Playing Mobile & Tablet Online Casino Games

Can I play online casino games on my mobile or tablet?

Online casino gaming has taken off in a huge way. One of the biggest reasons for this is the key difference between the old-fashioned bricks and mortar casinos and the new online casinos; flexibility. Where traditional casino are limited in space and need to literally shut the doors in order to make changes, online casinos can be modified on the fly or with minimal downtime, updating constantly to take advantage of new technology.

This coincides perfectly with the growing world of mobile gaming. Mobiles are used to game and to browse the internet all the time now, often more than PCs and laptops thanks to the convenience factor. The same is therefore true of online casinos, a merger of gaming and browsing. Ever more online casinos are updating to allow phones and tablets to play their games. Let’s look at the reasons behind this and the pros and cons.

The march of mobile optimisation.

When you look at the current state of the internet, it’s clear that everything is moving towards mobile. Whether this is phones or tablets, people want to access their games, information and social media in a convenient way. With bigger data tariffs and powerful processors, these small devices can now run most sites perfectly well, giving us the ability to browse at our leisure on the sofa or in bed, or out and about.

There’s little wonder than online casino fans want the same luxury! Now that phones can run the same content as PCs, why not have slots and roulette games on the small screen? This is the next logical evolution of online slots and thanks to forward thinking developers, a great many sites can already offer mobile play. Some sites even offer special promotions and extra welcome bonuses to mobile players.

How does mobile casino gaming work?

There are two routes towards casino and slot games on mobile devices. The first is apps. Some of the larger sites out there have their own apps, which you download like any other phone app, through iTunes for example. This is very handy as they’re optimised to run on the device you own. The second route is mobile websites, sites which are designed to be ‘responsive’ and work on other devices.

These responsive sites effectively load a slightly different version of the website when you visit on a mobile or tablet. The secondary version will usually be designed with the same colour scheme and logos, but the layout will be optimised to suit a smaller screen. You navigate around by swiping and tapping, as normal. The games also have to be modified to accept touchscreen commands but developers generally plan ahead and design all new games with this in mind.

Getting started with mobile casino games.

Finding a mobile friendly casino is pretty straightforward, though there are still some which don’t cater to this new audience (sites which rely on downloaded software are often incompatible with phones). You can usually tell as soon as you visit a casino site. Most online casinos will have a page somewhere telling you what they offer, so look for something like ‘Mobile’ on the navigation bar, or the icons of phone manufacturers. The next step will either be to download an app, or they will direct you to visit the site on your phone browser. Simply do this and you can use the same login information that you registered on the main site.

When you pick a game, you will usually need to hold your device in landscape view, which makes sense when you think about the reels. The best comic book slots are designed for this and will fit the screen, then you can tap the controls as you normally would. You may have to swipe left and right to access things like pay out information or preferences. Note also that some sites cannot offer their full game selection on mobile, especially if the games are from an older generation. Also, some table games don’t work too well on small screens. Fortunately, this is changing all the time as developers update old games and online casinos install the latest versions.