Online casino reviews
The CashtoCode Infoportal’s main goal is to bring you the best partners in each category, online casinos being one of the bigger ones. Here we explain how we do so consistently with Irish online casinos. This might be too much information to take in – but if you are curious – we show you how we value and compare the tiniest of detail.
All CashtoCode casino reviews in Ireland
These are all CashtoCode online casino reviews currently available. As our network grows larger, we are going to add more making sure they are tested and compared to rate them properly.
How we review online casinos in Ireland?
We do reviews of Irish online casinos only. Everything we include in the casino reviews is relevant to Irish players and Irish players only. In addition, our prime objective is to review and compare all CashtoCode online casinos first before we move to a new territory.
The review process has several steps, and all reviews start with the registration.
Registration
Most online casinos have rather easy to sign up procedures requiring only the most basic details. To deposit, very few casinos ask for KYC verification documents. We recommend to always follow through the KYC before submitting withdrawal requests. You might as well do the KYC just before you deposit or right after the deposit. Once you start playing, and you claim a bonus, more things can go wrong with the documentation that can be requested later.
We give points to casinos that allow players to submit KYC documents whenever they want, without the help of customer support. Simple, logical and easy to understand registration process isn’t too much to ask for.
Security check
There are four things we look for as part of the security check. These include the:
- Casino licence – although most provinces don’t recognize them, they are an indicator of trust and security. A Curacao casino licence is the bare minimum. An MGA licence is considered more trusted due to better transparency and actions they’ve taken in the past against money laundering and poor player protection practices.
- Company behind the brand – just in case the operator is trying to expand their network under a different licence. This is particularly useful with new casino brands that have just gone online.
- Affiliate company promoting the brand – in the past, there have been casinos that were run by the same people under a different company and a different licence but promoted by the same affiliate company. If this is the case, we then dig deeper and try to establish the connection between the new casino and the original owner who is trying to stay anonymous.
- Casino games – as it’s a security matter, we check the authenticity of the games as part of the security check, not the game offer evaluation. While very rare, we’ve seen in the past how a handful of casinos offered pirated casino games that could’ve easily been rigged.
With all these checks passed, casinos can get exposure at the CashtoCode Infoportal. You can find reviews of all CashtoCode casinos here, but only the legit ones get a spot in lists. The ones which have had malicious intents or have shown predatory actions are listed in the not recommended casinos list. We still haven’t encountered any so far, at least none bearing the logo of CashtoCode in Ireland.
Game offer analysis
As the games’ integrity is checked already, we then jump to the casino lobby and what features are available to help with navigation.
Number of games
The fact that quantity brings quality is apparent. Almost all casinos offer more than 1,500 games, most of which are slot games. Therefore, the game count is relevant, but not to everybody. We count all the games and how many are available of each type. Unless all game types are well covered, casinos can’t get top marks. In general, anything above the 1,000-game threshold is considered acceptable.
If you happen to prefer table and card games, compare the table and card game metrics or do so for with the live dealer information.
There are a few casinos that have decided to offer as many games as possible, to eventually be labelled the casinos with all casino games currently available. There is a point beyond which adding more games has a diminishing effect.
Game studios
Not all online casino game studios are of the same quality. There are dozens of studios that simply change the skin of the game and come up with a new name and logo. This is the lower tier of games.
Then there are those that produce games that are unique, with a unique game engine, one of a kind gameplay and designs. This is where the bulk of software providers fit. This is the mid tier studios. They have the fewest games and are not that popular. This is where providers like Swintt, Red Tiger Gaming and Big Time Gaming fit.
Lastly, there’s ones that are a mix of the two. Basically, they design several bonus games and mechanics and then scale them up. These are the studios that are most popular like NetEnt, Microgaming, Playtech, Pragmatic Play, Betsoft Gaming and Nolimit City fall in.
We’re quite familiar with their capabilities. In general, a more diverse portfolio with more studios offers a better experience. However, once we reach more than 50 providers, the experience improves marginally with every extra provider.
Filters
How you interact with the game library is super important, especially if you play on your smartphone. If you have a favourite game that you play most of the time this part of the review process doesn’t concern you. However, if are a player who likes to explore new content regularly, you want a casino that excels in this department.
Basic level, widely available but few casinos do it right. Usually they miss progressive jackpot games, megaways, video poker and games labelled as “other”.
Most casinos offer filtering by game studio, and some even show the number of games per provider. This is something we like and encourage.
Some feature filters are available like Bonus Buy, Drops & Win and Instant Wins. Casinos can add additional filters like Avalanche, Rolling Reels, Cascading Wilds and Expanding Wilds among many others. Most of these are relevant to slot players.
Relevant to slot players only, but a filter that gives exposure to thousands of slot games that see no promotion.
New slots if not produced by a studio with a lot of exposure don’t get a chance unless displated in a “New slots” section. Filtering by launch date enables players to explore new content.
Then again desktop players who like to explore new content need access to game filters as well. They are not detrimental to most players, but the group that likes to play the latest slots or compare between games that have the same feature depends on these game filters.
Bonus offer and terms
All online casinos offer welcome bonuses, which is why it’s one of the mandatory sections must compare if you are a bonus player. The bonus amount is just one side of the coin. We check the bonus terms, such as the wagering requirement (WR), the bet limits and what games you can play to get a successful cashout.
Some bonuses end up being good only because of the low WR. This is why there’s a balance in our ratings between the bonus amount the associated bonus terms.
We like a bonus with a decent bonus amount and fair bonus terms. In addition, we praise casinos that are transparent and display the terms next to the offers.
We take away points of casinos that hide bonus terms or simply don’t want to disclose them.
Ongoing promotions
However, we also consider the ongoing promotions available to existing players and the VIP program. While separate, in most cases casinos treat them differently. Don’t expect to have any benefit from the VIP programs if you don’t play a lot. Playing a lot doesn’t always mean depositing a lot. Ongoing promotions are usually triggered with deposits.
Overall, these concern you if you either know which games to play and you play a lot, or you just deposit frequently.
Cashier test
This bit is straightforward. The more deposit options with all the terms made easily available bring more points. If a casino charges fees on deposits, run. The payment provider might charge you the regular fee, but the casino shouldn’t. We also look for the withdrawals policy and what terms are displayed. Then, we compare the public information with the details registered players see. Generally, they should be the same. Also, all details should be visible to visitors without registration. Casinos that do this get bonus points, though it’s rare.
The payout evaluation is based on the payment options and the pending period. We also assume you have verified your identity with the casino and have provided all required documents. Note, most issues players experience come from failure to provide documents as part of the KYC and address verification.
Support test
The support test is something that requires multiple checks as we like to see if all the agents are doing a good job. We like to message the customer service department via live chat to ask for some details that might be unavailable on the website. Usually, it’s related to the payout time or the KYC procedure.
Unfortunately, phone support is slowly moving out of online casinos. Only a few well-established casinos offer phone support. Email is the last resort is available at all online casinos. We think email support is suitable only for legal matters and sending documents if necessary. It’s not redundant but not something we encourage relying on. Live chat should always be the first resort.
Putting the pieces together
With all of these tested we proceed to putting the pieces together and trying to make sense of it. Our opinion is based on these criteria. By this point, the hard part is finished and we merely put our thoughts “on paper.” It takes between two and four days to get a casino review up. Some aspects just take longer due casinos refusing to provide information or data, so we must do the research ourselves.
What our ratings mean?
The casino review ratings are balanced. Casinos can win up to a certain number of points per category.
Games 0-25%
The games section includes the three categories that in any way are related to the quality and quantity of the games section. We give equal distribution to the quantity and the quality. We can’t quanity the filters as that won’t do them justice. However, make sure to stay as consistent as possible with the filter rating.
| Number of games | 0-10% | 1pt for every 250 games |
| Number of game studios | 0-10% | 1pt for every 10 game studios |
| Filters | 0-5% | Arbitrary |
Irish casinos excel in the first two categories, but most of them fail in the filters category. It’s seldom we find a casino with advanced filtering options or a search bar that enables players to search for games based on game features, providers and themes.
Trust 0-25%
Trust takes 25% of the overall rating, with the 25% split in 4 categories. We consider what kind of user reviews are available online and how long the casino has been online. We think these two are equally important.
The security part involves multiple checks including terms of use, language consistency, game integrity and support quality.
Lastly, depending on what licence the casino has they can get up to 9pts.
| User reviews | 0-5% | 1pt for every Trustpilot star |
| Tenure | 0-5% | 1pt for every two years |
| Security | 0-6% | Arbitrary |
| Licence | 5-9% | 5pts for Curacao, 9pts for MGA |
Irish casinos with CashtoCode are mostly licenced in Malta with a few of them still operating under a Curacao licence.
Bonus 0-20%
Bonuses are rated based on the terms and their size. The terms are more important as they essentially can make or break a bonus player’s experience. Access to the promotions is also important, probably more so than the welcome bonus. This is because welcome bonuses are ubiquitous whereas promotions are not. The VIP program gets up to 3 points only because most players will never see any benefit from it.
| Welcome bonus | 0-5% | 5pts if $1,000+ and free spins 4pts if $700 and free spins 3pts if $500+ 2pts if $200+ 1pts if under $200 |
| Bonus terms | 0-6% | 2pt for less than 40 x WR 2pt for 2+ types of games in WR cont pt for free spins in offer 1pt for $20 min qualifying deposit or less 1pt for $6.5 or more max bet limit |
| Promotions | 0-6% | 2pts for every weekly offer |
| VIP program | 0-3% | 3pts only if all details disclosed |
VIP programs are widely available and welcome bonuses are very generous. However, they are carefully balanced with proportionally higher WR. Promotions for existing players are also widely available, but players should not of the bonus term that prevents certain players from taking advantage of reload bonuses. This is in effect when the deposit to bonus ratio is under 50%. In simple words, you must have deposited more money than what you’ve claimed in bonuses.
Support 0-15%
Balancing the support rating was the trickiest as we couldn’t define what constitutes player support. In addition, not all casinos are consistent. We eventually came up with this. The biggest share comes from the live chat experience, followed by the registration and the quality of the FAQs.
| Live chat | 0-5% | Design, response time, availability, agent's experience |
| Email, phone support | 0-2% | 1pt for each if available |
| FAQs | 0-3% | 3pts if available |
| Registration process | 0-3% | 2pts for easy KYC 1pt for simple registration |
In Ireland, players can complete the KYC when they please. That is, they can submit the documents and wait for approval without talking to the customer support via live chat or sending them by email. Overall, the customer support experiences can vary greatly, depending on which customer service agent you talk to. This is one of the reasons why support is worth up to 15%.
Payments 0-15%
This is the simplest part of the rating system as it’s very straightforward and easy to relate to. The more payment methods are available, the more points the casino gets. We also think that the payout speed is just as important as the payment methods on offer.
| Depositing | 0-5% | 1pt for cards, e-wallet, CashtoCode, online banking, crypto |
| Withdrawing | 0-5% | 1pt for cards, crypto, ewallets, online banking, bank transfer |
| Payout speed | 0-5% | 5pts if under 24 hours 4pts if 48 hours 3pts if 72 hours 2pts for more than 96 |
Generally, there’s a good choice of both deposit and withdrawal methods. We want to make it clear that we give casinos 1pt for CashtoCode because it’s different than the rest of the lineup. It’s not an ewallet, not a card and for sure not online banking.
Reviewing principles
When we review online casinos we stick to the following basic principles. We try to stay:
- Unbiased – we make assumptions about brands and we have our personal favourites too. However, we always question everything, regardless of our personal opinions. Sometimes it’s not so easy to put our personal preferences aside, but we always try to do so.
- Impartial – whether it’s a new brand or one that’s been our partner for years, we like to treat both equally. There’s no other way to provide unbiased recommendations and casino reviews.
- Honest – the truth can sometimes be hard and not be in the casino’s best interest. We however vow to stay honest and tell the whole truth. It is the only way of knowing what you’re getting yourself into.
- Transparent – it’s also important to keep it real and let you know if we have failed in providing the full information. Sometimes it’s just impossible to get all the data and to carry out specific tests. We always provide full disclosure if this is the case.
- Thorough – it’s common to find similar casinos and it’s easy to jump into early conclusions. We thoroughly check all of the earlier mentioned areas to ensure how we rate the casino is consistent with the factual situation.
Combining our reviewing principles with a consistent rating system and process guarantees you always get what you expect from our online casino reviews. We focus only on the Canadian casino market, which means you everything you see here is relevant to you.
How to use our online casino reviews?
There are qualities that all players like and prioritize, like bigger bonuses, more casino games, better filters and attentive customer support. However, not all players are affected by these or will need them in the future. Most players won’t need customer support for legit reasons. A good portion of players will not claim any ongoing promotions as an existing player. Most players rarely complain about game filters as long as they get their winnings paid out as expected.
This is why we recommend cross comparing the relevant casino ratings. If you are not into bonuses, ignore the bonus and promotions rating. Alternatively, if it’s something you are priotizing not only you should consider the bonus rating, but also read the bonus section of the casino review.
If by the time you get to the end of the review you’ve realized the cons are simply too much for you, check the alternative casinos we recommend. You can find them after the casino review conclusion. These alternatives target the casino’s cons specifically.
Lastly, while we try to keep the content fresh and updated, occasionally you might find certain inconsistencies. We ask you to always check three things yourself before you deposit as a bonus player:
- the bonus WR
- the maximum bet limit
- the games you can play as a bonus player
If you fail to follow any of these three, the casino WILL VOID your winnings.
Maintenance
Online casinos change their game offer and their bonuses, but this doesn’t take any dramatic updates. Usually it’s just the bonus amount, or the slots players get to play with the free spins. This is easy to take care of as we get proper updates from casinos. The tricky part is the game offer. Sometimes, we’re off for a couple of hundred games and we might not have recorded the addition of a couple of game studios. However, this can’t dramatically change our opinion of the casino. Our casino rating won’t change to that level with these updates.
We do however try to update all reviews at least once a year.
Irish casinos are easy to compare, difficult to review
Irish casino sites are easy to compare as they are very homogenous. The offer differs slightly and they clearly have a very good idea what casino players want.
However, they are not as easy to review as there are bits of information which they are not so keen to provide. Overall, it’s easier to review new casinos than ones that have a whole history of potentially questioning actions.
FAQs
The only good review is a detailed one. The casino review should cover all aspect of the offer, such as: welcome bonus, ongoing promotions, casino game offer, customer support and all banking terms. Security is another important factor which is essential to most players' experiences.
There are a lot of online gambling platforms that offer casino reviews, however, only a few of them are reliable. Our casino reviews are based on transparent rating criteria and we stick to our principles regardless of the brand at hand.
The best casino reviews are updated regularly and cover a wide breadth of information and are based on data. Our online casino reviews are consistent and benchmarked according transparent rating criteria, allowing you to compare all casinos easily.
The top spot changes throughout the year. Almost every month we have a new top contender, thanks to our regular updates. Check out our top list to see what the current best online casino in Ireland is.
