Beating Blackjack

Over the summer of 2020, a friend asked me what I knew about blackjack.

The answer was pretty simply: nothing. I hadn’t ever played, and didn’t even know the rules. I was aware that some people had figured out how to make money off the game, but figured that it wasn’t something that any person could pick up. I started to do some research, and eventually found myself down a rabbit hole of expected value, basic strategy charts, and card counting strategies. Once I emerged nearly 200 hours later, I was confident that I was playing a winning game.

This isn’t a page that will teach you how to beat blackjack- there are many resources online that can teach you how to do that. However, while I was studying I found that it was difficult to find consistent information on how to bet-spread effectively as an advantaged player. Since I’m a software engineer, I figured I’d take a shot at writing some simple software to solve the issue. I roped in a friend from school (different friend than the one that got me started), and we developed a Java application to help solve our problem.

This simulator will count and play blackjack optimally (Hi-Lo, Illustrious 18, Fab 4) while playing according to the specified bet spread. The user can input table rules, bankroll, desired spread, number of hours to play, and other factors that influence the overall result of long term blackjack play.

Here’s a link to the github repo: https://github.com/andygallup/betspread-sim