3-reel slots or 5-reel?

When you’re first playing slots, it’s a very common question: should I play 3-reel slots or 5-reel slots? Moreover, what’s the difference?

When slots were originally invented, they were all 3-reel. This is known as the ‘classic’ slot style. It simply means, there are only horizontal reels to play with. 3-reel slots are great for beginners and they’re good for simple paylines, fewer features.
3-reel slots tend to only have one horizontal payline. Some 3-reel slots do have diagonal paylines. Having diagonal paylines as well as horizontal paylines, this increases your changes at a bigger win.

You’ll win in a 3-reel slot by landing on 3 symbols in a row. You will typically win a cash prize. Wild symbols can also land on the reels, substituting regular symbols to form a combination. Again, this is a larger cash prize. By far, the largest benefit to playing 3-reel slots are their pure simplicity. Your bankroll will also last longer only playing 1-2 paylines.

As technology improved, 5-reel slots came into the mix and certain spiced things up. They added an extra 2-reels to the classic 3-reel slots. Most slots nowadays are 5-reels with 3 rows to give you 15 possible paylines to hit.

While playing 5-reels slots, it’s really important to check the payline table before you start playing. There are more paylines to hit big on (although most smaller). It’s also good to know that not all 5-reel slots pay the same. Some are very heavily loaded on the top while others have wilds and scatters stacked to the brim.

5-reels slots also usually have one bonus feature included. Most actually have a secondary feature included such as free spins, gamble features etc. It’s more important to check the RTP and volatility of a 5-reel slots (return to player). Classic 3-reel slots tend to have a lower return to player although your chances of hitting it big are also lower.

Which one have you decided to play?

Happy Spinning 🙂