How to Handle A Dealer 10 In Online Blackjack

Published: August 18, 2018

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In online blackjack you have to know how to handle the situation when the dealer’s face up card is valued at 10. You will get this situation more than 30% of the time because 4 out of 13 cards in a suit are valued at 10 in blackjack. This article will take you through the best responses based on optimum blackjack strategy. The online blackjack variant being used in this example is Vegas Strip Blackjack. The strategy will not be very different for other online blackjack variants.

In Vegas Strip Blackjack the second dealer card is dealt face down. When the face up card has a value of 10, the dealer will immediately check for blackjack. If the hole card is an ace then the game ends there and you move on to the next. If the dealer does not have a blackjack then the ball is in your court. You need to keep in mind that the dealer will stand on all 17.

With a 10 value card on display the dealer is in an extremely strong position. So you have to be conservative when employing split and double down options. You will use them more sparingly than if the dealer’s face up card was a deuce. The only time that you double down is when you have a two-card total of 11, because then you are a bit stronger than the dealer. Against a weak dealer face up card you would split smaller pairs. But against a 10 you split only eights and aces. You stand on pairs of nines and tens and hit on all other pairs.

On the other hand, you have to be more aggressive in your hit strategy. The main bet is already a sunk cost. The dealer is likely to end up on a good total and you have to reasonably try to beat that. If you have a hard hand then you stand only on totals of 17 or more. Otherwise you hit. It may seem dicey hitting on 15 or 16 because the chances of busting are high. But if you stand, the chances of the dealer overtaking your total are more. So you go will the lesser of the two evils so to speak. If you have a soft hand you can be even more aggressive, because the ace can be later converted from 11 to 1. You stand only on soft totals of 19 or more.

Remember that you will not always win if you adopt this optimum blackjack strategy, but you will win more often in the long run.

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