CRA 107: Craps Bets Explained — What Each Wager Actually Does

The easiest way to understand craps bets is not to memorize the entire layout. Sort the wagers by what they are betting on and how long they stay alive.

Some bets follow the main game sequence. Some let you choose a box number directly. Some are attached to another wager. Others are one-roll side bets that disappear almost as soon as they are made.

That framework is more useful than memorizing colorful names because it tells you what the wager is actually doing.

The craps layout in one table

If you know which family a wager belongs to, the table becomes far less intimidating.

1. Pass Line and Don’t Pass: the main game

The Pass Line begins on the come-out roll.

For Pass Line:

• 7 or 11 wins immediately;
• 2, 3, or 12 loses immediately;
• 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, or 10 becomes the point;
• after a point is established, the point must repeat before 7.

For Don’t Pass, the logic is mostly reversed:

• 2 or 3 normally wins on the come-out;
• 7 or 11 loses;
• 12 commonly pushes rather than wins;
• once a point exists, 7 before the point wins the Don’t Pass bet.

These are the bets that define the basic rhythm of craps. If a new player understands only one part of the table first, this is the part to learn.

The standard Pass Line house edge is about 1.41%; Don’t Pass is slightly lower at about 1.36% under the common 12-push rule. The percentages are close enough that the practical difference is small compared with the much larger jump to many proposition bets.

2. Come and Don’t Come: a new line sequence after the point is on

A Come bet is often described as a Pass Line bet made after the come-out phase, but the timing can confuse beginners.

Suppose the table point is 8. You place a Come bet. The next roll first acts like a come-out roll for that Come bet:

• 7 or 11 wins it;
• 2, 3, or 12 loses it;
• 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, or 10 moves the bet to that number.

Once it travels, that number becomes the Come bet’s own point. It wins if that number repeats before 7.

Don’t Come works in the opposite direction, much like Don’t Pass.

This means one player can have several separate point races active at once: the table’s Pass Line point plus one or more traveled Come bets. That can be useful once the flow is familiar, but it can also make a first session unnecessarily hard to follow.

3. Odds: extra money attached to an existing line or Come bet

An odds bet cannot normally stand alone. It must be attached to Pass Line, Don’t Pass, Come, or Don’t Come after a point exists.

For right-side Pass/Come odds, the standard true-odds payouts are:

Those payouts match the actual point-versus-7 combinations, so the odds portion itself has 0% house edge. The underlying line or Come bet still has its normal edge.

This is why saying “odds are the best bet” is only partly accurate. The pricing is fair, but the odds money increases the number of dollars exposed to the point race. A $10 Pass Line bet with $50 odds is mathematically better priced than $60 on many other wagers, but a seven-out still removes all $60.

See Odds Bet Explained for the full calculation and casino odds-limit conventions.

4. Place bets: choose a number directly

Place bets are simpler because you choose 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, or 10 and ask for that number to appear before 7.

Common payouts are:

That table explains why Place 6 and Place 8 are frequently singled out. The wager mechanics are the same across all place numbers, but the casino pricing is not.

A Place 6 is also not the same thing as taking odds on a Pass or Come point of 6. Both are waiting for 6 before 7, but the odds bet pays the fair 6:5 price while Place 6 normally pays 7:6.

Place bets are commonly dealer-managed: you give the dealer chips, identify the number and amount, and the dealer positions the wager in the correct player area. House procedure can vary, so do not reach into dealer-controlled boxes to place or adjust the bet yourself.

5. Buy and lay bets: true-odds-style payout with a commission

Buy and lay bets are number wagers that use true odds but add a commission, often called the vig or vigorish.

A buy bet backs a number to appear before 7. On 4 or 10, for example, true odds are 2:1 because 7 has twice as many combinations as 4 or 10.

A lay bet takes the opposite side: you are betting that 7 appears before the chosen number. Because 7 is more likely, you risk more than you can win.

The commission rule matters. Casinos may charge the vig when the bet is made, only when it wins, or under another approved house procedure. That changes the effective house edge. This is why “Buy 4 pays 2:1” is not enough information to judge its cost.

The dedicated buy-bet guide explains the commission math in detail.

6. The Field: one roll, several winning totals

The Field is a one-roll wager. It commonly wins on:

2, 3, 4, 9, 10, 11, or 12

and loses on:

5, 6, 7, or 8.

The field has 16 winning dice combinations and 20 losing combinations, so the bonus payout on 2 and 12 determines its value. If both pay only 2:1, a common house edge is 5.56%. If one pays 3:1 and the other 2:1, the edge is 2.78%.

That makes the Field a good example of why the printed payout matters more than the bet name. Two tables can both offer “Field” while charging different mathematical prices.

7. Hardways: the number must arrive as a pair

Hardways are not one-roll wagers, despite being located near many one-roll propositions.

A Hard 6 wins if 6 arrives as 3-3 before either:

• an “easy” 6, meaning 1-5, 2-4, 4-2, or 5-1; or
• a 7.

Hard 4, 6, 8, and 10 work the same way with their corresponding pairs.

Common hardway payouts are 7:1 on Hard 4/10 and 9:1 on Hard 6/8. Those payouts are shorter than fair odds, producing materially higher house edges than Pass/Don’t Pass or Place 6/8.

The phrase hardway describes the exact dice composition, not simply the total.

8. Center-table propositions: fast results, usually expensive pricing

The center of a traditional layout contains wagers such as:

• Any Seven;
• Any Craps;
• Aces (2);
• Ace-Deuce (3);
• Yo (11);
• Boxcars (12);
• Horn and Horn High combinations.

Most resolve on the very next roll. Their appeal is obvious: small chip, dramatic payout, immediate answer.

Their cost can also be large. At the common 4:1 payout, Any Seven has a 16.67% house edge. It is the same dice roll as every other craps wager, but the payout is substantially below the 5:1 fair price for a result that occurs 6 times in 36.

A center bet does not become better value because it has a 15:1 or 30:1 payout printed beside it. You must compare that payout with how rarely the event occurs.

A realistic first-table sequence

Consider a player at a $15 minimum table who wants to learn without having five different wager types working at once.

They begin with $15 on Pass Line. The point becomes 6. They add $15 or $30 in odds, depending on the table rules and their bankroll. Now they are watching only one race: 6 before 7.

After a few point cycles, they may add an $18 Place 8 to see how a dealer-managed number bet differs from odds. That creates a second active wager, but the logic is still clear.

Compare that with placing Pass Line, Field, Hard 6, Any Seven, and a Horn bet on the same roll. The second player may have more chips on the felt, but they are learning several unrelated payout systems simultaneously. “More coverage” does not make the combined action safer; it mostly means more money is being put through multiple house edges.

Who places the chips matters

Craps is partly a mathematical game and partly a controlled layout procedure.

Some wagers, such as Pass Line and Field, are commonly self-service: the player puts chips in the appropriate marked area. Other wagers, including place, buy, lay, and many center propositions, are handled or positioned by the crew.

That distinction matters because a correct bet must identify:

• the player;
• the wager type;
• the amount;
• whether it is working;
• the number or outcome being backed;
• whether the bet was accepted before the dice were in motion.

The exact procedure is governed by house and jurisdictional rules. The Massachusetts Gaming Commission craps rules are one formal example of how recognized wagers, payouts, and dealing procedures are defined in regulated play.

For a more detailed treatment of which bets players physically place and which the crew controls, see self-service craps bets.

Three questions that decode almost any craps bet

Before making a wager, ask:

1. What exactly makes it win?
“6” is not specific enough. Does 6 need to appear before 7, arrive as 3-3, or become a point first?

2. What exactly makes it lose?
Some bets lose only to 7. Hardways also lose to the easy version of their number. One-roll bets lose immediately on every non-winning total.

3. Is the payout fair for that probability?
This is where house edge comes from. True odds match probability. Casino-priced bets pay less than the mathematically fair amount.

The standard expected-value framework is:

EV = (probability of win × net win) - (probability of loss × amount lost)

For repeated action, a useful approximation is:

Expected loss = total resolved amount wagered × house edge

So $300 of resolved action at a 1.41% edge has an expected cost of roughly:

$300 × 0.0141 = $4.23

while $300 of action at a 10% edge has an expected cost of:

$300 × 0.10 = $30

Those are long-run averages, not session guarantees. They explain why two players can wager the same total dollars but pay very different mathematical prices.

What beginners actually need to learn first

You do not need the whole layout on day one. A practical order is:

1. Pass Line or Don’t Pass;
2. what the point means;
3. odds behind the line;
4. Place 6 and Place 8;
5. Come bets only after the main sequence is comfortable;
6. field, hardways, buy/lay, and propositions only after checking their specific payout rules.

That progression is not a rule of strategy. It is a way to reduce procedural confusion while keeping the mathematical differences visible.

Use craps payouts when the question is “How much does this pay?”, craps odds when the question is “How likely is it?”, and craps house edge when the question is “How much does the casino charge for this probability?” The craps odds calculator is useful when you want to convert a point and stake into an exact odds payout.