Roulette Casinos for Mayland Players & MD Gambling

According to historical records, Maryland is one of the first provinces places where gambling started in the United States: horse races have been held in Maryland since 1873 and bets have been placed on these races. So long before MD online casinos, people were into sports betting: the third leg of the Triple Crown races, known as The Preakness, has been held in Maryland for over a hundred years.

Perhaps because of this history, Maryland was one of the first states to legalize pari-mutual wagering, and slot machines were also allowed in the 1940s. Considering that gambling was subject to various restrictions even in Nevada during that period, this was an impressive development: If it had continued, online casinos in Maryland would have been legal a long time ago.

Unfortunately, this did not happen, and slot machines were banned in the 70s. Up until 2019, this was a pretty strict policy: Maryland had laws that also penalized gamblers, not just operators. Except for the legalization of lottery in 1972, no form of gambling was allowed in the state for almost 40 years.

Fortunately, that changed in 2008. The people of Maryland voted to make slot machines legal in Baltimore City and four counties (Allegany, Anne Arundel, Cecil, and Worcester). This did not mean that casinos had become legal: This change meant that businesses offering only slot machines were allowed. These slot saloons are still active today but are not as popular as they used to be, with land-based casinos becoming legal in 2010.

Speaking of which, since 2010, land-based casinos have been considered legal within Maryland and are licensed by the State Lottery & Gaming Control Agency. Currently, there are only 6 casinos in Maryland and the newest one opened in 2016. However, while land-based gambling is allowed, online gambling is quite limited: if you want to play online roulette in Maryland, there is no local option that allows you to do so. In other words, online casinos are still not considered legal.

There is no problem with sports betting: they became legal a long time ago and their restrictions were completely lifted in 2021. Now you can bet without any limitations. However, this still depends on some prerequisites:

• Betting is only allowed in casinos, sports stadiums, and racetracks.
• There are a limited number of licenses: Online betting is allowed, but a total of 60 licenses are reserved for this. Since it is necessary to obtain different licenses for both desktop and mobile, we can say that this is a very low number.

Changes to sports betting were made in May – June 2021 but licenses are still not distributed. In the first quarter of 2022, you can expect a full launch of online betting. There may be other changes during this time: Indiana plans to open a new land-based casino in Prince George's County. Although these plans do not cover MD online casinos, increasing the diversity of legal gambling would be good for everyone.

You can play traditional table games at land-based casinos. Special rooms are also available at each casino for games such as blackjack, roulette, craps, and baccarat. So, for example, you can find a roulette table where only high roller players are accepted. Due to the legal loophole that we briefly mentioned above, card games are sometimes found in charity organizations too, but this is a rare situation, and it is very difficult to have a pleasant experience since the bet/payout amounts are limited. If you want to play table games online, including roulette, you can choose any of the casino sites recommended in this guide: we have tested them one by one and made sure that they offer the most advantageous bonuses for all casino games.

Maryland doesn't have the card rooms you can find in many other US states. Therefore, your only option for playing poker is land-based casinos, and as we mentioned above, there are six of them. You can also play social poker games that use virtual credits instead of real money. If you want to play poker online, we recommend that you choose one of the casinos in the list we shared above: These sites accept Maryland players as members and allow you to play all card games, including poker, with advantageous bonuses.

Land based casinos are not your only option for slot games. As we briefly mentioned above, there are saloons with only slot machines, and you can find more than 2,000 games in them. But let us reiterate that these saloons are only found in Baltimore City, Allegany, Anne Arundel, Cecil, and Worcester. You can go to these facilities even if you live in another county.

Of course, it is possible to find slot machines in land-based casinos too. There are a total of 6 casinos in Maryland and each has more than 1,000 slot games. However, as the vast majority are located in the Baltimore area, you may need to travel a bit. As with other types of games, we recommend choosing internet casinos for playing slots: You can find thousands of slot games in every online casino we recommend, and you can play each one from the comfort of your home. It is not possible for Maryland casinos to compete with online casinos in terms of variety and number of games.

The Maryland Lottery was one of the first types of gambling to be legalized, and lottery tickets are sold at many retailers across the state. A large part of the proceeds from the lottery goes to education. In this regard, lottery income is the state's third largest source of income. In addition to the lottery, games such as Pick 4, Keno, Card Cash, and Cash4Life are also organized by the Lottery Committee. The grand prizes for such games range from $100 to $2,000. In Instant Win games, the grand prize can reach up to $2 million. Maryland is also part of the Mega Millions and Powerball lottery networks.

The Original Maryland Lottery, on the other hand, can offer much higher prizes: In March 2012, it awarded $656 million. In this respect, we can say that the lottery and other instant win games offered by the Committee are the most common type of gambling in the state.

In this context, it should also be noted that charity bingo games and raffle draws can be organized in Maryland. It is argued that due to a legal loophole, skill-based games such as poker and blackjack should also be a part of these events, but that doesn't matter as the charity organizations' grand prize is limited to $5,000. A maximum of 100 people can attend these events at the same time, and an event can last for a maximum of 12 months. Using the advantage of this rule, bingo rooms continue their activities within the borders of the state by obtaining a new permit every 12 months. They're not a real casino, but if you're into bingo, keno, and raffle, you can find plenty of gaming rooms in Maryland.

Federal law of 1988 gives Indian tribes the right to live on their own land according to their own laws, so you can find tribal casinos in many states. As a general rule, if a state has a federally recognized tribe, there are also tribal casinos. But that's not the case for Maryland: Interestingly, this state does not have a federally recognized Indian tribe and neither tribal casinos for the same reason.

Therefore, land-based casinos in Maryland are run by private companies and your options are:

• Hollywood Casino (Perryville)
• Ocean Downs Casino (Berlin)
• Maryland Live! (Arundel Mills)
• Rocky Gap Casino Resort (Flintstone)
• Horseshoe Casino Baltimore (Baltimore City)
• MGM National Harbor (Oxon Hill)

As we mentioned above, you can also place sports bets in casinos. In the near future, these casinos may be allowed to offer some of their services online, but do not hold your breath: no one expects serious changes in the next 5 years. Moreover, even if allowed, their online casino content would be very limited, as in Michigan. Unless there are legal changes at the federal level, online casinos in the United States cannot compete with international casino sites.

Therefore, if you want to play roulette and other casino games online in Maryland, internet casinos are still the best option and that will not change for a long time. Contrary to popular belief, there are many licensed, safe, and fair casinos that accept players from Maryland: You can play at any of them. But if you want to play at the best, you should use the list we have shared in this guide: We have tested all these casinos ourselves according to our high-quality standards and have chosen only those that have satisfied us. You can start playing at any of them right now and with a very useful bonus: may the luck be with you!