Bingo Advice

Just as understanding how to play the game, by understanding what the terms mean can also help you play the game better.

Admission Packet: This is a group of Bingo cards that must be purchased in order to play. Most places if you go to a Bingo Hall required you to buy one before you play.

Bingo Board: This is also called the display board. This is the board that shows each number that is being called.

Blackout: This is a Bingo game in which all numbers on the card have to be called in order to win anything. This is also called a Cover All.

Blower: This is the instrument that mixes and delivers the balls with a number on it that the caller will call out.

Buy In: Purchasing your Bingo Cards

Caller: Person who calls out the numbers

Case: This is when all that is needed to win is a single number in order to achieve Bingo.

Early Bird Game: This is when an early game is played before the actual normal game begins.
Free Space: This is the space that in the middle of the card and it does not have to be called in order to win, if you have all of your numbers marked off and the only space left is the free space then you win.

Hardway Bingo: This is getting Bingo without using the free space.

Money Ball: This ball is drawn before the game starts. If a player has Bingo with that number then it doubles the player’s winnings.

Pattern: The shape of the numbers that are needed in order to get Bingo. These are basic patterns that are straight lines or diagonals.

Payout: This is the amount that is based on the percentages that is paid by the house. Bingo Halls usually payout at 75 percent.

Postage Stamp: This is a pattern that matches four numbers in a two number by two number square that can be located in any one of the four corners of the card.

Progressive Jackpot: This is a jackpot that continues to expand until someone wins it. These do offer a change in the length and can build on daily, weekly or monthly time period.

Six pack or Nine Pack: This is when a block of 6 or 9 numbers are on one card.

Texas Blackout: This is a version of the blackout (see above) when the first number is called and it will determine if the odds or even numbers on your card will be free spaces. If the first number picked is odds then all of the odd numbers on your cards are covered. The first person to blackout wins.

Wild Number: This is the first number that is picked out to determine what the wild numbers are going to be. If the first number is picked and it is a 16 then all of the numbers ending in a 6 they will all be wild.

Wrap Up: This is the last game of the session for the day or night.