Luckiest and Unluckiest Casinos in New Mexico

People have been celebrating their gambling luck in New Mexico for almost 80 years now - pari-mutuel horse racing betting was first legalized in 1947. But from then, it was a long wait until 1990, when tribal casinos were allowed. 

The first casino to open up was the Sandia, in 1994, and after that a number of tribes began to take advantage of the potential for new revenue streams, and the enhanced social activities that casinos brought with them.

At current count, New Mexico has 26 casino locations, most of which are located in the northern half of the state. 

The gambling industry as a whole employs 22,000 people, which is pretty significant considering that the total population of the state is only about 2 million. According to the American Gaming Association, the economic impact of gambling is around $2.47 billion.

We decided to assess some of the top casinos in New Mexico, to see which are the luckiest. 

And how did we do that, you ask? Well, we took to Tripadvisor, of course. Our team of Casinos.com experts scoured the reviews for mentions of words like “winning”, “jackpot”, and “handpay”, and we ranked the list of casinos based on the mentions of our keywords. 

These are the casinos we looked at:

Our totally scientific casinos.com method for determining the luckiest casinos, ranked Camel Rock Casino as number one on the list. 

Out of 60 reviews, six of them mentioned the word “won”, and one even called out a “jackpot”. 

Despite all the luck players experienced, the casino itself obviously didn’t have much luck, because they closed down in 2018. Camel Rock has now been replaced with Tesque Casino, and the jury is still out on how lucky that one is. 

So, we’ll have to make do with the second luckiest casino in New Mexico, which is Zia Park Casino. This one got a Luck Rating of 26.99% and 26 out of 163 used either the word “won” or “winning”. 

Located in Hobbs, this casino is home to a selection of 750 slots, including classics and new games, plus lots of video poker options. 

Said one review, “We will definitely be visiting here again, if for no other reason than to attempt to pay back our winnings! Great place!” 

Wow, not many people try to get rid of their casino winnings, so that must really tell you something.

In third place was Sky City Casino which got a rating of 24.49%, with 12 keyword mentions out of 49 reviews. 

“Who knows if you will win at a casino, but the first night we were there my wife won over $100 and the second night I won over $100. Since we are neither spend thrifts nor particularly lucky, I am submitting that the slots here are pretty loose. And that's a win for the people of America!” Do you hear that? A win for the people of America!"

Right at the bottom of the scale, Route 66 Casino Hotel scored an appalling 9.69%, with only 19 keyword mentions out of 196 reviews. With 1,300 slots and video poker machines, 26 table games, and a 500-seat bingo hall, it sounds pretty great, right? Wrong. 

“Hubby ordered the Chicago dog, tasted the french fries and observed that they didn't even taste like potatoes”, nevermind the slots, that’s what I really call unlucky!

Isleta Casino in Albuquerque did a little better, achieving 15.29% on the scale, but it still came in at second to last. Not one person called this experience “lucky”. 

“My last 4 trips there have been miserable. Hardly ever hitting bonus rounds and when I do it's certainly not a "bonus payout”.” Nope, doesn’t sound lucky to us at all, so we’re not surprised at the rating. 

Methodology 

Casinos.com utilized Tripadvisor reviews to do an in-depth analysis of phrases associated with luck to determine the luckiest and unluckiest casinos in the state of New Mexico. We calculated the percentage of luck-rated mentions in the total Tripadvisor reviews and extrapolated them as if all Casinos had the same number of reviews for fairness.

Keywords tracked: Lucky, Luck, Winning, Big Win, Winner, Bonus, Profit, Success, Jackpot, Hand Pay

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