Baccarat is a casino card game that is popular around the world. It was a favorite of emperors and aristocrats in medieval Italy, and today it’s played in casinos and online. Its popularity has generated variations and side bets. It’s also featured in many James Bond movies. Baccarat is an easy-to-play game that maintains a low house edge and offers good payouts.
The game is played by betting on either the Banker hand, the Player hand, or a tie. Players place their chips on the appropriate betting option and wait for the dealer to signal that they can begin. After placing their bets, the dealer deals two cards each to the Banker and Player hands. A third card may be drawn if the total of the first two cards is not 8 or 9. The winning hand is whichever one is closest to nine points. If the game ends in a tie, bettors can choose to accept or decline a third card for one of the hands.
Before playing baccarat, you should familiarize yourself with the rules and payouts of the game. To do this, find a baccarat table on the casino floor and take an empty seat. If the table is full, wait until another round is completed before you play. You’ll need to know the different bets and the maximum payout for each one. Depending on the type of game, you can bet as little as $0.25 or as much as $200.
Once you have your seat, the dealer will ask if you want to “go bank” or if you would like to play against the Banker. If you choose to go bank, the dealer will set an initial bet amount and the other players can add their own bets to this amount in counterclockwise order. If you win, the winnings are paid out and any bets lost are collected. The casino then takes a 5% commission on any winning Banker bets, which is tracked in the “banker’s commission” box.
In baccarat, the maximum value for a hand is nine. The only exception is when a hand contains an ace, which is worth one point. All other cards are worth their face value, except for the ten, jack, queen, or king, which are valued at zero. If a hand’s total goes above 10, then it must subtract 10 from the sum to determine its new value.
Unlike blackjack, baccarat has no busting rule. If a hand’s total is over nine, the rightmost digit is used as its value. For example, an eight and a seven make a fifteen, so the ten is dropped. In this way, no player ever loses in baccarat. However, if the total is below nine, then the hand must add a zero to its total. This makes it easy for new players to understand the rules of baccarat.