Bingo is an undeniable staple of gaming. While it used to be associated purely with land-based Bingo halls, modern Bingo has an increasingly large online playerbase.
Here are ten of the top facts about this classic game, perfect for anyone looking to learn more before they play Bingo online.
Bingo’s Origin Dates Back To 16th-Century Italy
It wasn’t called Bingo at the time – that’s a much more recent addition – but the game can trace its roots back to Italy in the 16th century.
A game known as Il Gioco del Lotto d’Italia became popular as a weekly event in town squares up and down the country. It was a standard lottery – as the name implies – and involved a number being drawn and called.
But over the following centuries, the game evolved and travelled, gradually turning into what we recognise today.
Bingo Wasn’t Called Bingo When It Debuted In The Us
As iconic as the name is, Bingo was a fairly late addition to the game. It actually got its start in the US under the name Beano – based on the beans that players used to mark numbers off their cards.
This version was commonly found at travelling fairs and carnivals, only coming to be known as Bingo once New York toy salesman Edwin S Lowe published a commercial set under the name.
Not All Countries Play Bingo
While plenty of countries call the game Bingo it isn’t universal. Most notably, Australia still calls the game by its older name of Housie instead.
There Are Still Plenty Of Physical Bingo Halls
Bingo has taken off as an online game, but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t still many locations for players to play a game in person.
The number of Bingo halls in the UK has undeniably gone down from its peak in the early 2000s. Still, there are currently more than 200 different Bingo venues in operation around the country.
Us And Uk Bingo Look Very Different
The two countries have very different Bingo formats. From their ball count to the format of their cards and gameplay, there’s a clear distinction between US and UK Bingo games.
75-ball is the US format, with a 5×5 grid Bingo card, while the UK favours 90-ball Bingo, with a 9×3 card and unique nicknames for each of the numbers in play.
There Are Different Patterns In Some Bingo Formats
This is more unique to 75-ball Bingo, but in some Bingo games, players aren’t aiming to fill out straight lines of matching numbers. In some instances, patterns like an ‘x’ or ‘t’ or the four corners of the grid are required instead.
Players Can Play Mini Bingo Games
Thanks to online play, there are now even more Bingo formats for players to choose from than ever before.
This includes 30-ball Bingo, also known as speed Bingo, where a game can finish in a matter of minutes.
There Are Billions Of Possible Bingo Card Combinations
The exact number of potential combinations varies depending on the specific format of Bingo. However, in 90-ball Bingo, there are 24 quadrillion possible card combinations, and the number is several billion times larger than that in the 75-ball format.
Bingo Lingo Is In Decline
UK Bingo halls are no strangers to Bingo lingo – the unique rhyming nicknames given to the 90 numbers used in their games. However, as a growing number of players have moved to online play, this has led to a drop in Bingo lingo usage, with online games not using a human caller.
The First Online Bingo Game Debuted In 1996
When platforms began experimenting with online play during the 90s, Bingo was one of the earliest games to make the jump, with the first online Bingo game going online in 1996.
