Astonishing buildings, mind-blowing views, lively crowds of people, fancy cars and thousands of shiny casinos, non-stop fun and excitement that can take your breath away. There is only one place in the world where you can see the Eiffel Tower, the Colosseum, Taj Mahal and a desert at the same place; the only destination where you can go and see a bit of the whole world; the only place that can make you rich in the blink of an eye – Las Vegas, the city that never sleeps.
Las Vegas is a dream destination for many people in the world and it’s also a dream come true for many others, who have experienced the unforgettable and indescribable feeling of being there and becoming part of what Vegas really is. There is a huge number of casinos, where enthusiasts from all over the globe go to, wishing to get a lucky number and become rich, and others who go there simply to feel the spirit of this unique place.
There are so many amazing casinos which can catch your attention and make you want to get in and gamble, that it’s hard to choose which ones among all you should go to. Therefore, in this article, we want to share our experience with you and make a list of the top ten casinos in Las Vegas that you simply must visit.
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The Stratosphere Casino
The Stratosphere in Las Vegas is a casino, hotel and tower, all of which are combined to form an incredible set of buildings that you can see the whole city from. With its over three hundred and fifty metres, the tower is considered the largest free-standing one in the United States and the second one in the Western Hemisphere. The casino-hotel is a separate building which is the tallest structure in Las Vegas. It is situated on Las Vegas Boulevard, north from Las Vegas Strip. In 1990, an American entrepreneur and casino-owner, Bob Stupak, came up with the idea of building a giant ape that would serve to carry customers up and down the columns of the tower.
The original conception was to create the tallest free-standing building in the whole world by then with a hight of 553 metres. However, the plan was not accepted by the Federal Aviation Administration due to potential safety risks that might occur because of the nearby McCarran International Airport. In 1993, while the tower was still under construction, it caught fire. This led to necessary repairs that took some time and delayed a lot the whole process of building the tower.
In 1996, the construction was finally completed and put in use. There are two observation decks on the top of the tower, four speed rides and a restaurant. The 7 400-square-metre casino offers entertainment, such as slot machines, 50 different table games, over 1 500 video poker and slot machines, a sports book and a poker room.
Binion’s
Binion’s Gambling Hall & Hotel, formerly known as Binion’s Horseshoe, is one of the best casinos in Las Vegas. It is located on the Fremont Street Experience and is owned by TLC Casino Enterprises. Its name comes from its former owner, Benny Binion, whose family founded the casino-hotel in 1951. At first, the casino was in an old riverboat style, with velvet wallpaper and low ceilings. It was the very first carpeted casino and also the first one to offer comps to its customers.
The whole family was involved in the process of the casino’s proper functioning until Benny Binion was put in prison and sold his share of the casino to his fellow-gambler, Joe Brown. When Brown took over the whole casino, he installed a display on the floor, which became very famous for its price of one million. It was later recreated and it has been the casino’s attraction ever since. Visiting Binion’s is considered one of the must-do things when going to Las Vegas for the fact that it’s a classic casino where you can still sense the spirit of the old times. Binion’s is also the place where the World Series of Poker was born and held.
New York-New York
New York-New York is another great casino-hotel resort in Las Vegas that is worth seeing. It is located on Las Vegas Boulevard South and has a gaming space of over 7800 square metres. As its name implies, New York-New York is influenced a lot by the city of New York. The style of the building reminds of the old New York style and there are a few towers, which resemble the Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building.
There are more important New York signs there, such as a lake in front of the casino, which is a representation of New York Harbour, a 45-metre-tall replica of the Statue Of Liberty and also replicas of several other New York buildings, such as the Whitney Museum Of American Art and the Soldier and Sailors Monument.
Within the resort, there are many restaurants, gambling areas, lounges and shops, named after different neighbourhoods in New York City. The building process of New York-New York was completed at the cost of 460 million dollars and the casino opened in 1997. It is mainly famous for its roller coaster, formerly known as Manhattan Express, which resembles traditional New York checker taxi. It goes through the whole property and allows visitors to take a trip and see the interior and exterior of the resort.
The Mirage
The Mirage is one of the most impressive casino-hotels on the Las Vegas Strip. It is connected by a tram to Treasure Island, which is another casino-hotel. There is a marquee in front of the Mirage casino, which is considered the biggest free-standing marquee in the whole world. The casino was designed by Joel Bergman and built by Steve Wynn. It opened in 1989 and was the first casino resort to be built with money from Wall Street junk bonds. By that time, the Mirage was the most expensive casino with a total cost of about 630 million dollars. The construction contains a lot of gold, including the windows, whose golden colour is a result of the gold dust that is used in the tinting process.
The casino-hotel is considered the father and founder of today’s conception of Las Vegas. There are several attractions in the resort, such as a secret garden and dolphin habitat, an artificial volcano, rainforest flora at the entrance, a poolside nude area and a huge 16×2,4-metre aquarium at the reception. Many important boxing events have taken place in the resort, such as the match between Felix Trinidad and Freddie Pendleton.
Caesars Palace
Caesars Palace is another amazing casino-hotel that is in the top ten casinos in Las Vegas. It is situated on the west side of the Las Vegas Strip and is owned by Caesars Entertainment Corporation. The casino has a total gaming space of about 15 500 square metres and offers a lot of facilities and entertainment. The building of Caesars Palace started in 1962, when a motel-owner, Jay Sarno, came up with a concept for an attractive resort in a Roman style.
The constructions process was completed in the summer of 1966 and the casino-hotel opened its doors for customers. The idea behind the casino was to create something that evokes the feeling of royalty with its Roman water fountains and landscapes.
The resort offers a wide range of fashionable stores and a huge sportsbook that is worth watching. Bringing a real Roman touch, there is a replica of the Colosseum at Caesars Palace. The construction serves as an entertainment venue, which can host over 4 200 people, who want to attend concerts of different famous performers, such as Celine Dion, Cher, Elton John, Luis Miguel, Sheryl Crow, Gloria Estefan, Bette Midler and others. In 2009, President Barack Obama performed in a one-night show in the Colosseum, called ‘A Good Fight’.
Treasure Island
Treasure Island Hotel & Casino, also referred to as ‘TI’, is a casino-hotel, situated on the Las Vegas Strip. It is connected by free tram to The Mirage casino and also by a pedestrian bridge to the Fashion Show Mall, which is a big shopping centre. The hotel is one of the best ones in Las Vegas and it has received a Four Diamond rating every year since 1999. The building of Treasure Island was completed in 1993 at the cost of 450 million dollars.
At first, the idea was to build an additional tower to The Mirage. However, this plan developed to designing a whole separate casino-hotel resort. The original plan was to build the casino in a pirate style with a marquee with skulls and crossbones and a stage for pirate battles every night. However, in 2003 the theme of the casino and hotel was changed to a more adult-friendly environment, with a hot tub, a night bar and a different exterior colour, which changed from orange to dark maroon.
Treasure Island hosts the ‘Mystere’ show of Cirque du Soleil, which is considered the best show in Las Vegas. The pirate ‘Buccaneer Bay’ show was replaced with ‘Sirens’ Cove’ and ‘The Sirens of TI’ in 2003. The show programmes included dancing, singing, half-naked pirates and many audio-visual effects, all of which were meant to attract an adult audience. However, the show was stopped in 2013 due to construction.
Hard Rock
The Hard Rock Hotel & Casino is another entertainment resort which is worth visiting. Owned and operated by Brookfield Asset Management and Warner Gaming, LLC, the 6,8-hectare property is situated on Paradise Road in Las Vegas. Its total gaming space is 2 800 square metres but gaming earns the resort only about thirty percent of its income. Hard Rock is in contemporary chic style and it offers many facilities and ways to keep visitors entertained, such as a nightclub, cocktail lounges, many shops, six restaurants, a Tahiti-style beach, a poker room, a music venue and many more.
The resort was planned and built by Peter Morton in 1995. It was expanded and renovated a few times through the years, as the last time was in 2010. In 2002, a famous rock musician, John Entwistle from ‘The Who’, died in one of the hotel rooms, which is no longer released for guests but only visited by fans, who want to pay tribute to Entwistle. Entertainment that the resort offers includes ‘Vanity’ club, ‘The Joint’, ‘Rehab’ and ‘Vinyl’. ‘The Joint’ is a rock club, where many popular musicians have performed, such as Guns N Roses, The Rolling Stones, Coldplay, Alicia Keys, Oasis and others.
‘Vanity’ is a nightclub which has two bars and sixty VIP booths. The attraction of the club is a cyclone chandelier above the dance floor which sprawls. ‘Rehab’ is an event, which is considered the original pool party of Las Vegas. It takes place every Sunday, turning Hard Rock into an open daytime pool party. Many famous DJs play music there, such as Tiesto, Fedde Le Grand and many more.
Mandalay Bay
Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino is situated on the Las Vegas Strip and is owned by MGM Resorts International. The casino has a total space of 12 500 square metres and it’s styled in a South-East Asian theme. The resort was opened in the winter of 1996 as a Hawaiian-styled ‘Project Paradise’ resort. However, two years later the resort was renovated and its name was changed to ‘Mandalay Bay’, although there isn’t an actual bay in the capital of Burma – Mandalay.
In 2003, a Convention centre was added to the resort, which was announced the fifth largest one in the United States with its 93 thousand square metres. It includes a few ballrooms with a size up to 9 000 metres. The resort has a big shopping mall, called ‘Mandalay Place’, 24 restaurants, bars and lounges, an event centre, a shark reef aquarium and a 4,5-hectare Mandalay beach, which includes a wave pool, a small waterfall, three heated pools, a Lazy River water ride and a swimming pool for children.
The Shark Reef is a salt-water aquarium, which contains one of the biggest tanks in North America. Show programmes which take place at the resort permanently are ‘Chicago’, ‘The Lion King’, ‘Mamma Mia!’ and ‘Michael Jackson: One’.
The Palms
The Palms Casino Resort is one of the most popular casinos is Las Vegas. It is located on Flamingo Road, near the Las Vegas Strip. The resort includes a 8 800-square metre casino, a Michelin-recognised restaurant, a recording studio and the Pearl concert theatre that can host up to 2 500 people. Made in a modern, neo-retro style, the resort is similar to Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, with which it competes. Developed by George Maloof in 2000, the resort project was completed in September 2001 and two months later opened its doors to a huge crowd of people.
The Palms has several nightclubs and lounges, some of which are situated in one of the three towers at the resort. The second tower is called ‘Fantasy Tower’ and includes a two-story suite which has a basketball court. Other suits in the tower are the King Pin suite, the Barbie suite and the G suite. The casino includes all of the classic and latest table games, stylish bars and plush lounges, where you can take a break from the lively gaming spirit.
Bellagio
Bellagio is the last on our list but not the least casino in Las Vegas that offers an incredible time. It is a luxurious casino located on the Las Vegas Strip. It is owned and operated by MGM Resorts International, the company that owns Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino. Bellagio is famous for its elegance and style that is inspired by the lake town of Bellagio in Italy. The casino opened in 1998 and has a total gaming space of 10 800 square metres.
Bellagio offers many facilities and is well-known for its professional poker room. Many poker experts play there, referring to the casino as ‘The Office’. The reason why they choose Bellagio is its high table limits. The casino also hosts many tournaments of the World Poker Tour. It offers a range of gaming slots, table games, a race and a sports book.
The resort includes many attractions, such as the Fountain of Bellagio, which is a huge fountain with choreographed water that is set to perform to light and sounds. Bellagio also contains several restaurants and bars, a conservatory, botanical gardens and a gallery of fine art, which offers exhibitions of works of fine art.
FAQs
While many people believe that it was the fabulous Flamingo opened in 1946 by Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, in fact, Las Vegas had many legal gambling halls before the 1910 prohibition of commercial gaming.
The Red Rooster was among the first establishments to obtain the license, although it definitely could not brag of long life on the Strip. Originally a popular nightclub, it was open for less than three months before being caught with illegal liquor sales.
Another casino that is seen as the first sustained venues on the Strip is the Pair O’ Dice built on Highway 91. Similar to the Red Rooster it was a nightclub, in essence, which also offers a few one-armed bandits, one roulette wheel, as well as blackjack and craps tables.
Speaking of the first casino resort, it is, undoubtedly, El Rancho Vegas that besides luxurious hotel had a swimming pool, a showroom, and offered a buffet.
All venues in Vegas offer a decent selection of various table games but, generally speaking, downtown casinos located on Fremont Street are a better choice for playing cards than their more fashionable Boulevard counterparts.
As a rule, the most popular among the tourist places have the tightest slots, hence casinos located on the Las Vegas Strip constantly report to the Nevada Gaming Control Board the highest slot hold percentage. They are closely followed by playing houses located in the Downtown area.
Sleek cabinets on the floors of casinos in the North Las Vegas and the Boulder tend to have a lower house edge, so they are pretty looser in comparison with the Strip and Fremont machines.
Fortunately, not. Actually, it is very surprising that such a senseless delusion, which is in total contravention to medical science and physics, turned out to be so resilient. Against all odds, it still puts broad smiles on the faces of not only casino staff but also seasoned punters.
Many punters do believe, slot managers make significant effort to distribute loose machines near buffets, aisles, elevators, showrooms, in short, everywhere they are in view of a large number of people.
Although it could probably be a nice way to attract players, it is too far from being a reality. Do not waste time trying to figure out the location of the “best paying” machine, instead, find your favorite and simply have fun.
Today the majority of casinos have their own loyalty programs intended to keep players from jumping from one place to another in return for various, often a way past glamorous perks.
It is a quite widespread superstition, that inserting your club card in a slot machine or giving it to the dealer at the table can affect (positively or negatively) the outcome of the game.
In fact, these cards just keep track of your gambling style and related activities, they register how much you wager, how long you have played, how you spent your comps, etc. There is no chance, using your card can change the result of a game you play.
The Europen wheel gives players better odds of winning: 1 in 37 instead of 1 in 38 offered by American roulette. Is this the reason casinos in Vegas do not want to make space for more single-zero wheels?
Even though this suggestion looks pretty reasonable, in fact, it is unfounded. The truth is, some casinos at different times tried to introduce more European-style games on their floors but it turned out many punters simply love the familiar double-zero and don’t want to change their habits.
Vegas is always busy, but, of course, at nights or at weekends casinos are really crowded. Does this fact boost your chances to win big? No.
Maybe more jackpots are paid during these busy hours but due to the only reason – more people place their bets, more spins generate more lucky combos and more chances for a life-changing hit. But in general, not specifically for you.
It is definitely Megabucks, known for its mind-blowing progressive Jackpots. With a house edge being about 13%, this title tops the list of the tightest machines.
Speaking generally, smaller denominations slots are tighter than their higher denominations counterparts, therefore penny slots are not too generous. So, if you used to play higher bets ($1, $2 or $3) on penny slots, it is time to switch to larger denomination machines as they offer better payout rate.
Yes. The SkyJump attraction is open daily and if the weather permits, all interested can experience an amazing (yet controlled) free-fall after taking a quick safety lesson.