I Played 20 $1 Spins in 10 Vegas Casinos—Here’s What Happened

I wasn’t feeling very lucky at all when I landed in Las Vegas. After one canceled flight and one aborted landing, I was wondering what could go wrong next. Maybe my taxi would crash. 

Only when I finally made it to my hotel unscathed (Planet Hollywood, the GOAT for many reasons: Earl of Sandwich, am I right?) and took my first step into the blazing August desert sunshine, did I start to feel better. 

I was in Las Vegas for a few reasons: to eat (did somebody say “Secret Pizza”?), to drink (although I could have gone without paying $29 for a frozen cocktail at an Irish pub that I won’t name and shame), and to see a show. But being in the gambling capital of the world, who was I to say no to a couple of spins? But rather than simply leaving my fate in the hands of the casino gods, I decided to conduct a small science experiment. 

On a day when the high temperature only reached about 41 degrees (that’s 105 for my American friends), I decided to walk the center of the Strip and play 20 $1 spins on the same slot machine in each casino. By doing this, I’d be able to determine which Vegas casino is the luckiest. Then, on my next trip to Vegas, I could concentrate all my efforts on playing there.

My wife holding a lucky cashout voucher in the Aria. (Image: Adam Kenny)

Before I go any further, I need to let you know that I only did this for fun. According to one source, the average gambling budget for a Vegas trip in 2023 was $787, so even by gambling at 10 casinos as part of my experiment, I wasn’t getting close to what most people spend. 10 casinos is also a tiny sample size. 

Given the fact that there are around 45 casinos on the Strip and seeing I was too lazy to even walk as far as the Venetian, I’m aware that I probably didn’t get a very accurate reading. 

Finally, yes, I know about slot games, RTP, and Random Number Generators, and I know that there’s no such thing as a “lucky casino," so please save your breath and don’t come for me on one of your YouTube channels. This is just for fun.

The first step was to choose the game I wanted to play. And for me, this was an easy choice: it had to be Buffalo Link. Ever since my first trip to Vegas two years ago, the theme music has lived rent-free in my head. When I close my eyes, I can see the special symbols landing on the reels. My eyes have gone all misty just writing this. 

I started my Buffalo Link odyssey in Planet Hollywood. (Image: Imago / Alamy)

To give the uninitiated a quick overview, Buffalo Link is one of many buffalo-themed games made by Aristocrat. Just like most slot games, wins pay out when you align enough of the same symbols on adjacent reels from left to right, starting with the leftmost reel. The highest paying symbols include the wolf, the eagle, and the mountain lion, and the canyon scene acts as the wild. But there’s so much more to it. Get at least eight of the special buffalo cash symbols, and you’ll open up the Hold & Spin round, where filling up the whole grid awards the progressive grand jackpot. 

There’s also a free spins round, which can be triggered by landing three of the coin scatter symbols. And it can be re-triggered, and re-triggered, and re-triggered. Finally, collecting buffalo symbols on the reels can lead to you winning a special free feature, which can take the form of either free spins or the Hold & Spin. The free feature must be won before 1800 buffalos are collected.

The next thing I had to do was plot my route. I started my journey at Planet Hollywood and was planning to do all of the casinos in the vicinity with the aim of getting to 10. I also had to account for the fact that a few casinos might not even have Buffalo Link (the horror). 

I had high hopes for Planet Hollywood, based on the fact that it’s one of my favourite places on the Strip. But alas, I couldn’t even get one measly bonus round. In fact, I didn’t land a winning combination at all until spin number nine. Feeling dejected, I cashed out after 20 spins with a total of $7.60. That wasn’t even enough to get myself an iced latte in the horribly overpriced Starbucks on the casino floor. 

After lunch at the Yard House (highly recommended) on the Linq Promenade, I visited the flamingo habitat at the Flamingo and asked the brightly-coloured birds to please send me some luck. I guess they couldn’t be bothered. 

After 20 spins, I had 92 cents left—just as I was about to cash out, I won the lucky last chance spin and got 20 cents back. Yay. But seeing that was spin number 21, it didn’t count. 

After the Flamingo, the Cromwell was next on my list, but even though I did really enjoy the aircon in there, I couldn’t find Buffalo Link anywhere, so I made my way to the next casino, Paris. Things went a little better here, because I actually got into a free feature! The Hold & Spin round triggered on my eighth spin, and I won $20 from that. After my 20 spins, I cashed out with $23.22—the first time so far that I actually bothered to collect the money from my ticket.

I decided to see if I might have some luck on the other side of the Strip, so I crossed the road and made my way into the iconic Caesars Palace. Things didn’t go so well here either. After 19 spins I’d secured almost no winning combinations, but then finally on spin number 19, I got the free buffalo feature! I won $22 there (collecting 19 out of the 20 symbols I needed to bag the Grand Jackpot) and cashed out in the end with $22.90, so you can see for yourself how good my luck would have been if I hadn’t gotten into that free feature. 

One away from the grand jackpot in Caesars Palace. (Image: Adam Kenny)

The Bellagio was up next, and here I actually felt embarrassed to put a $20 into the machine. I think the majority of Bellagio players could play through my daily budget before breakfast. So I guess it was time to test another theory: do higher-end casinos pay out more than the cheap and cheerful ones? I managed to trigger the Hold & Spin after just 12 spins and won $27 there. My 20 spins collected a total of $3.20 in winnings, so I was able to walk away with my highest total yet: $30.20. 

By now, I was halfway there. I’d spent $100, and I had $84.84 to my name. Not too bad. I was down less than a half-priced cocktail at Carlos ‘n Charlie’s. 

So far, my theory was right—higher-eend casinos do pay out more. So it made sense that my next move was simply to walk next door to the Cosmopolitan. Here I was thrilled to get into the Hold & Spin after just two spins! I even landed a mini jackpot of $20! My heart couldn’t take it! I cashed out for a whopping $43.06. 

I almost didn’t play at the Aria at all. All four Buffalo Link machines were occupied when I arrived, so I had to hang around and play the machine next door (Buffalo Dash for Cash) until someone got up and I could pounce. 

My fellow slots player next to me glanced over, “This is the machine for you; I just know it. I saw you waiting for it!”. I didn’t dare have any hope. 

That is, until I got into the free spins round on spin 12. But even that didn’t go so well at first. Finally, two more scatters landed, the free spins re-triggered, and then it happened. My screen filled with buffalos on reels 1, 3, and 5. In between them were wild multipliers. And my win just kept going up and up and up until it reached $216. I cashed out after 20 spins for $224.74. My slots neighbor smiled to himself. Was he a magician, perhaps?

At this point, I considered quitting my experiment. Surely the Aria was the luckiest casino on the Strip, and there was little point in continuing. But I had to persevere—in the name of science.

I headed over to Park MGM next and played a very disappointing 20 spins. I cashed out for $3 and contemplated joining the crowds of Raiders fans making their way to the Allegiant Stadium for the preseason game against the 49ers. Surely even paying $100 for a ticket to a preseason game to sit in a half-empty and swelteringly hot stadium would be less depressing. Instead, I stopped for a cocktail at Eataly and contemplated my next move. 

Lion proved to be luckier than flamingo, but buffalo still has my heart. (Image: Sipa US/Alamy Live News)

New York New York should have been my eighth stop, but again, all Buffalo Link slots were occupied, and I simply didn’t have the patience to wait. I crossed the road again and headed for the MGM Grand. Determined to go out in a blaze of glory, I willed a bonus round into existence, and I was lucky enough to get into the Hold & Spin after 15 spins. I ended up cashing out with $58.79, but the very thought of crossing the road yet again and dealing with the levels of tackiness at the Excalibur made me want to cry. Nine casinos would have to be it. 

Sadly, I was due to fly out early the next morning, so I made my way to the airport at an ungodly hour. Seeing I had failed on my mission yesterday, there was only one thing left to do so that I could reach 10 casinos: hit the slots in the airport. If you’ve never been to Las Vegas, you might be astounded to hear that you can literally gamble in the airport. And if you win, you just take your ticket up to a desk, and they’ll count out your dollars and hand them to you. Then, if you’re an international visitor, you’ll have to scramble to use them up because a couple of $20 bills won’t be much good in your home country. 

Luckily, an omelet in Harry Reid airport will set you back $19 plus tax, plus tip. But yet again, I digress. It was 4am and the bright lights of Buffalo Link really did feel like they were going to set my soul on fire. I popped $20 into the machine and had precious little luck for the first 12 spins. On spin number 13, I hit the Hold & Spin round, and after my 20 spins were complete, I walked away with $44.33. Not a bad way to end my trip and my experiment. 

When I added up all my totals (while I cried into my cream cheese bagel, waiting for my flight to board), I’d made a profit of $258.76. The south end of the Strip was luckier for me, and without a doubt the Aria was the best place to play. 

Next time, I might even be brave enough to up my gambling budget—maybe I’ll do $25 in each casino and consider myself a real high roller!