Fancy some bingo bling? How about competing to cover a ‘diamond pattern’? This is a pattern made from four squares — covering top, bottom, left and right of the free space in the middle.

And forget about the cost of a first class stamp nowadays, the ‘Postage Stamp’ pattern, or even the ‘Double Postage Stamp Pattern’, involves having to cover four squares in a corner. The double postage pattern involves any two corners.

Players enjoy the fun and variety of 75 ball bingo – who knows what pattern will crop up next? There are many other varieties of free online bingo, including 90, 80, and 30 ball games. A new type of 75 ball bingo, known as ‘ Swedish variant’ is also gaining in popularity. Play 75 ball bingo today and discover how exciting it can be. Happy pattern-hunting.

The first is the free bingo bonus they get when they register. Enticing cash offers can often be a dealbreaker. After all, isn’t it better to join a site that is offering a large no deposit bonus, as opposed one that isn’t offering anything at all? Also, the ‘deposit match’ is an important reason. This is represented by a percentage — sites offer anywhere between 100% to 1000% in sign up bonuses. It’s interesting to note that well-advertised sites tend to have smaller bonuses, so it may be worth scouring around the lesser-known sites to see if you can boost your bankroll.

Competitions and giveaways also feature highly on a player’s list of priorities. Some sites give away cars, holidays, and huge amounts of cash. Some players join because a friend recommended it to them. And plenty of people join up to a site because of large, enticing jackpots. And, last but not least, a significant proportion of bingo players sign up to have fun and to socialise. After all, bingo is a communal activity, where it’s easy to make friends. Why not join an online bingo site today to find out why it’s one of Britain’s most popular pastimes?

Bingo portals are impartial, and contain reviews and up-to-the-minute news articles about what is taking place at a bingo site each day. There are almost as many bingo portal sites as bingo sites, making it easy for the average player to shop around and find out which deals are best.

Many players fall into the trap of playing at the same site day in day out, but by doing this, you can miss big competitions, free bingo games and large bonuses. With several hundred free bingo sites in the United Kingdom, it pays to shop around, and using bingo portal site is the perfect way to do this.

How do you choose your bingo? Do you look for a good no deposit bonus? A large deposit bonus? Or do you look for free bingo games, exciting promotions, and tempting offers?
Whichever you prefer, bingo portal sites ensure you always stay ahead of the latest news, and stay clued up on your favourite numbers game.

More and more people are trying online bingo thanks to free bingo games which are offered at most bingo sites. If you are new to the world of bingo, it may surprise you to learn that all bingo sites have chat rooms which is where players meet to gossip, chat and to relax.

It’s only natural that friendships blossom in these busy, sociable places, and all chat rooms have a chat moderator on hand, who promotes a friendly atmosphere even further. They do this by running regular chat games, which encourages interaction and also by welcoming new players into the room.

Furthermore, online bingo can be a godsend to socially isolated people, including the elderly, the housebound, and those who live in remote places. With several hundred online bingo sites for people to choose from in the UK, each offering amazing prizes, and life changing jackpots, isn’t it time you tried this exciting way to make friends?

Since then, the game evolved into its current day format, with an American travelling toy salesman working alongside a professor of maths to create the numerous card combinations we use today.

The most up-to-date version of this game is online bingo, and its popularity has shot through the roof recently, going truly global and travelling to Australia, Japan, Korea, South America … but not Italy! Ironically, the ‘home’ of bingo has only just sorted out its licensing laws, meaning fans of the game can now get their fix too. At last, bingo has gone full circle and returned to its spiritual home.

Italy already had a huge following in land-based bingo clubs, and with the introduction of free online bingo sites, is it possible that the Italian market will go as mad for it as those in other parts of the world? Chances are yes. Bingo has an incredible ability to reinvent itself time and again.

We can only speculate what the future holds for everybody’s favourite numbers game? Holographic bingo? Zero G bingo?  Who knows? We can’t wait to find out.

Not a lot of online bingo sites still accept players from the United States of America (USA) due to these payment restrictions.  The few trusted and respectable bingo sites that accept play from US players are listed below.

Online Bingo Sites that accept US Players

Currently NO reputable online bingo sites accept US players.

So if you are based in the United States and want to play bingo online, all you have to do is visit one of the above bingo sites.

• Eight per cent of the population play bingo – 10% of all women and 5% of all men.
• An average British game of bingo takes between four and four and a half minutes.
• The average speed of a British bingo caller is 23 numbers per minute.
• The average time to check a winning claim is 30 seconds.
• There is a “caller of the year competition” in which bingo callers compete for a two week holiday.
• The French were the first to play with Bingo playing cards, tokens and reading those numbers out loud!
• Celebrities love bingo! Denise Van Outen is a big bingo fan, as are Catherine Zeta Jones and Robbie Williams.
• Bingo became popular in Australia early in the 20th Century. It was known as Housie. Housie was held in large marquees before they moved into halls.
• In the 1800′s a Lotto game similar to Bingo was used as an educational tool in Germany designed to teach children multiplication tables.
• Throughout the 1800s Bingo spread quickly in Europe. Typically, the ‘Caller’ would draw from a bag full of wooden chips numbered from 1-90. Like today, the object of the game was to be the first to cover a horizontal or vertical row.
• In 1929, a game called ‘Beano’ was played in a carnival near Atlanta, Georgia. Dried beans, a rubber stamp and a cardboard sheet were all that these Americans need to get their minds off the sting of the Depression.
• The most common reasons for playing bingo are because it’s fun, it offers companionship and the chance to socialise.
• It wasn’t until a New York toy salesman named Edwin Lowe, observed how players shouted the word, ‘Beano’ after winning was the modern game of Bingo born.
• Mr. Lowe introduced the game to his friends in New York where one of them mistakenly yelled ‘Bingo’ for the first time in her excitement, and ‘Lowe’s Bingo’ was soon the talk of NYC. Lowe asked players to pay him $1 per year to allow them to call their games Bingo as well…
• By the late 1940s, Bingo games sprung up all over the country with thousands of games being played every week.

In the United Kingdom and Australia bingo cards have three rows and nine columns. Five squares in each row contain numbers ranging from 1 to 90 and the rest are blank. The numbers are usually called quickly, so players rarely play more than one book (six cards). A bingo book (a set of six cards) contains all the numbers from 1 to 90, fifteen numbers on each card, five numbers in each row. The first column contains single numbers, the second tens, the third twenties, and so on. Number 90 is placed in the ninth column along with the eighties.

Each card has a unique serial number to permit quick verification by computer.

Calculating the total number of possible combinations yeilds the result that there exists 552,446,4557,061,129,000,000,000,000 possible BINGO cards, 4,976,640,000 of which would have the same twenty four numbers, but in a different arrangement.

If we presume that there are six billion people in the world today, that means that there are 92,0557,412,343,521,400 cards for each and every person in the world.

If you could print a million cards per second, it would take 17,505,972,382,599.7 years to print every possible BINGO card,

Admission Packet

Blackout – (Also, Coverall) A pattern where you must cover the whole card to win. Usually 50 to 60 of the 75 bingo numbers have to be called to cover all the numbers on a card. But blackouts in as few as 43 numbers have been recorded.

Bingo Board – A display board, usually electronic that lights up showing each number as it is called.

Bingo Card – A card containing 24 numbered spaces and one free space (blank), with which you play BINGO. The numbers are assigned at random on each card and are arranged in five columns of five numbers each by five rows (5 x 5 = 25 in total including the blank square). The numbers in the B column are between 1 and 15, in the I column between 16 and 30, in the N column (containing four numbers and the free space) between 31 and 45, in the G column between 46 and 60, and in the O column between 61 and 75. Players have thousands of unique (unduplicated) cards to choose from. Some manufacturers print unduplicated series of 6,000 cards. There are also series of 9,000 cards available. Hard cards and Flimsy cards have a series number printed on them. For example, card number 1252 will always have the same numbers in the same spaces.

Blower – A forced-air device that mixes the bingo balls and dispenses them to the caller who announces the number and displays it on a bingo board.

Bonanza Bingo – A progressive coverall Jackpot that is usually played as the 13th game of the session. Forty-five numbers are drawn before the session and players mark them on separate cards and set aside. There is an additional fee to play this game, usually $1. The countdown begins at 48 numbers or less and go up one number per week to 52 numbers or until won. The amount of the jackpot is determined by card sales for that game.

Buy-in – Buying bingo cards or an Admission Packet (see above). Converting cash into bingo cards.

Caller – The person who calls out the bingo numbers.

Chat Room – A handy monitor or screen where you can read and exchange messages with other players.

Consolation Prize – The prize or prizes offered on some special games if there is no winner in a predetermined number of calls.

Coverall - (Also Blackout) A pattern where you must cover the whole card to win.

Dauber – Bingo dauber is ink-filled bottle/pen with a foam tip on it used to mark called numbers. When you touch the bingo card with the foam tip it marks the square.

Early Bird Game – A bingo game that starts earlier than another regularly scheduled game.

Flimsy, Flimsies – Bingo cards printed on thin sheets of paper. There are usually three cards printed on a single sheet but flimsies are also printed in one, two, four, six or 9-card formats.

Although these numbers are amusing and each has its own story, most professional bingo halls do not use them.

There are traditional calls for the numbers. For example:

1 – Kelly’s Eye
5 – Man Alive
7 – Lucky for Some
8 – One Fat Lady
9 – Doctor’s Orders
10 – (current PM)’s Den
11 – (Chicken) Legs
13 – Unlucky for Some
16 – Sweet Sixteen
21 – Key of the Door
22 – Two Little Ducks
23 – Thee and Me
30 – Dirty Gertie
37 – More Than Eleven
45 – Halfway There
51 – Tweak of the Thumb
55 – Speed Limit
59 – Brighton Line
64 – Red Raw
66 – Clickety-Click
71 – Bang on the Drum
76 – Trombones
79 – One More Time
81 – Stop and Run
86 – Between the Sticks
88 – Two Fat Ladies
90 – Top of the Shop