Best Real Money Pai Gow Sites (2024)

Pai Gow is a poker game based on the original Pai Gow game and is played with cards instead of tiles. Pai Gow is a fairly complex game to learn, but it is fun to play and fairly low risk. You play against the dealer, and the aim is to make the best five-card and two-card poker hands from the seven cards you are dealt.

Pai Gow originated in China as a game using a set of 32 Chinese domino tiles. The modern Pai Gow poker was developed in the mid-1980s by an American casino operator, using a deck of 53 cards (52 normal cards and the joker). Sam Torosian, the casino owner who invented Pai Gow poker, did not patent the concept when he invented it.

Pai Gow poker is a simple game once you learn it. You are dealt seven cards (after making a single bet) and must make one poker hand with five of the cards, and a poker hand with the other two. The five-card hand must be higher in value than the second card hand. The aim is for both of your cards to beat the dealer’s two hands. The most common result is winning one of the two hands, which results in a push.

Pai Gow is a different form of poker compared to most, and you may assume it is rarer at online casinos as a result. While there are certainly less online casinos offering Pai Gow, there is no shortage, as the game has maintained a good level of popularity since its inception over 30 years ago. For the best online casinos offering Pai Gow, check out our list here.

Apart from the obvious (Pai Gow poker is played with cards, Pai Gow tiles is played with tiles) there are a few other differences between the games. Pai Gow poker is played with a 53 card deck (52 cards and a joker) while Pai Gow tiles is played with 32 Chinese domino tiles. Pai Gow tiles sees player and dealer dealt four tiles, whereas the poker variant is seven cards. In both games, the aim is to make two hands, one high and one low, and beat the dealer with both hands.

Pai Gow tiles, with the exception of the number of tiles dealt, is similar in its basics to Pai Gow poker. You make two hands (of two tiles each) and must beat the dealer with both hands to win. The best hands in Pai Gow tiles are either a pair, or the total number of pips on the tiles adding up to nine. If you beat the dealer with both hands, you win, if the dealer wins both, you lose, if the hands are split, the result is a push.

Pai Gow is a reasonably low risk casino game as long as you play the regular game and avoid bonus bets (which have a much higher house edge). There is strategy to play here thanks to the five-card hand needing to be higher in value than the two-card hand. The best way to play as a beginner is to use ‘house-way’, basically betting as the house would. You can actually turn your cards over and ask the dealer, who will tell you how the house would play your hand.