How to play 90-ball Bingo

90-ball bingo is without a doubt the most popular choice when it comes to online bingo games. The principle of the 90-ball bingo is fairly simple and easy to learn, making this game perfect for beginners.

To get started, you have to buy your ticket. Once you enter the game, you’ll have the caller call out numbers at random – if they appear on one of your tickets, you’ll cover them up. Or as we say in bingo lingo, daub them. To win, you have to be the first one that covers all three lines – that’s when you get a Full House. In 90-ball bingo, you can also get prizes if you cover lines or even just one.

The 90-ball bingo ticket

Each 90-ball bingo ticket consists of a 3x9 table of numbers. Each line has nine columns which display five numbers and four empty spots.

Here’s how the lines are set up:

  • 1st Column holds 1-9
  • 2nd Column holds 10-19
  • 3rd Column holds 20-29
  • 4th Column holds 30-39
  • 5th Column holds 40-49
  • 6th Column holds 50-59
  • 7th Column holds 60-69
  • 8th Column holds 70-79
  • 9th Column holds 80-90

You normally play the game on strips of six tickets each. One of the strips will show the total of the numbers spread around the rest of the tickets, allowing you to cover a number at each bingo call.

The 90-ball bingo caller

90-ball bingo uses numbers from 1 to 90. The caller’s job is to call out these numbers one at a time, as they’re actually drawn from the bingo system. Each number can only be called out once in every game.

The winning combination in 90-ball bingo

So how can you win a 90-ball bingo game? With three patterns, each coming with its own prize.

  • Any 1 Line – Cover all the numbers in any single row
  • Any 2 Lines – Cover all the numbers any 2 rows
  • Full House – Cover all 15 numbers on the ticket

You can win all three prizes by creating each pattern one after the other.

90-ball bingo payouts and jackpots

The payout depends on a couple of things – one of them is the cost of the ticket and the other is the actual number of players. With a higher ticket price and more players in the game, you can win a bigger and better jackpot. Cheeky Bingo also sometimes offers 90-ball bingo games with a fixed minimum prize that doesn’t change with the amount of players or the price of the ticket. Keep an eye on extra available jackpots in a select number of 90-ball bingo games.

The details of the game’s jackpot are available in the info bar, located on top of the ticket strips. You can access these details before the game as well as during it.

90-ball bingo ticket selection

Cheeky Bingo allows you to choose your strips and tickets for each bingo game. To do so, you’ll need to click on each of the strips. Another option is to let Cheeky Bingo’s system choose the strips randomly.

Manual selection of tickets

To buy a ticket, all you need to do is click on it. You can also choose the entire strip by using the ‘click to select strip’ button. If you don’t like the strip, you can just press ‘get a new strip’ and a new one will appear on the screen. You can alternate between the 4 strips available by clicking the red arrow button in the centre.

Automatic selection of tickets

If you don’t want to select your tickets manually, you can take advantage of Cheeky Bingo’s system to do it for you. All you need to do is select the amount of strips you’d like to purchase and then click the ‘Auto Select Strips’ box. All auto-selected tickets appear under the auto-select strips area.

Buying the tickets for 90-ball online bingo games

In order to participate in 90-ball bingo games, you need to buy at least one ticket. But you can purchase up to 96 tickets, or 16 strips, in a single game. If you want to deposit money into your account, you need to click the ‘cashier/banking’ button.

You can always view ticket prices on the left hand side of the screen. The price is also visible on the actual card and on the purchase panel.

Playing the game

Once you’ve bought your tickets for Cheeky’s 90-ball bingo game, you’ll need to wait for the game to start. All Cheeky Bingo games feature a countdown in the top left corner of the bingo screen – this will help you keep track of your games and make sure you never miss the start.

Once you’re in the game, you’ll be able to see exactly how many people are playing it, what prizes can be won based on the winning pattern, and the amount of the jackpot. The called numbers appear in the top left-hand corner. You’ll also be able to keep track of previous five calls near the main-called number.

Daubing your numbers

Tickets can be daubed manually or automatically. While daubing manually makes you feel more present in the actual game, the benefits of daubing automatically includes never missing a number. The automatic daub is chosen by default, but if you want to daub manually, you’ll have to change it in the options menu by unchecking the ‘autodaub’ box. The options menu is located under settings in the top left-hand corner.

The best part about it is you can turn on the ‘autodaub’ settings whenever you want and it has no impact on the game outcome whatsoever.

Winning

When a player wins the game, the entire game ends – the players will receive a message about the winner and how much they won.

90-ball bingo has a 70% return to player rate and the house edge equals 30%. These numbers vary for each game, depending on the amount of tickets bought and the actual ticket price.

1TG and 2TG games

Cheeky Bingo also offers 1TG and 2TG games, which increase your chance of winning even if you don’t necessarily hit the jackpot. These games allow you to get a share of the prize if you get close to winning the jackpot.

90-ball bingo game options

Your bingo interface is completely customisable when you play with Cheeky Bingo. All you need to do is click on the ‘options’ button, located in the right corner of the screen.

The options button will give you several settings to choose from – you can go back and change these settings at any time you want.

The settings available:

Autodaub: When you select this setting the numbers that are called will automatically be covered on your card.

Note that it doesn’t matter if you manually daub the numbers or if you select autodaub to have it done for you. This selection doesn’t affect the outcome of the game. If you have a winning bingo card, the prize is yours no matter what!

Price alert: This lets you enable or disable the presentation of the card price within the bingo rooms.

Show 3TG: This stands for "Show 3 to go" and if you select it your tickets that only have 1, 2 or 3 numbers left to cover until you win will be highlighted.

Best Card First: This displays the card that’s closest to winning in the screen in the top left corner.

What happens if your game disconnects?

We understand not everyone has the best internet connection – it sometimes gets too slow for our liking. But if this happens while you’re playing games at Cheeky Bingo, the system will continue to auto cover your cards. So despite the fact that you might not be able to play the game due to your connection, you will still be awarded any prizes you would have won during your time away.