Best Slot Providers

A lot of players underestimate the value of software providers at online casinos. In reality the companies that power the games give the casino its strength. You can think of them as supplements that make the casino bigger and more attractive. The more games the casino has in its offer the bigger number of players it can attract.

This is why many online casinos are powered by the best slot providers in the industry, along with a number of smaller companies. This creates a versatile and quality games offer, meeting the needs of all players. In this article we will explain what they are, which are the best ones and how to evaluate each one.

Which Are The Top Slot and Casino Providers?

For a long time, the best online casino software providers were Microgaming and Playtech. But things change fast in the online gambling industry and we saw Net Entertainment rise to the top of the industry in recent years. The top providers are a great indicator that you are playing at a safe online casino. They want to offer the best for their players and will do everything they can to keep them happy.

Best Providers For Slots

There are a lot of slot game software providers in the industry today. Some are considered to be the leaders, while some operate on the outskirts of the online gambling industry. Below is a list of all providers that can be found at the top online casinos.

Novomatic

Novomatic is a popular brand from Austria, whose origins date back to the 1980’s. They are primarily a land based casino provider and their games can be found across Admiral casinos all over Europe. For many hardcore gamblers, the Novomatic slots are simply the best you can play. Most of them are high variance games with the potential for producing massive payouts. Many Novomatic slots have a legendary status among players, with the most popular ones being Sizzling Hot, Book of Ra, and Lord of the Ocean.

But despite their wide presence in the land-based gambling sector, Novomatic has a small impact when it comes to online gambling. The company has a different approach than other providers when it comes to online casinos. They decided to buy already existing online gambling companies and offer their games through them. So today if you want to play the Novomatic slots you can find them mostly under the Green Tube platform and a few other smaller companies.

Netent

Today NetEnt is the absolute leader when it comes to slot providers casino games. But this wasn’t always the case. The company was founded back in 1996 and at the time, in addition to creating casino games, they also ran a number of NetEnt slot sites of their own. But their early games simply didn’t have the appeal like their competitors. The visual details were basic, along with the animations, and the payouts they would produce were not too attractive.

But the company decided to make major changes in the way they ran things. They sold all of their online casinos and focused only on creating top slot games. When they introduced their new collection of slots it spread like wildfire across the industry. Their games had outstanding visual details, interesting game play and the potential for massive payouts. Slots like Gonzo’s Quest, Starburst, Dead or Alive, Jack and the Beanstalk, The Wish Master and many more gained legendary status and are still very popular even today. NetEnt continues to create top of the line video slots even today and still manages to dominate the world gambling scene. Also, Netent is a key partner with many new mega reel sites.

Microgaming

Microgaming is a name which needs no introduction among the online casino software providers. They date back to 1994 and are considered to be the founders of the online gambling industry. Their games are incredibly popular even today, with a massive number of daily players across Microgaming casinos. Their Viper download platform was considered to be the best casino solution for a long time among online players.

The company also helped form eCOGRA. This is the most reputable independent testing agency in the world, which makes sure that the payouts on the games are within the given parameters. Today we can freely say that Microgaming comes second from all software providers, after NetEnt. The company simply couldn’t match what NetEnt has to offer, even though they are working hard to make it happen. Microgaming keeps on releasing new and exciting slots and manages to attract many players to their reels on a daily basis.

Playtech

Playtech came online back in 1999. The company was founded by Teddy Sagi, with headquarters in Tartu, Estonia. From the very start Playtech proved to be a unique software provider. Their slots have an interesting appearance, with many of them adopting a comic like design. They are still one of the few software providers who offer a download platform and for many players it’s the best solution there is.

Over the years the company released a massive number of slots. There are many popular games in their portfolio, but the most popular ones of all times were without a doubt the Marvel Jackpots. Today these games are replaced by the Age of the Gods Jackpots, since Marvel was acquired by Walt Disney and they didn’t want anything to do with gambling. Playtech is best known for their progressive jackpot slots, like Jackpot Giant and Gladiator Jackpot. These slots can award multimillion payouts in one lucky spin, so it’s no wonder why they attract thousands of players to their reels.

Up-and-Coming Slot Providers

The online gambling industry is always changing and we can see a massive number of smaller providers fighting their way to get a piece of the pie. Most of them fail and operate on the outskirts, but a handful are growing in popularity. Here are some of the top new online slot providers that are making a big splash across the industry.

Big Time Gaming

Big Time Gaming was founded in 2011. Their founder and CEO is Nic Robinson and he already had years of valuable experience in the business. The late start meant that the leading providers in the industry had over a decade of head start over Big Time Gaming. It would be a mammoth task for this company to rise in popularity and become a notable name in the industry. But their founder didn’t give up on his ambition.

He managed to bring something new to the industry with the Big Time Gaming slots. Most of their games have a robust appearance, but come with an interesting game play and even more interesting bonus features. The most notable detail about their games is that most of them offer the option to buy the feature, instead of triggering it via base play. In most of their slots the RTP value actually increases by using the Buy Option, bringing more profit to the player in the long run. This made Big Time Gaming slots popular among players and today the company can be easily placed among the top new online slot providers in the industry.

Red Tiger

Red Tiger is one of the new casino providers that exploded in popularity in a very short time. They were founded in 2014 and slowly started to spread across online casinos. Their games are unusual and bring something new to the market, so they managed to acquire a big number of daily players. This was noticed by the leading software providers and NetEnt was first to make their move. They acquired the company, so today the Red Tiger slots can be found alongside the NetEnt games.

Without a doubt the most attractive detail about the Red Tiger Slots is the daily jackpot feature. This feature is available to most of their games, but they left the option for the operator to choose whether the jackpot feature should be available or not. The mechanism is pretty simple. The jackpot is filled during the day and it must fall within 24 hours. The prizes are usually smaller in size, but enough to attract many daily players to their reels.

Play’n Go

Play’n Go was founded in 1997 and its headquarters are in Växjö, Sweden. Today the company also has offices in the UK, Malta, Hungary and the Philippines. From the very start Play’n Go was a B2C provider. This means that they don’t operate any casinos of their own. Over the years Play’n Go managed to grow to a reputable software provider with a massive offer of casino games under their belt.

Their games are known to have attractive visual details, an interesting game play and innovative bonus features. One of their most successful slots so far is without a doubt Book of Dead. This slot alone boosted the popularity of this provider and their games, leading more casinos to add the Play’n Go slots in their portfolio. Most of their games come with a top payout of 5,000 times the total stake per spin, which is reason enough for many players to visit the reels chasing the top payout.

Live Casino Providers

When it comes to live casino software providers the leader and founder is without a doubt Evolution Gaming. But since the inception of this software many more providers launched live games of their own, making up for fierce competition in this sector as well. Here are some of the most popular ones in the industry at the moment.

Evolution Gaming

Evolution Gaming entered the gambling scene in 2006. Compared to the leading software providers in the industry this is pretty late, so the company had to bring something new to the table. Instead of focusing on slots like all other providers Evolution Gaming decided to create live casino games. They were the first among the live casino software providers to launch their software and they remain leaders in this field even today.

For their software to work as they planned the company had to build a live casino floor. The tables were served by professional dealers and the game play was streamed to the players screen in HD quality. The Evolution Gaming software was an instant hit. A massive number of players flocked to the tables, leaving the electronic table game variants empty. Even today when it comes to playing table games, the live casino and Evolution Gaming are the primary choice for a big number of players.

Playtech Live Casino

The Playtech live studio was built as a direct competitor to the live games from Evolution Gaming. Their main studio is located in Riga, Latvia, but they also have studios in several other countries, including Philippines, Romania, Spain and Belgium. Their new studio went live in 2017 and has been operating seamlessly ever since. The live games from Playtech are versatile and players can enjoy Live roulette, Live Blackjack, Live Baccarat, Spin and Win, Hi Lo, 3 Card Brag, Casino Hold’em, Dragon Tiger, Sic Bo, Deal or no Deal. Many of their tables are branded and they even include jackpots to some games, like Age of the Gods Roulette.

The company continues to be a great innovator in this sector and are always working to improve their live casino software. The dealers that serve the tables are encouraged to be extra chatty and interact with the players. This creates a more relaxed gaming environment, keeping the player longer at the tables. They also had a lot of work done in the mobile interface of the live casino software.

Ezugi

The Ezugi name is certainly not as popular as Microgaming or NetEnt, but they are definitely a big provider when it comes to live casino games. The company was founded in 2013 by Kfir Kugler. Today the company founder acts as their Chief Executive Officer. From the very start Ezugi was focused on creating live casino games. Their goal was to create a simple and friendly interface, while keeping the top notch quality of their games. They certainly managed to do this and today Ezugi is a serious contender when it comes to online roulette software providers.

In addition to roulette the company has a full plethora of other live games. Their Live Dealer Blackjack is known to be very exciting with fast game play. If you’re a poker fan you can test your skills on the Ezugi Caribbean Stud Poker. If you want to try other Blackjack variants we can strongly recommend the Ezugi 21 + 3 Blackjack variant.

Pragmatic Play

Pragmatic Play is a relatively young company founded in 2015, with headquarters in Malta. But the tradition behind this company is much longer. They acquired the notorious Top Game Software and rebranded the company from the core. This gave them the initial push they needed to make their presence known in the online gambling world. Today the Pragmatic Play games can be found at a big number of reputable online casinos and is a key player on Jumpman Casinos.

When it comes to their live games their offer is still limited. Still this is not a surprise as their live casino was launched in April 2019. The games were licensed in Romania and their live games studio is situated in Bucharest. The first step to the live casino software by Pragmatic Play was to acquire Extreme Live Gaming. They rebranded and redesigned their games in the HTML5 protocol, offering a complete live casino solution. Today the Pragmatic Play live games are quite popular among players, bringing in a big number of customers on a daily basis.

Microgaming

In addition to slots and other casino games Microgaming introduced Live Games in their portfolio back in 2006. They had to keep up with the competition in this sector and their live casino was launched to go heads on with the ones from Evolution Gaming and Net Entertainment. The casino games Microgaming offers are pretty standard, but they do have one detail that gives them an edge over the rest of the providers. That detail is the Playboy Live Dealer Casino.

Inspired by the Playboy empire by Hugh Hefner Microgaming launched their branded live Playboy casino in 2013. The games here are pretty much standard, with the only difference being that the croupiers are wearing recognizable Playboy costumes. The casino floor is elegantly designed featuring dominant red and black colors. The Playboy casino is the perfect place to unwind and play in a relaxing and different atmosphere than at standard live casinos.

How to Evaluate a casino provider?

Pretty much any company can create casino games. But the best gambling software providers offer much more than the rest and that’s why they are leaders in this field. Below we will mention the most important details every leading provider has and why they are so important.

Number of games

The number of casino games is without a doubt important when it comes to online slot providers. If a company has only 5 games in their offer, the chances are they won’t make a big impact in the industry and bring in a big number of daily players. But in addition to the quantity the providers also need to make sure that their games are of high quality and original. We can see that today some providers simply copy the top slots from the leading providers. Still this doesn’t make a difference since everyone wants to play the original, instead of some cheap copy. This is why the leading providers focus on creating quality games, which are original, attracting many players to their reels.

RTP Fairness and security

Before a game is released it must go through rigorous testing. This is done to prove that the game payouts are fair and random. This way the player is certain that winning or losing depends solely on his luck, rather than on some other factor. Many casinos also employ the services of independent testing agencies to prove that their games are fair. The job of these agencies is to test the games on a monthly basis and compare their results to the promoted RTP value of the game. RTP fairness is important since players can plan their game play based on the RTP value of the slot. The higher the RTP value is the better your chances are to make a profit on the game in the long run.

Mobile and tablet compatibility

Today pretty much all online slot providers and especially new slot providers focus on mobile and tablet compatibility. This is to be expected as today over half of the transactions made across online casinos are done by mobile. With a rise in mobile gaming, which is expected to rise even more, slot providers invest a lot of resources to make their games mobile ready.

A well designed slot with the HTML5 protocol will automatically fit the screen of your mobile device or tablet, resulting in an enjoyable game play. If the games face glitches in mobile play the chances are that the player will simply move on to some other game or visit the games from another provider altogether. In the long run this means that the provider will lose revenue and no company wants that.

Aesthetics

NetEnt proved that it takes a lot more than to just create a slot game and launch it on the market to attract players to their reels. They were the first company that saw the importance of aesthetics when creating slot games. When they launched their new games collection players found aesthetically designed slots with top of the line animations. This was proven to be a winning combination and was the main reason why the NetEnt slots became so popular among online players. The same recipe works today and is adopted by almost all new providers. The new slots come with top notch visual details catching the eye of players and luring them to spin the reels.

Innovative Features

All of the above about slots can easily be disregarded if the slot doesn’t have an innovative and attractive bonus feature. In the past most slots came with a free spins bonus where the payouts were tripled in size. But today players want to see much more than one boring bonus round. This is why software providers are always coming up with new and innovative features. We already saw slots using a Rolling Reels design and progressive win multipliers. We also have a chance to play Mega Ways slots or try our luck on the Cluster Pays slots. Some of the biggest payouts come on slot machines where the bonus round consists of Wild Reels or Sticky Wilds. What the future brings in terms of features on slots remains to be seen.

Mobile Gaming & Slot Providers

That’s right, mobile gaming today is of crucial importance to every online casino. In the past players preferred to play the casino games by using the download or instant play platform, but today mobile gaming is on the rise. The revenue generated from mobile gaming is substantial and it’s only predicted to grow in the future. This is due to the easy availability of smartphones and tablets, as well as high speed mobile internet. Thanks to them players can now access their favorite casino games from virtually any location and at any time. This is why it’s very important for software providers today to keep up with the latest world trends and create games that are mobile ready.

Most of the providers today design their games with the HTML5 protocol. By itself it allows for the games to be mobile ready. They will automatically expand to cover in full the screen of your mobile device. But some providers that are focused on mobile gaming take things one step further. A perfect example for this is Elk Studios. They are a small provider with a modest slots portfolio. But their games are primarily designed to run on a mobile device, rather than on a desktop computer. This makes them perfect for playing from smartphones or tablets. Many other new providers follow their example and focus their slots on mobile gaming.

In Conclusion

We hope that we managed to help you better understand how software providers work and what their role is at online casinos. You can now see that a casino is nothing with a good collection of casino games. This is why the leading operators can have thousands of casino games on offer. Some casinos are powered by over 100 different software providers. They take the most popular titles from each one to cater to the needs of every player.

The math is simple. The more games you can find at one casino the smaller the chances are that you will move to another one. Every reputable online casino today aims to attract and keep as many players as possible, resulting in a positive revenue in the long run. This is why more new software providers will rise in the future, hoping to find their place at online casinos.