According to Ancient Chinese history, Cheung Leung of the Han Dynasty created a game very similar to Keno around 200AD to fund the war that had been going on for several years. Funds to support the way were getting low and the people of Leung's city were refusing to contribute more of their wages to support the war. Leung decided a game of chance, similar to keno would be the best way to generate revenue for his army.

If you have played online keno, you may have noticed the similarities between keno and a lotto or lottery game. The reason for this is keno is a form of a lotto. The name has changed a few times in the last 3000 years, but by all accounts the Chinese invented the game as discussed above to fund the war, their army and the Great Wall of China .

The game derived from the well known poem, “The Thousand Character Classic”, which prior to being used for keno, was a romantic numbering system, since no two characters were alike. Keno started out using 120 Chinese Characters. Prior to the game leaving China , it was reduced to just 90 characters. The game was further reduced to 80 Chinese Characters when it followed Chinese railroad workers in the 18 th century to the United States .

Although illegal, keno thrived among Chinese immigrants, especially around big cities like San Francisco . It became known as the Chinese lottery. English speaking Americans became interested in the game, but had difficulty differentiating the Chinese characters used in the game. Around the beginning of the 20th century, keno operators replaced the Chinese characters with Arabic numbers to entice more players.

Although illegal, keno thrived among Chinese immigrants around big cities like San Francisco . It quickly become know as the Chinese lottery, at which time English speaking Americans became quite interested in the game, but had difficulty understanding and differentiating between the Chinese characters used in the game.

Although Nevada legalized most forms of gambling in 1931, lottery was not legalized by the legislature. Chinese Lottery was not changed to Keno until the early 20 th century, when gambling was legalized in Nevada . Since the legalization of gambling did not include lottery, the game was changes to Horse Race Keno, using the idea that the numbers represented horses and you wanted your horse to place first, rather then your number coming first. Shortly thereafter, Nevada placed a tax on all Off Track Betting and to avoid this tax, the name was shortened to Keno.

In 1963 the aggregate keno payout limit in Nevada was $25,000. In 1979 it was changed to $50,000. In 1989 the Nevada Gaming Commission eliminated the cap, thus allowing casinos to offer any aggregate keno payout they liked.

Keno

is a game all about numbers. You have to choose numbers from one to eighty. You will be choosing to twenty numbers at one time, or you can choose as little as just one number.

Once you choose your numbers, you will find that the host of the casino will draw up to twenty numbers. From this point, the person who has matched the most numbers as drawn by the host of the casino wins. This game is easily played, and can be played fast. You can play from home or your office or anywhere because little time is involved in this game.

You pick your numbers and the balls are drawn for you to compare and match your numbers with. This is similar to playing lottery games. You can play at anytime of the night and do not have to wait.

It depends on how many numbers you get to match to determine what you win. If you were to match one number out of twenty, then your winnings would be small. If you were to match all of the numbers correctly, then you are in for a big payout.

The payouts in Keno will vary and sometimes you can get a straight payout of one to one, but usually you will find that payouts are based on a seventy to eighty percent payout on the dollar. The payouts for playing keno in any casino online is going to be listed on the payout page for the casino in which you are playing.

Keno Tips

Welcome to our keno tips section. This is where we try to guide you a little in your play so that you might have a better time or, at the very least, not find yourself completely out of luck.
The first tip is, when you get to the casino, have a walk around. Know where the keno outlets, monitors, writers (and big board if there is one) are. Stop by the keno booth and pick up the booklet, which they will give you for free. It will answer any questions about specific differences or options available at the casino relating to keno. If you happen to get disoriented it can cost you, as our next tip will demonstrate.

The second tip is, pay attention to your game. If the game ends while you're eyeballing the crowd at the blackjack or craps table, you'll have to make a mad dash for the keno writer! The keno writer is the nice guy or girl who sells you your ticket, and if you don't make it there to cash in a winning ticket before the next game starts (in most Vegas casinos that's five minutes) you don't get to cash it in at all!

This is of course advantageous to the casinos themselves as it allows keno players to sit down at table games without having to get up every five minutes, or to become like the slots player who jealously guards their machine in eager anticipation of a payout.

The rest of keno tips directly relate to the previous ones. Many casinos offer 'multi-race' cards (to find out why they are named after races, read up on the keno history page), which allow you to play the same set of numbers over multiple games. There are essentially two types of 'multi' games. One where you can play a single set of numbers over as many as 20 games, at the completion of which the player can check the ticket for any wins. Beyond this you may also purchase something called walk away keno, or stray and play tickets. This method enables patrons to purchase keno tickets for an extended number of games (read, more than 20), forget about them completely, and return at a later time or even a later date to have the tickets checked by a computer for winning games.

Which type of game you should play depends on which activities you enjoy doing more. Remember, number one keno strategy is to enjoy yourself while playing, whether it be gambling at another game while the keno numbers run by in a different part of the casino or watching each number come up and stamping it like bingo or some healthy point between the two. I hope these simple keno tips prove useful for you.