Land-based or Online Casino – Which Is More Profitable?

No one can deny the experience of getting “high” by playing the games of risk. The rush of pure bliss to your brain is so potent that studies have been done on why gambling is so addictive. It should come as no surprise when you consider that gambling activates the same reward system in our brain that drugs do. The ecstasy, the exhilaration you feel after gambling, is none other than a dopamine surge.

As technology is evolving, so are the other things in our society. Same way, brick-and-mortar casinos are being replaced by online casinos. But our question is: which is better and more profitable? 

The profit one gets from a product depends on which features customers are attracted to. There are pros and cons associated with both types of casinos, but there’s always a better option, even if just by a margin. The impact of pandemic can also not be ignored when analyzing which casino is more profitable. Considering these points, let us look at the anatomy of both casinos to see which is going to be more beneficial:

Land-based Casinos

Although the first known European gambling house, Ridotto, dates back to 1638 in Venice, Italy, gambling had always been prevalent in some form or other. Before the prelude to the practice being as old as the Paleolithic period, the Old Stone Age, according to the book Roll The Bones: The History of Gambling. Gambling has been outlawed in various countries since but has reverted to being legal in most. 

Although technology has birthed online casinos, and it looks like the need for land-based casinos is dying, the latter are still prominent today. Let us look at the pros and cons of brick-and-mortar casinos.

Pros

• Online casinos can not emulate the experience one gets by going to the “real” casino. The rush of adrenaline evoked by the brilliant neon lights and the booming music, the energy in the room, and the gusto of competition remain quite unmatched. This is the primary reason why land-based casinos are not yet obsolete because of the advent of online casinos.
• Land-based casinos offer real interaction with players. Ask anyone better: talk to someone every day on social media platforms or talk to them in person, even just for a day. The response would be in favor of the latter. Yes, you definitely can interact with users in online casinos, but it’s not the same as a communal experience you get in an offline casino.
• Land-based casinos take the upper hand over online ones in the payout processing time. Online casinos can be slow in this regard, but players are immediately paid in the brick-and-mortar casinos. When you play on websites, you might have to face a pending withdrawal period depending on the casino website. This added with the average processing time of the payouts, which is already too much, may make the players frustrated, and they may lose the motive to play again.

Cons

• The unease involved in driving to the casino may steer the players towards the online system. Moreover, the expense of commuting to the casino can be tremendously augmented with the risk of losing money when you get there.
• The number of employees hired to work in a casino has to be massive because land-based casinos are high maintenance. This might not be a disadvantage for the clients, but it is a dominant factor in why more and more entrepreneurs turn towards online casinos. Online casinos can be operated by a few employees, so the low budget won’t be a problem for them to launch and maintain the website.
• The matter of accessibility is where online casinos trump their land-based counterparts; clients don’t have to go and find a casino nearby; they could always play at their home. 
• This is a time of an outrageous outbreak of the virus, and although some lockdown restrictions are now being eased, it is far safer to play at home. This is the incentive behind more activity seen on online casinos in 2020. Consequently, fewer people are going to land-based ones now.

Online Casinos

Online casinos are in fashion now more than ever because of the pandemic. The highly sought-after casino games are now being offered in online casinos, and the hunger for the thrill of gambling is reawakened. From poker games with promotional benefits that could upgrade your bankroll to free slot games with bonus rounds, online casinos are always offering a little extra as if the convenience of playing them at your place and time wasn’t already enough. 

But are they that good as people make them out to be? Let us find out below:

Pros

• Online casinos are far more accessible than the land-based ones; clients can gamble online with the comfort and immunity of their home, any time, and anywhere in the world. They don’t have to waste money to commute to gambling houses. Also, they don’t have to worry about the dress-code and other trivial matters. 
• Online casinos have a myriad of games in different niches. This is one of the things land-based hubs don’t offer; their options are minimal and expensive. Most websites grant an alternative where clients can try out games for free. This is a stroke of genius since, even if the client doesn’t go for the version where they’ll have to deposit cash, the games they try out for free drive more traffic on the gambling website, making it a much more profitable option than the land-based casinos.
• Safety is hung in the air because the vaccine for COVID-19 isn’t available yet, and the numbers of cases are increasing day by day. Even if the lockdown is eased in some countries, people prefer to be safer than sorry. Businesses have moved online, and people resort to executing their work-related and other financial tasks in the comfort of their homes, so it should not be surprising that they have the same view of entertainment. Owing to the pandemic, so many people are now veering towards online gambling that the global online gambling market is predicted to grow from $58.9 billion in 2019 to $66.7 billion in 2020 at a growth rate of 13.2%. The revenue expected in 2023 is $92.9 billion at a Ca AGR of 11.64%. The current revenue is 59 billion US dollars, so it’s anticipated to double in the upcoming years.
• People want a distraction from the atrociousness of tCoronavirus’sdeaths, and online gambling game developers try their best to provide their clients with comfort. After the pandemic surge in March, Verizon reported in a week-by-week analysis that gaming saw a 75% increase in data usage over its networks. Among games, gambling is becoming more prominent as the gambling industry is evolving. 

The options online gambling provides for accessibility are magnifying now that games can be smoothly played on any device. Most of the games are designed to be adjustable on landscape or vertical modes, and the layout has become enticingly sleek. This flexibility is not available elsewhere and is why gambling on mobile devices has increased during the pandemic. Online Gambling Quarterly states that 61% of the revenue of gambling operators comes through mobile devices. Also, 72% of betting stakes are placed via mobile devices. All this accounts for the exponential growth in online gambling market revenue over the last five years.

• Clients always go for products that seem more lucrative in the long run; this is one reason why online casinos take an edge over their brick-and-mortar counterparts. Online casinos offer more tempting bonuses and promotions, which act as the incentive for clients to revisit those gambling websites. If you’re a gambling game developer and are looking to attract more users to your sites, the least you have to do is offer bonuses of free spins.
• Online gambling sites are protected through a firewall which protects them from DDoS attacks. So clients don’t have to worry about hackers stealing their information. The risks associated with land-based casinos, from robbery to physical harm, are strong enough to prevent people from going there.

Cons

• Online casino operators yet have to emulate the experience one gets by going to casino hubs. It remains to be seen how potent virtual reality could become in the future to render brick-and-mortar casinos obsolete.
• The payout system is slow in online gambling, where clients have to wait for a time before they are allowed to withdraw the money.

Our Deduction 

The services online casinos offer to outweigh those provided by the land-based ones. Users, naturally, tend to go for the convenience of online casinos owing to the pandemic. And although land-based gambling hubs are not yet considered outdated, they are being replaced by online ones. The consequence being reinforced by people staying indoors due to pandemic, our verdict favors online casinos: they are more profitable than their land-based counterparts.