Card counting

Card counting is one of the strategies designed to turn the casino game of Blackjack into a positive result for the players. Blackjack substantially increased in popularity in the 1960s and 1970s once a strategy for beating the game was made public by Eward Thorp in the 1962 publication of Beat the Dealer..

As the cards are played, the remaining cards can be identified. The larger the proportion of aces, face cards, and tens remaining in the deck, the more favorable the odds are for the player. Players take advantage of this by increasing their bet sizes and altering playing strategy.

A skilled card counter can play against the casino at a small mathematical advantage. Some casinos, in some jurisdictions, falsely consider this cheating and will ban card counters from playing. However, card counting is not illegal in any country.

Blackjack writers

These are prominent blackjack writers, whose works are published by reputable non-vanity publishers. The many self-described "experts"who pay for their own websites are of course excluded.

Les Golden

Long-time columnist for Bluff Europe, igamingbusiness, gambling.com, Jackpots Review, and gamblingonline magazines. Author of the biographical novel Never Split Tens and the adapted screenplay, based on the life of Edward Thorp. Golden was named as an International Gambling Institute Scholar (University of Nevada, Las Vegas) for 2016.

Edward Thorp

A pioneering book codifying the methodology by Edward Thorp was published in 1962: Beat the Dealer: A Winning Strategy for the Game of Twenty-One.

Olaf Vancura and Ken Fuchs

Authors of Knock Out Blackjack.

Stanford Wong

Author of the books Basic Blackjack, Professional Blackjack, and Blackjack Secrets.

Frank Scoblete

Author of Golden Touch Blackjack Revolution.

Arnold Snyder

Author of books Blackbelt in Blackjack, Big Book of Blackjack, and Blackjack Wisdom..

Don Schlesinger

Author of Blackjack Attack.

Barry Meadow

Author of Blackjack Autumn

Rick Blaine

Author of Blackjack Blueprint

Ian Andersen

Author of Burning the Tables in Las Vegas and Turning the Tables in Las Vegas.

Maverick Sharp

Author of the 2013 Dynamic Blackjack.

Ken Uston

Author of Ken Uston on Blackjack and Million Dollar Blackjack..

Lawrence Revere

Author of Playing Blackjack as a Business.

Peter Griffin

Author of The Theory of Blackjack.

Lance Humble and Carl Cooper

Authors of The World's Greatest Blacklack Book.

See also

• Blackjack card counting systems

In the Media

Never Split Tens!, a novel based on the life of pioneering card counting theorist Edward O. Thorp, by Les Golden published in 2017 by Springer, includes numerous examples of card counting in simulated casino play including changing bet sizes, the Kelly criterion, group card counting, and entering the play when the deck is favorable to the player.