Great Gambling Games for New Year’s Eve Parties

2023 is upon us, and the New Year’s Eve festivities will soon begin. Party food, champagne, and New Years resolutions will be shared by friends and family as the countdown to midnight unfolds. I created this list of simple gambling games you can play with basic household items to make your New Year’s Eve Party more fun. All you’ll need is a deck of cards, some pennies, some dice, and potentially an internet connection to play them. I start with gambling dice games and go from there. Let’s discover the best gambling games for New Year’s Eve parties!

It’s amazing how much fun you can have with a pair of dice, especially when real money wagers are involved. Dice and cards have been the center of popular gambling games for centuries, and you can play the following for some extra fun at a New Year’s party.

Shooting Dice

This is simple as can be, but there are a few different ways to play. You can wager on who will get the highest or lowest number in a dice roll, or you can bet on who will roll a specific number first. For example, if you’re playing against a partner, bet them that you’ll roll seven before them. Once the wager is made, all you have to do is roll and roll again until one of you wins.

Sic Bo

Sic Bo is one of the most popular dice games in the East. With the rise of online casino gaming, it’s starting to take root in the West, too. You’ll need to print off a Sic Bo table format or buy one online. The idea behind Sic Bo is simple – players wager on various outcomes of a dice roll by placing chips on those sections of the board. The dealer then rolls the dice, collects the losing bets, and pays out those that win. As you’ll see when you study Sic Bo, the more unlikely the outcome, the bigger the payout is. If you’re playing for real money, make sure the funds can cover the bet sizes and payouts. Alternatively, play for chips that can be redeemed for prizes later.

It’s amazing how much fun you can have with a bag of pennies. People have forgotten the simple things in life, but a simple bag of coins can unlock a couple of fun New Year’s Eve gambling games.

Coin Toss

A good old-fashioned coin toss that pays even money on bets can keep people entertained for more time than you think, especially if there are extra rewards for unlocking something like five wins in a row. To make coin toss games a little more fun, create a tournament format. Have partygoers pair up and move through the ranks on a ‘first to 10 wins basis’ or by whoever has the most wins after 2 minutes. The coin toss tournament keeps things moving and creates excitement in the air. Of course, there should be a prize for whoever wins the final. It’ll be even better if you can create a game board to show the action as it proceeds through to the final two.

Pitching Pennies

Pitching pennies is a simple and hassle-free way to have a lot of fun in groups. This game has been played since at least the Victorian Era in England and probably has been around in some form for a lot longer. The idea of pitching pennies for real money is simple enough: line up at a wall and toss your penny. Whoever lands closest to it wins. You could run it in such a way that the winner collects everybody’s pennies or that everybody bets a fixed amount before they pitch. Again, it’s perfectly possible to create a tournament format for pitching pennies. That could supercharge the fun and make this a great NYE gambling game.

A good old deck of cards has seen many people through long journeys, lazy afternoons, and fun parties. You can play lots of gambling games on New Year’s Eve with nothing more than a few $1 decks bought at your local store. Let’s have a look at some of them.

Texas Hold’em Poker

Playing Texas Hold’em is the ideal way to get partygoers sitting around the same table. The nature of the game is social; bluffing, faking, and taking other peoples’ chips elicits lots of reactions from everyone. In short, it’s the most-played card game for a reason; it’s a lot of fun. If you have a lot of partygoers, you can break the games down at different tables. That’s how they do things at the World Series of Poker. Those who win at each table proceed to the next one until there’s a winner. Alternatively, if it’s a small group of friends, just play at one table. Make sure to read our ultimate guide to Texas Hold’em before you play. You’ll need to understand poker hand ranks and the basic order in which the betting should proceed.

Head-to-Head Blackjack

Blackjack is the most popular card game at every casino, but did you know you can play it with friends, too? It’s the ideal card game for New Year’s Eve parties. You could run your private blackjack games one of two ways: either have a dealer who handles things and bets against the players at the table or run head-to-head games in which players bet against each other and deal their own cards. As with every other game on this list, you could run a tournament if you have enough players. Alternatively, make it a fun thing where players change partners after a set number of rounds or minutes.

There’s one option I haven’t covered yet, and it’s arguably the most interesting and fun New Years gambling activity of all. Hook up a widescreen TV or monitor, load up an online casino, and start playing real games. You could play slot machines and split any potential jackpot or head to the live dealer section and play dozens of card and table games with real dealers around the world. If you’re going to do this, make sure it’s safe, which is something the best online casinos bring to the table. Also, decide in advance what you’re going to do with the winnings so as to avoid any disagreements if you hit the jackpot!