A craps table is the loudest, most intimidating spot on the casino floor - a dozen people shouting at dice, a felt covered in numbers you don't recognize, two dealers moving chips faster than you can follow. Here's the secret nobody tells you: underneath all of it, craps is one bet and one rule. Learn those, ignore the rest, and you can walk up and play.
Find the strip on the felt that says PASS LINE. It runs along the edge closest to you, because it's the bet the table is built around. Put a chip on it before a new round starts and you're playing. That's it - everything else is optional.
Here's what the dice do for your Pass Line bet on that first roll of a round (the "come-out"):
Once a point is set, the whole table's goal flips to a single question: will the shooter roll that number again before they roll a 7? The dealer flips a marker to "ON" and drops it on the point number so nobody forgets.
Notice the twist: a 7 is your best friend on the come-out and your worst enemy after the point is set. Same number, opposite meaning, depending on where you are in the round. That single reversal is most of what makes craps confusing to watch - and most of what you now understand.
After a point is established, you can put a second bet behind your Pass Line, called Odds. To be clear about why this matters: the Odds bet is the only wager in the entire casino with a 0% house edge. It pays the true mathematical odds of the point (2:1 on the 4 or 10, 3:2 on the 5 or 9, 6:5 on the 6 or 8), so the house has no built-in advantage on it at all.
Stacking Odds behind your Pass Line pulls your combined house edge from 1.41% down toward zero - well under 1% at most tables. If you take one thing from this page to the table, take this. Our Odds bet page and the odds calculator show exactly how much to put down.
Let's walk one round so the loop is concrete:
If a 7 had shown up before that second 6, you'd have lost both bets and the dice would move on. That's the whole rhythm: come-out, point, then a race between the point and the 7.
The center of the layout is a carnival of one-roll bets with names like Any Seven, Hardways, and the Horn. They pay big and lose fast - some carry house edges north of 16%. They're fun to toss a chip at; they are not how you make your money last. Here's the honest order, best to worst:
The full payout chart lists every bet with its exact edge.
Two practical things. First, the etiquette - where to stand, how to buy in, why you never hand the dealer cash mid-roll - is worth two minutes so you don't feel lost. We wrote a short craps table etiquette guide for exactly that. Second, drill the loop until the come-out-and-point rhythm is automatic. Reading it once isn't the same as having played it.
No signup, no download, no real money. Learn the rhythm before the table does it for you.
The Pass Line. Put a chip on it before the come-out roll: you win on 7 or 11, lose on 2, 3, or 12, and any other number becomes the point for the shooter to repeat before a 7. It's a low 1.41% edge, and one bet is all you need to play a full game.
If the come-out roll is 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, or 10, that number becomes the point. The shooter keeps rolling until they hit the point again (Pass Line wins) or roll a 7 first (seven-out, Pass Line loses). 7 and 11 only win on the come-out.
The Pass Line backed with maximum Odds. The Odds bet has a 0% house edge — it pays true odds — so adding it behind your Pass Line drags the combined edge well under 1%.
No. The table is busy and the center bets are loud, but the core is one bet (the Pass Line) and one rule (repeat the point before a 7). Practicing a few rounds first makes the real table far less intimidating.