How to play roulette in a casino, from walking up to walking away

Find a table with the minimum you want; the limits are on a placard at the end. Wait for the current spin to settle. Stand or sit at a free spot. Do not put anything down on the layout, including drinks, phones or your hands, until you have bought in.

Put your cash on the table, outside the betting area, when the dealer is not mid-spin. Do not hand it to the dealer; cameras need to see money change hands on the felt. Say the denomination you want your chips to be, for example "ones" or "fives". The dealer gives you a stack of coloured chips: your colour, nobody else's, valued at what you asked. That value is marked on the wheel rim with a token so the dealer remembers. The chips page covers this in detail.

The dealer spins the wheel and launches the ball, then says the table is open, or simply gestures. Place your chips on the layout. You can keep betting while the ball is spinning. If you cannot reach a number, ask the dealer to place it: say the bet clearly, "£5 on 17 straight up", and slide the chips towards them. Do not reach across other players.

As the ball slows, the dealer calls "no more bets" and waves a hand over the layout. From that moment nobody touches anything. Chips placed late are pushed back. Hands near the layout after the call will get a polite word the first time and a firm one the second.

The ball lands. The dealer places a marker, the dolly, on the winning number on the layout. Losing chips are swept. Winning bets are paid, outside bets first, then inside, with the stake left in place. Do not touch your winnings or your original bet until the dealer lifts the dolly; that is the signal the table is open again.

Collect your winnings or leave them to ride. Place the next bets. Tip if you want to, by placing a chip for the dealer and saying so; it is customary in some countries and rare in the UK, and never required. The dealer page covers what dealers do and how to deal with them.

When you are done, wait until the spin has settled and ask to colour up. Push your coloured chips to the dealer, who counts them and gives you standard casino chips of the same value. Take those to the cage to cash out. Coloured chips are worthless anywhere else, including at the next roulette table.

Everything above is handled by software online: no colour chips, no dolly, no reaching. The betting window is a timer rather than a hand wave. The online-versus-casino page sets the two side by side, and RouletteFinder's how-to-play section goes deeper on the bets themselves, which are identical in both places.