Are you looking to lose less when you have a lousy hand in Blackjack?
There is a correct strategy to use in this situation, as long as you’ve made preparations and you’re playing at a blackjack table, which has one of the features that let you get an early payout.
Three providers—Visionary iGaming, Evolution, and Playtech have designed versions of Blackjack that offer players the chance to withdraw from the hand early in exchange for a payout based on the hand’s strength.
Blackjack Early Payout is a Visionary iGaming blackjack feature that you’ll only find in blackjack games by this developer that lets you take a percentage of your initial stake in exchange for abandoning your hand. The amount depends on your probability of winning or losing the hand.
Blackjack Cash Out is the same thing found in Evolution Blackjack games.
Cashback Blackjack is Playtech’s take on this niche.
All three are the more elaborate variants of Surrender (Late or Early), a well-known blackjack feature on many tables that always gives you half your initial stake back.
So, we have five different ways to limit our losses while playing Blackjack, possibly plugging a few leaks and gaining an additional edge against the dealer.
But which of the five features is best, and where can you play the blackjack games that have them?
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| Rule | Game | Play At | Rule Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Early Surrender | Ezugi Seven Seat Live Blackjack | Winz | Can get 50% of stake back even before dealer peeks for Blackjack. |
| Late Surrender | Visionary iGaming Blackjack HD | DublinBet | Can get 50% of stake back, but will lose to dealers Blackjack |
| Early Payout | Visionary iGaming | DublinBet | Can get percentage of your initial stake back based on quality of hand. |
| CashBack | Playtech Cashback Blackjack | Bet365 | Can get percentage of your initial stake back based on quality of hand. |
| Cash Out | Evolution Classic & Speed | Playojo | Can get percentage of your initial stake back based on quality of hand. |
You can surrender your hand before you draw a third card. You won’t be able to surrender before the dealer gets Blackjack. When used properly, Late Surrender is another tool in your arsenal that reduces the house edge – by about 0.08%.
Visionary iGaming Blackjack HD and BetConstruct Blackjack have Late Surrender. You’ll find these two games at DublinBet and VBet casinos, respectively.
You can surrender your hand before you draw a third card. Crucially, you can surrender before the dealer peehttp://load.php?c=vbetks for Blackjack if the dealer shows an Ace. This favourable rule reduces the house edge by as much as 0.63% as it protects you against dealer Blackjack.
Ezugi Seven Seat Live Blackjack has Early Surrender, which you can play at Winz.io casino.
Early Payout is a proprietary feature by Visionary iGaming used in its blackjack games. Depending on your and the dealer’s hand quality, you will be offered a percentage of your initial stake.
You’ll find the feature in Visionary iGaming blackjack game that you can play at DublinBet casino.
Cash Out is the name for a proprietary feature by Evolution that is essentially the same as Early Payout, with some minor differences in actual payouts.
You are also offered a percentage of your initial stake depending on your mathematical chances to win the hand.
You’ll find the feature at select Evolution Classic and Speed Blackjack tables at Playojo Casino, among other Evolution casinos.
Cashback Blackjack is Playtech’s version in Royale Cashback Blackjack and Italian Cashback Blackjack.
The math model and payouts offered are the same in both games.
You’ll find Royale Cashback Blackjack at Leo Vegas casino.
| Dealer | Hand | bet | Offer | +/- | Best EV Play |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| T | 9 7 | 1.00 | 0.42 | -0.58 | -0.54 Stand |
| T | T T | 1.00 | 1.40 | +0.40 | +0.56 Stand |
On my first hand, I got a nine and a seven against the dealer’s ten and an early payout offer of £0.42.
My hand is poor. However, if I accepted the offer, I’d lose 0.58 units. If I decided to Stand, I’d expect to lose 0.54 units in the long run. If I could choose to Surrender, I’d lose 0.50 units because I’d get half of my stake back.
In a more favourable situation, where my 20 is up against the dealer’s 10, I get an early payout offer of £1.40. However, that’s less than I’d get on average in the long run, +0.56 units or £1.56.
Visionary iGaming was the first to have this feature in 2016. Playtech and Evolution picked up on its popularity in 2021 and 2022, respectively. It’s rare for Evolution to copy someone else; it’s usually the other way around!
In Early Payout, you can play up to three hands simultaneously and be offered a separate Early Payout value for each.
As rudimentary as this game’s visuals are, I like it. I certainly have plenty of reasons to – this table allows Double Down After Split, which is one of the most favourable table rules you can get.
Also consider Blackjack HD, the traditional 7-seat game with Surrender. This table has DDAS and Bet Behind, so you can play even without a seat.
Table limits are from 50p to £2500.
| Dealer | Hand | bet | Offer | +/- | Best EV Play |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | 3 4 | 1.00 | 1.01 | +0.01 | +0.03 Hit |
| T | T 9 | 1.00 | 0.95 | -0.05 | +0.07 Stand |
| 7 | 3 5 | 1.00 | 1.06 | +0.06 | +0.08 Hit |
I played three hands at Evolution Classic Blackjack with Cashout. I was pleasantly surprised not only by the fairness of the payouts but also by the fact that you can cash out even later in the game when you have more than two cards.
You can use Evolution Cashout as an instant blackjack hand calculator. If you get offered more than your initial bet, you know your EV is positive and that you should Stand or Hit.
Blackjack Cash Out, found in select Evolution blackjack games since Q4 2022, is somewhat similar to the cash-out feature in sports betting. It is a money-maker for the sportsbooks as mainstream gamblers frequently misuse it. They cash out in panic and, therefore, remove themselves from a position where they still have a chance to win.
Whenever you need to decide to Hit, Stand, or Split, you’ll also see a tempting Cash Out amount you can get if you withdraw from the hand.
The feature is available on the Classic and Speed Blackjack tables but not on all of them, so if you want to find Cash Out, you’ll likely have to click around a bit.
Table limits are from £5 to £10,000.
| Dealer | Hand | bet | Offer | +/- | Best EV Play |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | 4 7 | 1.00 | 1.11 | +0.11 | +0.11 Hit |
| 9 | 5 6 | 1.00 | 1.08 | +0.08 | +0.16 Hit |
| T | 9 T | 1.00 | 0.96 | +0.04 | +0.07 Hit |
I played Playtech’s Royale Cashback Blackjack and initially got excellent cards!
I got a hard eleven against the dealer’s Ace and was offered £1.11 on a £1 bet. That immediately seemed like a good deal, and a quick check of my blackjack hand calculator confirmed it.
The best EV play is Hit (you should Double, but it’s the same play), as it has an EV of +0.106. And Playtech is offering me +0.11!
The second hand wasn’t as rewarding, I was offered a profit of £0.08 whereas in the long run my profit would average £0.16 if I chose to Hit.
And then, in the Italian Cashback Blackjack, which uses the same payouts as the Royale Cashback, I got offered a loss of -0.04 units on a hand with a positive EV of +0.07.
Playtech has two Cashback games.
The first one was the Italian Cashback Blackjack, which initially catered to the Italian market and later evolved into Royale Cashback Blackjack for everyone else. I like Royale Cashback because sometimes you get really good offers, as in my example above.
Table limits are from £5 to £10,000.
Now, you must be asking yourself the most logical question: Do these three features offer better or worse payouts than the classic choice, Surrender?
Based on my playing experience and circumstantial evidence, the hands you should surrender will pay better if you played Surrender Blackjack.
When you get offered a payout of 0.21 for a hand here, you’ll learn to appreciate the 0.50 that Surrender gives you.
Blackjack Surrender – Guide for Limiting Your Losses Like a Pro
You can easily make sense of early payout features in blackjack if you think like a Texas Hold’em Poker player and get one thing straight:
If the money offered to withdraw from the hand is more than you expect to win on average, if you stay in the hand, you should always withdraw.
For example, if you’re in a situation where you’ll lose exactly 50% of the time but the offer is 51p to leave your £1 hand, then it’s a good decision.
Likewise, taking the offer is a bad decision if you’re expected to lose 40% of the time, but the offer is 35p.
That’s the one thing you should care about. Now, let’s dig a bit deeper.
Almost exclusively, you should consider early payout features only when you’re in an unfavourable position. Never abandon positions from which you’re likely to win the hand. All early payout features will probably offer you less money than you’d get for sticking with your hand.
All early payout features are there because the casino hopes you’ll underestimate your hand and take a bad cash-out deal.
Statistically, you should never take an early payout.
However, in the real world, blackjack players vary their bets. They go on a Martingale rampage, doubling their bets after a loss. If you have a huge bet, you might take an early payout offer for a winning hand, as it’s a no-risk option. You’re willing to give away some of the profits in return for a sure win.
That’s a legit thing to do.
Knowing exactly when to cash out and when to stick with your hand is a pro thing that takes a lot of experience and quick math in your head, possibly aided by some strategy tables you draw up. After all, you only have a few seconds to make the decision!
To make the correct Early Payout or cash-out decision, you must first know the odds of winning or losing your hand.
That’s why it’s easier with Surrender. You can memorize the correct strategy because the payout offer is always the same. Here, it varies.
As a general rule of thumb, I’d advise sticking to the same surrender formula and becoming proficient in using Surrender to your advantage.
After surrendering several hundred hands and making the correct decision, you may have a better feel for what Early Payout and Cashout are offering you.
The best thing about early payout blackjack games is that you can use the amount offered as a learning tool or a cheat sheet that immediately tells you your odds of winning the hand.
Based on that, make your hit-or-stand decision.
It’s a known fact that the Cash Out feature in sports betting is a cash cow for bookmakers—the punters keep misusing it.
They win less when they win because they’ve cashed out early to cement their winnings and willingly abandon positions perceived as losing ones, even though many of these positions end up as winners.
A pair of 8s can still beat the dealer’s Ace more often than you think. The only sure way to lose that hand is to surrender it.
Make no mistake about it: Blackjack Early Payout, Cashback, and Cash Out are incredibly difficult to master. They aren’t for the mediocre player who’s still learning the ropes; the player will lose money.
If you’re a newbie, I’d use the amounts offered by early payout games as an easy learning tool that tells you which hand is good.
It’s like you have your own instant blackjack hand probability calculator!
The next level would be mastering the Surrender strategy.
Given an easy pivot point of 1/2 of your stake back, you can perfect your decision-making regarding which hands to surrender and which should not be.
Then, you can move onto Early Payout, Cashback and Cash Out games and see how their payouts compare.
After a lot of experience, you’ll probably find that one of the three options offers better payouts.
My guess would be that Cashback is best, as you can get good deals, and that Evolution Cash Out has the best math model, always giving you the exact same loss compared to your hand’s actual EV.
I suspect you’ll be going back to Surrender as the superior feature that offers better payouts. You want to take the 50% payout whenever your hand is expected to win less than 50% of the time.
Neil Walker
I’m Neil Walker, and I created this site to provide information on everything related to Live Dealer Games. I do extensive research, play and test all the games, and author all the content. I’ve appeared in the media and presented at conferences—you can read more about me on my About Page. I’ve been doing this full-time since 2014, and I am trusted for my straightforward reviews and honest opinions.
Where you can find me:
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