Blackjack (formerly black jack and vingt-un) is a casino banking game.[1]: 342 It is the most widely played casino banking 🤶 game in the world. It uses decks of 52 cards and descends from a global family of casino banking games 🤶 known as "twenty-one". This family of card games also includes the European games vingt-et-un and pontoon, and the Russian game 🤶 Ochko [ru].[2] Blackjack players do not compete against each other. The game is a comparing card game where each player 🤶 competes against the dealer.

If the dealer shows an ace, an "insurance" bet is allowed. Insurance is a side bet that 🤶 the dealer has a blackjack. The dealer asks for insurance bets before the first player plays. Insurance bets of up 🤶 to half the player's current bet are placed on the "insurance bar" above the player's cards. If the dealer has 🤶 a blackjack, insurance pays 2 to 1. In most casinos, the dealer looks at the down card and pays off 🤶 or takes the insurance bet immediately. In other casinos, the payoff waits until the end of the play.

Number of decks

Most 🤶 blackjack games have a house edge of between 0.5% and 1%, placing blackjack among the cheapest casino table games for 🤶 the player. Casino promotions such as complimentary matchplay vouchers or 2:1 blackjack payouts allow players to acquire an advantage without 🤶 deviating from basic strategy.[16]

Parlett, David (1990). A History of Card Games, OUP, Oxford. ISBN 0-19-282905-X