Playtech offer a solid range of blackjack tables. They don’t offer anywhere near as many all-access 7 seat tables as other providers (notably Evolution with 200+ and Pragmatic Play with 100+). But they do still offer considerable variety.
Their EU market facing tables are housed in their main studio in Riga, Latvian as well as a Romanian studio which continues to expand.
Video capture improvements and a noticed effort to bring more UI uniformity have also contributed to a better playing experience in recent years.
The key characteristics of Playtech’s live blackjack offering are set out below. For a summary of all table options from all providers visit our live blackjack summary.
Look & Feel
House rules & RTP
The majority of Playtech live blackjack tables are classic 7 seat tables. They also offer a few ‘1-to-many’ deal tables:
- Unlimited Blackjack
- All Bets Blackjack
- Cash Back Blackjack
Additionally, Playtech offer a few Blackjack based live games (eg Majority Rules Blackjack, Quantum Blackjack, Mega Fire Blaze Blackjack with significant rules departures from the traditional game. Follow the links for details on these games.
Classic 7 seat tables
With regard to the 7 seat tables, there are many to choose from streamed from different studios (the old Riga studio, Grand & Royale Blackjack from the new Riga studio, Romanian studio, Manila studio) with a variety of different playing interfaces. But house rules are identical for all, and summarized below.
- 7 seat dealt from an 8 deck shoe, re-shuffled mid-shoe.
- Dealer stand all 17s
- You can double after split
- You can double any 2 cards
- You can’t hit split Aces (ie you will can only draw 1 card to split Aces)
- Insurance is offered
- You can’t re-split
- Side bets offered (Pairs & ’21+3′)
- 10 Card Charlie applies
- You can Bet behind other seated players if you prefer or if table is full
- Theoretical return to player rate:
– Main game: 99.5%
– Pairs side bet: 95.90%
– 21+3 side bet: 96.30%
One distinction to be aware of is 2 deal types that are offered (and clearly indicated in live lobbies):
- EU Style…dealer draws a single, face up card during the initial deal
- US style…dealer draws 1 card face-up and 1 face down during the initial deal
You can read more about EU style versus US style deal here. The basic strategy chart applying to both deals, is set out below.
One to many deal tables
Unlimited Blackjack
An unlimited number of players can play this table. You still play your hand (or hands…you can play up to 5 seats) individually, and are allocated cards based on your play decisions.
All Bets Blackjack
The All bets Blackjack table also caters to an unlimited number of players. But it employs a clever technology whereby the real cards transition to virtual cards, appearing in front of each player in accordance with their play choices.
This concept is better understood when viewed (see below video) than explained.
Importantly, house rules on this table, for the main game, are the same as on the 7 seat tables.
This table also offers a 6 side bets.
You can read more about All Bets Blackjack here.
Cash Back Blackjack
This table employs the same real to virtual card transition as All Bets Blackjack. The same six side bets are also offered.
The main game is however different, in that you are offered an early surrender payout option in addition to the standard Hit/Stand/Double/Split.
The early surrender payout is offered at each decision time except to Split hands when you have Split Aces.
You can read more about Cash Back Blackjack here.
Sample game recording
Our picks for where to play, and why
Assuming you want to play a classic 7 seat table, with a nice choice of limit ranges, then your best bet is the casino with the most blackjack tables to choose from…both all-access generic tables and private tables.
The winner in this regard is bet365 which carries tables from both Playtech’s Riga and Manila studios, as well as the largest private/exclusive blackjack table area (of any Playtech casino). You also get to choose your deal style on their private tables…US Style on bet365 Premium and Dragon Blackjack tables, EU Style on their other private tables.
Way back when…
This is what Playtech’s Euro studio live blackjack tables looked like back in 2009.
This is what Playtech’s Asian studio live blackjack tables looked like back in 2009.