Baccarat Terminology
| Updated: Understanding Baccarat Terms for Better Gaming Experience
Baccarat is one of the classiest games you can play at a casino, with many land-based casino floors dedicating special areas for baccarat tables. Back in the day, baccarat tables were accessible exclusively to high rollers, as the game was well known for incorporating high-stakes bets into the gameplay. Nowadays, baccarat has become more accessible, with many online variations even offering low bet limits, making it a great option for any type of player.
One of the many reasons players enjoy baccarat is the simplicity of the game. With straightforward rules and gameplay that require almost no decisions or actions, baccarat is great for both beginners and experienced players. If you want to enjoy a few baccarat sessions, you can head to the nearest brick-and-mortar casino offering the game, or you can simply register with almost any virtual casino and pick from various virtual and live-dealer baccarat tables. Before you start wagering real money on the game, however, we recommend getting familiar with any terms you might encounter as you play. To make this process easier, we have provided definitions for all popular baccarat terms, helping you fully enjoy the game whenever you wish to test your luck.
Table Personnel Terminology
Callman – Large baccarat tables are manned by three dealers, each of whom carries out a distinct duty. One of those dealers is referred to as a callman (or caller) and is positioned in the very middle of the table so as to face all players. The callman is responsible for handling the cards, positioning them in the corresponding places on the layout, deciding whether or not more cards can be drawn to a hand according to the predetermined drawing rules, and verbally announcing the winning hand (hence the name “callman”).
Croupier – Croupier is derived from the Old French word croupe, which was used to denote the back part of a horse. Initially, the word croupier referred to the person who stood behind a player to back them up with extra cash during the betting session, hence the analogy with a horse’s rump. The word’s meaning gradually evolved, and its current usage is that of a casino representative, i.e. a callman in the context of baccarat, who is in charge of overseeing the game and announcing the results of the coups.
Dealer – A distinction should be made between a callman (a croupier) and a dealer in baccarat. Two dealers stand on each side of large baccarat tables while the callman is positioned in the very middle. Unlike the callman, the dealers do not come in direct contact with the cards. They only handle the money on the table, paying out the winners and collecting the chips of losing players.
Ladderman – The role of a baccarat ladderman is identical to that of the pit bosses in craps. The ladderman is responsible for overseeing the game and sits in a special high chair positioned above the baccarat table, which enables them to keep close track of all the action.
The purpose of the ladderman is to ensure everyone adheres to the rules and to prevent or correct mistakes on the part of the caller and the two dealers. Laddermen also intervene should any disputes occur at the table. If a ladderman spots a cheater, they would call security or surveillance but would never leave their high perch over the table. Sometimes one ladderman may be responsible for overseeing several baccarat tables at the same time.
Pit – Tables with high limits are normally kept separate from other casino games on the main floor and are placed in a roped-off area called a pit. It is precisely this atmosphere of exclusivity that makes baccarat so alluring to high rollers, as it enables them to gamble for higher stakes undisturbed by the racket of the main casino floor.
Shill – The practice of shilling has almost become obsolete, but back in the day many casinos would hire shills (also called starters) to attract more betting action. The shill would take a seat at an empty baccarat table without revealing in any way that they worked in conjunction with the house. Once seated, the shill would secretly bet with the house’s money while pretending to be a regular player.
Not surprisingly, casinos used to employ predominantly young and attractive women or men as shills at their baccarat tables. A shill should not be mistaken for a proposition player – the latter is still a casino employee and, as such, is on the payroll of the house, but would use their own money when betting at the tables.
Table Equipment Terminology
Cheques – Cheques are chips intended specifically for play at the baccarat tables. They are a different size from the chips used in other table games, which further contributes to the sense of exclusivity baccarat instills in players.
Continuous Shuffle Machine – Often abbreviated as CSM, continuous shuffle machines are special card-shuffling devices used at the blackjack and baccarat tables. At the end of each coup, the caller collects the discarded cards from the table and places them back into the CSM, whose mechanism works continuously, shuffling the decks throughout the game and ensuring the randomness of the deal. These machines are used at some tables mostly because they speed up the game, as the callman does not have to shuffle the decks manually after the end of a shoe.
Cut Card – This is a plastic card inserted towards the end of the baccarat shoe to show the callman when to reshuffle. After the callman reaches the cut card, they must deal more cards to finish the current coup and then play one final hand before reshuffling and starting a new shoe.
Discards – The discards are the cards that have already been dealt out of the shoe and are not in play until the reshuffle. These are stored in a discard tray until the cut card is reached and a fresh shoe starts.
Lammers – Lammers are small laminated disks used by the dealers to mark the commissions on winning banker wagers.
Layout – Large baccarat tables can accommodate up to twelve players, with six players sitting on either side of the caller. In contrast, mini baccarat tables can be occupied by no more than seven players. The table layout contains the commission and betting boxes and has the available bets in the game, along with their payouts, printed on it.
Marker – A piece of paper a player must sign when borrowing credit from the house.
Muck – The muck is a freshly shuffled baccarat shoe that contains a total of eight French decks of 52 cards each.
Palette – This is a flat wooden bat used by the caller to move the cards on the table. In player-banked games, the palette also serves as an indicator of which player is currently acting as banker. The palettes used at high-roller tables in luxurious casinos are often exquisitely crafted pieces of equipment, decorated with elaborate ornaments, which further add to the sophisticated atmosphere at the tables. Palettes have been an essential piece of equipment at baccarat tables ever since the 15th century.
Rule Card – These cards contain the fixed rules by which baccarat and chemin de fer variations are played.
Baccarat Variations
Baccarat à Deux Tableaux – This baccarat variation features the banker hand playing against two player hands at the same time. It is also known as Baccarat en Banque and can be found mostly in European gambling venues. Interestingly, spectators observing the game are permitted to place bets if the participating players cannot cover the banker’s bet entirely. The name of the variation translates to “baccarat on two tables”.
Chemin de Fer – This is one of the most popular variations of the game and is available mainly in European casinos. In chemin de fer, players take turns clockwise, acting as the banker, so, in effect, they are betting against each other instead of playing against the house. US casinos ditched chemin de fer in favor of baccarat toward the end of the 1950s. The name of the variation means “railway” in French.
Dragon Tiger – This is yet another distinctive baccarat variation that enjoys considerable popularity in Asian casinos, especially those in Macau. The difference here is that the player and banker hands consist of one card instead of two. The object is to predict which of the two hands will receive a higher-ranking card. The peculiarities of this variation allow for various proposition bets to be made.
Mini Baccarat – Mini baccarat follows the same rules as the standard variation of the game. The key difference lies in the size of the semi-circular table, which is smaller and, as such, is serviced by a single member of the casino’s personnel instead of three. Consequently, the smaller table can accommodate fewer players, usually up to seven.
Baccarat Bets Terminology
Banker Bet – The banker bet is one of three possible betting options in baccarat, along with the player and the tie bet. Winning banker bets offer even-money payouts, but the house collects a 5% commission from such wagers, so, in effect, banker bets pay at a rate of 19 to 20. This wager yields the smallest house edge of only 1.06%.
Loss Bet – This term is used to refer to a wager made against the banker.
Player Bet – The player bet is one of the three possible bets you can place in baccarat. Its house edge is 1.24%.
Tie Bet – This is the last of the three bet types in baccarat. Players are generally advised to avoid it since the tie bet gives the house a higher advantage of 14.36%. With this wager, you are practically betting on the player and banker hands ending in a tie, i.e., having the same total.
Baccarat Hands
Baccarat – The term baccarat is also used to refer to the worst possible hand you can get in this game, one whose total value is zero, similar to a roll of 2, 3, or 12 in craps, which causes pass line bets to lose. In baccarat, this worthless total always loses unless you push with the other hand (player or banker, depending on which one you have initially backed) whose total is also zero.
Le Grand – This is a natural (see below for the definition) with a total of 9.
Le Petit – This is the “smaller” natural, with a total of 8.
Natural Hand – Naturals are the strongest pat hands you can receive in any card game. In baccarat, naturals are pat hands whose total is either 8 or 9. A natural is an automatic winner and receives no additional cards. One such pat hand loses only against a higher natural; for example, if you have backed the banker’s total of 8 but the player hand’s total is 9.
Etiquette and Player/Dealer Actions
Banco Prime – This rule is effectuated mostly in banked baccarat variations like Chemin de Fer, i.e. games where one of the actual players at the table assumes the role of banker. In such games, the role of banker rotates, with players taking turns after each coup. Similar to the small blind in poker, the banker posts a forced bet at the start of the coup.
One of the players can match the banker’s bet by calling out banco. Sometimes several players announce banco, but in such instances the privilege is awarded to the player sitting immediately to the banker’s right. They announce banco prime to indicate this privilege.
However, many gambling experts are of the opinion that this is not a countable game because it abides by fixed drawing rules. Baccarat is a symmetrical game since there are no card ranks that yield a bigger advantage either to the player or to the house.
Carte – As you may have guessed, this is a French word that translates as “card”. The term is used to request additional cards from the callman.
Card Burning – This action involves the dealer discarding cards from the freshly shuffled shoe before the game starts. Unlike blackjack, where only one card is burned at the start of a new shoe, baccarat callers burn multiple cards. The callman first takes one card from the shoe, and the number of pips it shows determines how many cards must be burned subsequently. Note that face cards have a value of 10 instead of 0 when cards are burned, so if the dealer takes out a Queen first, they will remove ten cards from the shoe.
Fading – This term is used in player-banked variations of baccarat when the players cover the entire bet of the banker or part of it.
Flat Betting – Flat betting involves wagering the same amount of money on each baccarat coup. In contrast, players using betting progressions vary the size of their wagers depending on the previous coup’s result.
Pass – To pass means to win a hand in baccarat.
Push – When both the player and banker hands have the same total, they are said to “push”. The same term is used in blackjack to denote a tie, in which case no money changes hands because neither the house nor the player wins or loses.
Shuffling Up – This is when the dealer at the baccarat table decides to shuffle the shoe unexpectedly before reaching the cut card.
Squeezing – This is a practice among some baccarat dealers who gradually reveal the face-down cards on the table. While squeezing the cards certainly adds to the entertainment value of the game, it has absolutely no impact on the order in which the cards leave the shoe.
Squeezing is sometimes permitted in player-banked games as well, but only one person is allowed to squeeze the cards for the player bet and another for the banker bet. These are usually the two people at the table who have backed the player and banker with the biggest bets.
Stand-Off – This is another term for a player and banker push/tie.
Miscellaneous Terms
Baccarat Bankroll – Your bankroll is the amount of money you bring to the baccarat table to play with during a betting session.
Coup – A coup is a single round of play at the baccarat table.
Court Card – A court card is another term for face cards (Jacks, Queens, and Kings).
Casino Commission – The 5% commission the house collects from each winning banker bet. In some casinos, you might find baccarat tables where this percentage is reduced to 3% or 4%, which causes the house edge on banker bets to drop even further.
Down Card – The term refers to cards that are dealt face-down on the table.
Face Cards – These are the Jacks, Queens, and Kings in a baccarat shoe, which are practically worthless since they are assigned a value of zero.
House Edge – The statistical long-term advantage the casino holds over players is called the house edge. Baccarat is one of the games with the lowest house edge, but this also depends on what you are betting on. The banker bet gives the house its lowest edge of only 1.06%. Meanwhile, this percentage increases to 1.24% for player bets and a whopping 14.36% for tie bets.
High Roller – A high roller is an important patron in the eyes of casino personnel because they wager substantial amounts of money in baccarat and other table games.
Monkeys – When you pass by the baccarat or blackjack tables, you are likely to hear players shouting “Monkey! Monkey!”. Just so you know, they are referring to the face cards in the shoe, which are also called “courts”, but players may sometimes refer to them as “monarchy cards” as well.
Asian players and dealers struggled to pronounce the English word “monarchy” and often twisted it into something that sounded a lot like “monkey”. This mispronunciation caught on with English-speaking players, who sometimes use it as well.
Punto – Punto is a Spanish word denoting the player bet. Allegedly, the term first emerged in gambling venues across the Argentine city of Mar del Plata.
Shooter – Shooter is used to refer to the bank or the player who assumes the role of banker in player-banked baccarat variations.
Upcard – A card that is dealt face-up is called an upcard.
Whale – A whale is practically the same thing as a high roller, i.e. a gambler playing with a substantial bankroll and betting huge amounts of money on each coup.