Card Counting in Nevada
Updated
Nevada law draws a sharp line, and it is not where most people think. Counting cards in your head is not a crime. Using a device to help you is a felony. And separately from both, a casino may ask you to leave for any reason at all.
- Mental counting is not unlawful in Nevada. It is not cheating.
- NRS 465.075 makes using or possessing a device to gain an advantage a crime.
- A first offense is a category C felony — not a fine, not a warning.
- Casinos are private property and may exclude you regardless.
The statute, and what it covers
NRS 465.075 makes it unlawful to use, or to possess with intent to use, any computerized, electronic, electrical or mechanical device that is designed, constructed, altered or programmed to obtain an advantage at playing a game in a licensed gaming establishment.
That language is broad on purpose. It covers a purpose-built counting device, and it also covers a phone running an app. A first violation is a category C felony, which in Nevada carries a prison term and a fine.
Separately, NRS 465.083 makes cheating at gambling a crime. Nevada courts have consistently held that counting cards using only your own memory and arithmetic is not cheating within that statute — you are using published information about a game whose rules have not been altered.
Where the line actually falls
Legal: counting in your head. Using a printed basic strategy card. Varying your bet. Leaving a table when the count goes bad.
Felony: any device. A phone at the table used to help you play. A hidden computer. Sharing information with a confederate through a device.
The distinction is the device, not the advantage. Nevada does not prohibit having an edge; it prohibits getting one with electronics.
What actually happens to counters
Almost never anything legal. Nevada casinos are private property, and under long-standing state law they may refuse service and exclude people at will, provided the reason is not a protected characteristic.
In practice a suspected counter is asked to leave the blackjack tables, or told they are welcome to play anything else, or asked to leave the property. A trespass warning may follow, and returning after one can be a criminal matter — which is the one way an ordinary counter ends up in genuine legal difficulty.
Detention by casino security while police are called is also lawful in defined circumstances, which is why the sensible response to being approached is to be polite, cash out and leave.
How Nevada compares
Nevada’s position — counting legal, devices criminal, exclusion permitted — is the model most US states follow. New Jersey is the significant exception, where a 1982 ruling removed the casinos’ right to exclude counters.
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By Martin Kosek · every number on this site is computed by us, not copied.
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