No Deposit Bingo Sites

No Deposit Bingo Sites

Bingo sites with no deposit bingo allow you to start playing (and potentially winning) bingo without having to deposit any money. This can be very useful for those new to online bingo who may not be sure they will like it, or who are bored with their current bingo site and want to try somewhere else out without committing any funds.

Why There Are So Few No Deposit Bingo Offers

Some bingo sites will let you play no deposit bingo in their newbie free bingo room for up to 7 days after registration , but up until August 2017 it was far more common for a no deposit bonus of up to £20 to be offered as well as or instead of this.  At that point, the taxation of bonuses changed.  Previously, operators only had to pay tax on bonuses if the player ended up winning anything but from then on, tax has been due on the value of the bonus whether the player won or lost.  This applies to all bonuses, not just no deposit bonuses, but it was particularly expensive for operators to pay the tax on no deposit bonuses because only about 5% of the players who took up a no deposit bingo bonus ever went on to deposit and play with real money.

It should come as no surprise then, that the vast majority of bingo sites that offered a no deposit bonus to new players changed to a deposit based offer and by the end of 2018 no deposit offers had become as rare as hens’ teeth.  And that’s not all – the few remaining free signup offers are mostly for free spins, not a bingo bonus.  So while you can sign up and try the site out for free, that won’t include being able to try out any bingo rooms unless there’s a free bingo room of some kind.

No Deposit Free Spins Offers

Free slot spins as a welcome offer have been increasing in popularity over the last few years.  As well as being more straightforward for operators, they have some advantages for players too:

• If there’s a wagering requirement attached it won’t be on the face value of the free spins but on the winnings (if any).
• They are simple and easy to use and keep track of.
• Free spins are normally used, when you open the game in question, before anything else in your account – unlike a bonus which typically won’t be used unless and until your account is empty of cash.
• They are fun to play.

No deposit free spins offers usually have some strings attached.  There may be a cap on what you can win from the free spins.  The winnings will almost certainly be paid as a slot bonus complete with wagering requirement rather than as cash.  Free spins offers also have a fairly short expiry date; 24 hours is not unusual.

What a no deposit free spins offer at a bingo site DOESN’T normally allow you to do is try out the bingo.  If the winnings are paid as a bonus, it will be a slot bonus and you won’t be able to use it to pay for bingo tickets.

Free Bingo Ticket Offers

Free bingo ticket offers have been evolving and have come a long way from their origins.  In the earliest free bingo ticket offers, the tickets were all for the same game and you had to go to the bingo room shortly before the game started for the tickets to play.  This type of use them or use them offer wasn’t suitable if you couldn’t be online at the allotted time.  These days, there’s two distinct types of free bingo ticket offer:

• Dragonfish: Free tickets are all for a specific room and are redeemed via vouchers which can be found in the gift box in the top right hand corner of the lobby.  If it’s something like the Big 10K which only runs once a month, you’re going to have to use them all in the same game as otherwise they’ll expire.  If the room runs games daily or more frequently, you can redeem them a few at a time.
• Virtue Fusion, Gamesys & GVC:  Free tickets have a maximum face value per ticket, and can be redeemed in games where the ticket price doesn’t exceed that value, in any bingo room that isn’t cash only.  So you could redeem 10p free tickets in a 1p or 5p game if you wanted, but you wouldn’t be getting the best value.  Only at Virtue Fusion can free bingo tickets be used to pre-buy.

Currently, free bingo tickets are used as part of deposit based welcome offers or given as rewards to existing players rather than used as part of a free sign-up offer. We haven’t yet seen much in the way of no deposit free bingo ticket offers for new players.  It’s surely only a matter of time though!

Free Bingo Rooms

In a free bingo room, all of the tickets are free and although you still have to claim them shortly before the game starts, you can play in as many games as your schedule and the room opening times allow rather than having a set number of tickets to redeem.

Free bingo rooms for new players, with small amounts of bingo bonus to be won, have been a thing for years; they are typically open for a couple of hours a day and available for a fixed period after registration (usually between 3 and 10 days).  These newbie free bingo rooms often require players to make a deposit and/or spend a specified sum on bingo tickets to gain entry, but sometimes no deposit is required.

Some of the bigger name bingo sites also run free bingo games for existing players.  Unless there’s some sort of play, deposit or loyalty level requirement for entry, these free bingo games tend to have extremely large numbers of players and the chance of ever actually winning anything is remote.

Nevertheless, free bingo rooms can really help new players get a feel for how the bingo software works and how friendly the community is.

Why No Deposit Bingo Offers Are Making A Comeback

Since May 2019, it hasn’t been possible to play with a no deposit bonus, free spins, free bingo or any other kind of free sign-up offer – or even free demo versions of games – until after the bingo site has successfully verified your name, address and date of birth and in some cases this may involve sending them copies of your driving licence or other documents.  Most sites also now require phone number and/or debit card verification.

We thought that this would kill off no deposit bingo completely, but actually the reverse seems to be true.  Because of the commitment required from the player before claiming a no deposit bonus which typically involves verifying a mobile phone number and debit card as well as name, address and date of birth, there are far fewer, well, time wasters claiming them.  Hardly anyone who has zero intention of ever actually making a deposit wants to part with all that information.  The result is that no deposit offers, although still expensive for operators, are much more effective at attracting genuine real money players than they used to be.  That explains why we are now seeing a few more of this type of offer as we go into 2021 and why newbie free bingo is still going strong.

Why No Deposit Bingo Can Actually Be Bad For Players

The lack of no deposit bonus offers, when they used to be so prevalent, may seem pretty disappointing.  But when you think about it, there’s a problem with no deposit bingo bonuses – and indeed with bingo bonuses in general if operators give them out too freely.

The prizes in online bingo games are funded by ticket sales, and the more tickets that are sold the bigger the prize gets and the smaller chance each ticket has of winning.  This is all very well and good when everyone’s playing with cash.  But what if half or even more of the players in the room are playing with a free bonus or free tickets?  The number of tickets in play will go up, but the prize money probably won’t go up as these players are not contributing any cash.  If there’s only the occasional player using a bonus the effect won’t be noticeable, but if the network is awash with bonus as has happened at certain groups of sites in the past, anyone playing with cash will soon realise that they are winning less often and/or winning smaller amounts.

A no deposit slot bonus or no deposit free spins offer doesn’t have this drawback.  The only case in which a player using slot bonus can have any effect on the experience for other players is that of a progressive jackpot slot where bonus play (if it’s even allowed) may not contribute to the jackpot – and even that would only affect the eventual jackpot winner (who’s unlikely to care as they’ll just be happy to have won the jackpot).

Free bingo rooms for newbies don’t have this drawback either; as no-one pays for their tickets the playing field is level between players.

The conclusion?  While a free sign-up bonus with no deposit required can be very tempting, a bingo site that offers no deposit free spins instead or doesn’t have a no deposit offer at all is likely to yield a better player experience in the long run.

Sue Dawson

Head of Content

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