A casino, also known as a gambling house or a gaming room, is an establishment for certain types of gambling. Casinos are often combined with hotels, restaurants, retail shops and other tourist attractions. In some countries, casinos are licensed and regulated by government authorities.

Many casinos offer free or discounted services to entice large bettors, especially high rollers. These may include meals, hotel rooms, free or reduced-fare transportation, tickets to shows, and even limo service and airline tickets. These inducements are referred to as comps. Unlike cash bets, comps do not affect a patron’s mathematical expectancy of winning or losing at a particular game.

Although some gamblers are tempted to cheat or steal, these activities are rare because of the rules and patterns that govern casino behavior. For example, the way dealers deal cards, the locations of betting spots on tables, and the expected reactions and motions of players follow a pattern that makes them easy to spot by security personnel.

There are more than 1,000 legal casinos worldwide. Most are located in places such as Atlantic City, Las Vegas, and Chicago, but there are also casinos on American Indian reservations and in other countries. In the United States, many states have passed laws to permit or ban casinos. The number of casinos is increasing as more states legalize them, particularly in the Midwest and Northeast. These casinos range from opulent temples of temptation to down-home gambling clubs. There is one certainty in casino gambling: the house always wins. The odds are always against the player, and the longer he or she plays, the more likely it is that the house will win.