Because of the basic nature that makes up roulette there are not a lot of variations of the game. There are two versions of the game that can usually be found in online and land-based casinos.

The Law of Independent Trials is a statistical term which says that any event is as likely to happen again every time a game is played. In terms of roulette that means that each round is independent of the last round played and the next round that will be played. In other words, the ball could land in any pocket each time.

Roulette is a game of chance because of that ability for an independent outcome each time. And since each outcome is independent, the objective of Roulette is made: to predict where the ball will land.

This translates to a game of chance also because a player can do nothing to influence the outcome. Thus the phrase, ‘Round and round she goes, where she stops, nobody knows.’

Because of that nature it is harder to create variations of roulette.

The two most common and most popular variations are American Roulette and European Roulette.

American Roulette is what people are most often referring to when they are speaking of the game of roulette. This version has a thirty eight pocket wheel with two of those pockets being zero pockets.

European Roulette is played the same way as American Roulette except the wheel is a little different: it only has thirty seven pockets, only one of which is a zero pocket.

But that one pocket difference creates a different house edge for each game. European Roulette only has a house edge of 2.7%, while American Roulette has a house edge of 5.26%. In terms of gambling and house edges, that is quite a difference. It is also why European Roulette is the more advisable game to play.