet over the long run.
To win the insurance bet, the dealer must have a 10-value card as his hole card. Pro card counters can keep track of how many cards are left in the deck. They can calculate when there are enough to make the percentage and ask for insurance.
Benefits of using Blackjack Insurance bets
- For card counters who can roughly keep track of the ten-point cards still in a deck, insurance betting can be profitable.
- When the player already has a blackjack in hand, the insurance bet pays out at a ratio of 3:1.
- When a big bet is made and the player is about to hit the initial goal, insurance bets can often be profitable.
Do you need Blackjack Insurance?
According to the mathematics of blackjack insurance. You should never take it if you want to play in the best possible way to reduce the house’s edge. However, there are cases in which insurance may be useful. If you are at a live casino and counting cards to reduce the house edge. You need to be aware that there are a lot of tens and face cards in the deck.
Insurance might be a smart move if you have a weak hand and would prefer to break even against blackjack than lose if you have set a preset bankroll for the day’s blackjack session (always a good idea).
Why it’s best to stay away from insurance in blackjack in general?
The example below shows why betting blackjack insurance is always a losing strategy. Even in the best-case situation like the one below.
In a one-deck game where you are playing alone against the dealer. Neither of the cards in your first hand has a value of 10.
Thus, your £10 insurance bet has the best chance of winning since 16 of the remaining 49 cards have a value of 10.
In spite of this, your position is still unlikely to be profitable in the long run.
The £10 insurance bet loses 33 times and wins 16 times on average. Each victory yields a £20 profit, for a grand total of £320.
However, you end up losing £10 altogether, after 33 defeats at a cost of £10 each.
Because none of the players have any opening hands that contain 10-value cards, including you. This hand represents the best-case situation. Moreover, there would be even less chance that the dealer would have a 10-value hole card and you will win your insurance bet.
Conclusion
Avoid placing insurance bets, even if you believe you have magic powers. Depending on the number of decks in the shoe, the dealer’s basic odds of having blackjack change slightly, although the dealer is still unlikely to have blackjack more often than one-third of the time. Even while you might rarely win one of these bets, you will always lose money on them. The only case when buying insurance is almost always a mistake is when playing blackjack.