Guide to Slot Bonus Features
Slots with bonus features are some of the most sought-after games amongst players because they mix up the gameplay. These bonuses come in many flavours though the most common ones you’ll come across are free spins, multipliers, jackpots, and re-spins.
These bonuses extend the basic slot machine features and are triggered inside the game itself, making them separate from any bonuses you may be awarded as part of a promotion.
The exact method of unlocking them varies from game to game but usually involves landing certain symbols on the reels in the base game.
If you’re a player who seeks out novelty from your slots, you’re in luck. The entire online casino industry is continually innovating in a quest to make their games stand out and to offer players something new and fresh that they’ll love.
Slot games bonus features are a great way to do this as they create new and unique mechanics that go beyond the standard features of the base game.
Types of Bonus Features to Trigger
Each slot game has its own distinct combination of bonus features, the most common of these mechanics can be found below.
- Free Spins: Free spins are the most common of bonus slot machine features. When triggered, they grant you a certain number of spins of the reels for free. These spins might use the same reels as all other spins or they may feature different symbols and/or combine with other bonus features to mix up the gameplay.
- Multipliers: Multipliers are a bonus feature that award you a payout proportionate to your wager. For example, a 2x multiplier will return £2 on a £1 wager whilst 5x would yield £5. Games that include this mechanic will usually offer ways to unlock different sizes of multipliers and combine them together.
- Jackpots: Jackpots are a common slot game bonus feature that come in many different sizes. Some slot games offer their own in-game jackpots, whilst others are included in the MGM Millions eligible slots that grow progressively bigger until a player triggers it.
- Re-Spins: Re-spins are a bonus that let you re-spin a specific reel in the hopes of landing different symbols on the paylines to unlock a payout.
- Pick‘em: Pick’em bonuses work a little differently across games but they all follow the same basic principle of presenting several options with a prize assigned to each one. Your task is to pick one, with the corresponding payout being awarded afterwards.
- Special Wilds: Wild symbols can serve several functions in a slot game, including substituting for another symbol on a payline or by unlocking a bonus round. Some wilds will expand to fill an entire reel, making it easier to pick up wins, especially if they lock into place over multiple spins.
- Cascading Reels: Cascading, tumbling, or avalanche reels can be used in the base game or a bonus feature, replacing the traditional spin mechanic with one where the symbols fall from the top of the screen. Instead of matching symbols on a payline, you need to make groups of them together. Once you get a match, they explode, making way for more to fall from the top, creating additional opportunities to win.
- Gamble: The gamble feature gives you the opportunity to increase your winnings, often by a multiple of two or three, but with the chance that you’ll also lose them.
- Giant Symbols: Giant or Colossal Symbols are symbols that take up more than one space on a reel, often spanning multiple reels, rather than just several rows on a single reel. Common giant symbols can be 2x2, 3x3, and 4x4.
In-Game Free Spins - What’s the Big Deal?
Free spins are, by far, the most common and most popular bonus feature in slot games. There are several reasons for this, including the fact that they’re simple to implement.
Getting to spin the reels for free just involves creating a function in the game’s code that triggers a number of spins without any additional wagers. They use the same graphics (more or less) and underlying mechanics, making them an easy addition to any slot game.
Everyone loves getting something for free, so it’s easy to see why players are big fans of free spins. They give you more opportunities to win and the chance to make your bankroll stretch further.
This universal popularity and simple implementation means you can find free spins in almost every slot, even ones that don’t have many augmentations to the base game.
Not all free spins are the same, they can vary greatly between games. They may also be different within a single slot game as some developers include multiple free spin bonus features, each with a different name and trigger.
The number of free spins you receive, the number of reels, the value of symbols, whether there are expanding reels or giant symbols, the inclusion of wilds, multipliers, the ability to unlock additional free spins, and re-spin options all affect how attractive free spins are to players.
How you trigger free spins varies from game to game, but it usually involves landing a certain number of a particular symbol on the reels. Scatter and wilds are the most common triggers, but games with several bonus features may create special symbols specifically for each bonus.
What Makes a Bonus Feature Good?
There’s no definitive answer as to what a ‘good’ slot game bonus feature is as it depends on your own preferences. However, there are some key factors that you’ll want to consider when browsing options.
Firstly, it’s important to be able to understand the bonus. One of the reasons free spins are so popular is that they’re easy to understand, so it’s logical that complicated bonus features are not as attractive. Most games do make their bonuses easy to work out and provide clear instructions to help you understand the rules.
Another key thing to consider is how often does the bonus feature(s) trigger? A bonus is no good if you never get to play it, so this is something to examine. Thankfully, most games aren’t stingy with triggering bonuses, but the frequency does vary from slot to slot, so pick games that trigger as often as you like them to.
Connected to this is what is required for the bonus feature to trigger. It’s usually landing certain symbols on the reels but it can vary. That said, if a slot is designed to trigger bonuses regularly, the mechanism for doing so will be made easy to obtain.
Once you get into the bonus feature, how much you can win can vary from just a few quid to hundreds of multiples of your wager. Of course, the latter occurs much less frequently, even if it’s possible so you definitely shouldn’t bank on it. However, if a bigger win potential is attractive to you, then be on the lookout for slots that offer this.
What Happened to Bonus Buy in the UK?
If you’ve been playing slots for a while, you may remember a feature called Bonus Buy, which, as the name suggests, allowed you to purchase a bonus feature instead of waiting to trigger it in the base game.
Thanks to the robust rules set by the Gambling Commission in Great Britain that are designed to protect players and promote responsible gaming, Bonus Buy has been banned since 2019.
It’s one of the many measures designed to safeguard vulnerable players, alongside self-exclusion, limits, and reality checks.
This doesn’t mean you can’t play these bonuses though, you just can’t pay extra money to trigger them.
How to Find Slot Machines With Bonus Features
BetMGM makes it easy for you to find slot games with bonus features. On each game’s individual page, you’ll find a table with key information about the slot, including whether it is eligible for MGM Millions.
Even more information about bonuses and how they are triggered is available inside the game itself. You can access this without placing a bet or staking money, simply click on the gold Play button and the game will usually show the paytable, symbols, and bonus features after it has loaded.
When comparing games, factor in the volatility and variance, the RTP, maximum payout, and whether there are jackpots, in addition to what bonus features are included as this will make for all-round better slot playing.