Casino Bonuses

Have you heard what a Non-Sticky bonus is?

Many people now play at online casinos and benefit from the fantastic bonuses on offer. As many will realize, there are many different types of bonuses, including non-deposit bonuses, deposit bonuses and free spins. However, what many don’t realize is that bonuses can either be sticky or non-sticky, and it’s exceptionally important to understand the difference between each.

Author: Manyspins Published: August 23, 2021 Last update: July 14, 2022

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On this page, we’ll be explaining how to differentiate between a sticky bonus and a non-sticky bonus. Once you’ve finished reading, you’ll know exactly which of these online casino bonuses is right for you. Then you can head over our selection of casino bonuses and pick the one for you!

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Sticky and Non-Sticky: What’s the Difference?

When you claim a deposit bonus, one of two things will happen to your deposit. It could be attached to your bonus money, which would mean that the money you’ve deposited, like the bonus money, is not withdrawable until you’ve reached the bonus’ wagering requirements. The fact that your real money is stuck to your bonus money is why it’s referred to as a sticky bonus.

Alternatively, you could find that your real money is not attached to the bonus money – the fact it’s not attached means that it’s non-sticky. With non-sticky bonuses, you’re able to withdraw the money you’ve deposited without meeting the bonus’ wagering requirements.

It’s important to remember that you’ll still have to meet wagering requirements if you want to withdraw money won from bonus funds, regardless of whether the bonus is sticky or non-sticky. The only difference is that, with non-sticky bonuses, the money you’ve deposited isn’t trapped until the wagering requirements have been met.

Wagering Requirements of Sticky and Non-Sticky Bonuses

Before we look at the wagering requirements of sticky and non-sticky bonuses, it’s important to first understand what wagering requirements are. Essentially, they are something put in place to stop you immediately withdrawing your bonus money. You might find that a bonus has 35x wagering requirements, which is fairly typical. This would mean that you’d have to play through your bonus 35 times before you could withdraw.

Here’s an example: you’ve received a $100 bonus with 35x wagering requirements. This means that you have to make bets worth $100 x 35, which is $3,500, before you can withdraw any money you’ve managed to win. The higher the wagering requirements, the lower your chances are of ever making a withdrawal.

You’ll generally find that non-sticky bonuses have higher wagering requirements than sticky bonuses. This is because non-sticky bonuses are riskier for the casino, and therefore the casino wants to make it tougher to ever withdraw the money you’ve won. If they made it too easy, they’d be handing out money to loads of players, without the players spending anything. This certainly wouldn’t be good for business.

Which Bonus Type is Better?

This is a simple question to answer: non-sticky bonuses are without doubt the better bonuses. This is because you’re not risking any of your own money – if you want, you can deposit, claim the bonus, and then withdraw what you’ve deposited. This means you’re then playing with the house’s money, much like a no deposit bonus.

With sticky bonuses, your money is trapped, therefore meaning that there’s far more risk attached. If you do decide to withdraw your deposit, you would forfeit your bonus funds, along with anything won using them.

Of course, as already mentioned, non-sticky bonuses have higher wagering requirements, which is certainly a downside, but this is trumped by the fact that your money is not at risk.

How to Tell If a Bonus is Non-Sticky

There’s often only one way to tell if a bonus is sticky or non-sticky, and that’s by looking through the terms and conditions. This is something you should always do, as checking out the terms and conditions will also tell you many other important pieces of information, such as what the wagering requirements are and whether there’s a cap on the amount of money you can win. If you don’t look at the terms and conditions of a bonus, you’ll never know if it’s a great one or one you should avoid.