Every casino on Retrigger carries a rating out of 10. This page explains how we rate casinos and slots: where the number comes from, what we check before anything is listed, and who does the checking, so you can judge our judgement.

Never for sale

Commissions never change a score.

Negatives stay in

Caps, unfair terms and complaints appear in the review.

Two sources

Independent safety scores, cross-checked.

How we rate casinos: Finnegan with his casino review clipboard

How we rate casinos: what the number means

Our headline rating is anchored to the casino.guru Safety Index, the most rigorous independent safety assessment available for online casinos, and we verify it against our own research before adopting it. Where our analysis disagrees with the index, we say so openly in the review and explain why: our Instaspin review rates the casino above its index because the gap is driven by its licence, not its behaviour.

9.0–10
Very high safety

Verified licence, fair terms, clean or well-managed complaint record.

7.0–8.9
Above average

Solid record with specific caveats we spell out in the review.

5.0–6.9
Below average

Playable, but read the review first: the caveats are significant.

Below 5.0
Warning

We list these as warnings, not recommendations.

A rating below 5.0 is a warning, and we publish those too. Our Rollino review carries a 0.6 so you know which casinos to avoid.

What we check before we rate a casino

This is how we rate every operator: a casino that fails a core check is not listed. These are the checks behind every review on our casino bonuses page.

Licence verification

We confirm the licence number actually exists on the regulator’s register: verified, not merely claimed on a footer.

Terms read in full

We flag every predatory clause: confiscation rules, win caps, “irregular play” catch-alls and unreasonable KYC timeframes.

Two-source cross-check

We compare the casino.guru Safety Index with AskGamblers’ editorial and player scores, and when they disagree sharply we publish both numbers.

Complaint records

Open, resolved and unresolved complaints, black points, and how the operator responds when things go wrong.

Operator networks

Many casinos are sister brands of one company. We map these networks and tell you when a “new” casino shares an operator, licence and complaint pool with ones you already know.

Studio coverage

We check which studios’ games are genuinely in the lobby, not just claimed in the marketing. That check is how we found one casino advertising EGT games it did not carry.

Payments and payout speed

Deposit methods, withdrawal limits and real payout timeframes, including the caps casinos prefer not to headline.

Two sources, one honest number

Independent scores do not always agree. When they split, we publish both numbers and analyse the gap instead of hiding it. GG.Bet is the clearest example on the site.

casino.guru Safety Index
9.1
AskGamblers score
5.8

The same honesty applies to caps: iWild’s $1,000 daily withdrawal cap is in our review title, not buried.

How we rate slots

How we rate slots follows the same rule as casinos: a number is only published once it has been checked. Every reviewed slot can be put side by side in our slot comparison tool.

1
Studio documents first

Specs are checked against the studio’s own documentation before they are published, never copied from another review site.

2
Max win, cross-checked

A maximum win goes into a review only when independent sources agree on it, and we say whether it is quoted per line bet or per total bet.

3
Every RTP version named

Where a game ships more than one certified RTP build, we name them instead of quoting the most flattering figure.

4
Volatility, honestly labelled

When a studio publishes no official volatility rating, the review says “no official rating” rather than presenting a guess as fact.

Who does the reviewing

Retrigger’s reviews are researched and written by Irakli Chachua, who has spent more than ten years in iGaming across several of its verticals: inside game providers, as an affiliate manager, and writing casino and slot reviews. Working the supply side and the affiliate side is why the rules here are what they are: specs are checked against the studio’s own documentation before they are published, terms are read in full rather than summarised from a landing page, and where a game ships more than one certified RTP build we name that instead of quoting the most flattering figure.

How we make money, and what that does not change

Retrigger is an affiliate site. If you sign up at a casino through our links, we may earn a commission from the operator. Two things keep that honest:

The rating is never for sale

Commissions do not change a casino’s score. We publish 0.6 ratings and “avoid this” verdicts about operators with affiliate programmes.

Negative findings stay in

Withdrawal caps, unfair terms and complaint records appear in the review, and usually in the title, whether or not a casino partners with us.

Full details in our affiliate disclosure.

18+

Play responsibly

Gambling is entertainment, not income. Everything on this site is for players aged 18 or over. If gambling stops being fun, help is free and confidential at GamCare and BeGambleAware.