How Smartphones Are Changing The Online Casino Industry

The online casino industry is a new – and booming – part of the gambling industry. In the last few years, it has grown by leaps and bounds and it is becoming a serious player in the gambling industry in general. It is such a massive part of the industry now that established casino brands around the world have branched out and opened their own online casinos.

For most of their existence, online casinos have been accessed through desktop browsers. In fact, until very recently, desktop browsers were how most sites on the internet were accessed. It is only in the last few years that mobile usage has outpaced desktop browser usage. Between 2015 and 2021, mobile traffic share jumped from 31% to 54%.

These figures show that consumer behaviour is changing in a serious way. Desktop browsers have been the norm for the life of the internet and a permanent transition to mobile being more dominant will have an effect on how websites are designed and how the user interfaces are created. For older digital industries, this period of transition may cause some uncomfortable growing pains.

Since online casinos are a fairly young industry, they are perfectly placed to adapt quickly to the mobile landscape. This article will take a quick look at the ways in which smartphones are already changing the online casino industry – and what changes might be coming soon.

Mobile optimisation

As anyone who has used their smartphone to visit a website that hasn’t been optimised for mobile knows, an unoptimised website is incredibly frustrating to use. As online casino brands are realising how important mobile usage is, they have produced websites for mobile. You can play these online slots on your iPhone or Android phone and get a good idea of how well slot machine games can be developed or formatted for playing on a mobile phone.

Many online casinos have also created their own apps. This allows them to offer more games to mobile users. There is, of course, the risk of alienating some users who are tired of having to download an app to use a site or service. Conversely, it’s a great way for online casinos to encourage brand loyalty, since many people will be happy to download one online casino app and leave it at that.

Faster, secure payment options

In the earliest days of online casinos, the only options for players wanting to make a deposit were a bank or wire transfer, or a credit card payment. As more digital banking options have become available, making deposits and receiving withdrawals from online casinos have become easier and more secure.

Smartphones make it possible for users to use even more payment methods. Digital wallets and payment apps such as Venmo, Skrill or Zelle are secure and transactions can be processed almost instantly. For online casinos, this means that players can quickly make deposits while playing but that when they feel like they’ve reached their limit, it is just as easy for them to withdraw their money.

Blockchain casinos

Cryptocurrencies have been in the news recently for some dramatic swings in the market but it seems likely that the major coins are here to stay. An increasing number of industries have begun to accept cryptocurrency payments. Online casinos are one of those industries and smartphones help to facilitate this. Though they do also exist on desktop browsers, most blockchain casinos focus on mobile optimisation.

Blockchain casinos are online casinos that are built utilising cryptocurrency technology. They emphasize the ability for players to remain anonymous and the high level of security that they can offer. Both of these are particularly attractive features for many players.

Augmented reality

Live dealer table games are hugely popular as they closely mimic the actual experience of being at a traditional land-based casino. With live dealer online casinos, there is a live dealer, and players are able to interact with the cards on the table and with one another through a chat feature.

Augmented reality is essentially a middle ground between regular digital media and virtual reality. It uses your smartphone’s camera to place digital images into the real world. Augmented reality is already a popular feature in mobile gaming and is being built into an increasing number of apps.

For online casinos, augmented reality can bring the live dealer experience even closer to the traditional casino visit. Augmented reality will allow dealers to be projected into a player’s living room. This has the potential to be a very interesting development that could draw lots of new players to online casinos.