Labouchere Roulette Strategy

The Labouchere Roulette Strategy originates from the 19th century and takes its name from the English gambler who invented it, Henry Labouchere. This progression-based gambling strategy is designed to be placed on even money bets or wagers with around a 50/50 chance. This makes this ideal for the game of roulette, but we want to investigate further. So today, we’ll take this playing method through its paces to decide whether it’s worth using.

Roulette Casino Bonuses


How Does The Labouchere Strategy Work?

Although at a quick glance, the Labouchere strategy can seem a little complicated, it is, in fact, straightforward to put into action once you have a grasp of it. This method, again like the Martingale and Fibonacci strategies, requires the player to place only even money bets. These are red or black, 1-18 or 19-36, odd or even.

Before you place a single bet, you first need to set a target of how much profit you would like to try and make. As an example, I will choose €30. Of course, this amount must be relative to your bankroll. The next stage is to break up the targeted profit into smaller numbers that equal that total. These can be whatever size you wish; my breakdown and number sequence are the following.

4 – 3 – 6 – 5 – 3 – 6 – 3 = 30

Now you’re all set to go and place your first bet, all you need to do is take the number furthest to the left ( 4 ) and the digit furthest to the right ( 3 ), add these together, which is €7, and that would be the bet for that spin on an even money bet. If this is a successful spin and you win, then you cross out the 4 and 3 and begin the process again.

3 – 6 – 5 – 3 – 6

The above is what my sequence now looks like after the first successful spin, so for my next bet, I would again take the number furthest to the left ( 3 ), the digit furthest to the right ( 6 ), and the total bet for that spin would be €9. Again I would place that amount of an even money bet. Just like the above, if this is a winning spin, you would cross out the 3 and the 6 you used and carry on with the same process. The aim is to cross out all of the numbers in the sequence. If I achieve this, I will have made my targeted €30 profit.

As with any progression-based roulette strategies, they become a little more exciting and potentially expensive once you hit a losing streak. So let’s take the first bet I made again of €7 and this time say that it lost. Rather than cross any numbers out, you now add the number you just bet to the rightmost side of the sequence so that it will look like the following.

4 – 3 – 6 – 5 – 3 – 6 – 3 – 7

Each time you lose, you must add that amount to the rightmost of the sequence. This means my next bet would be 4 + 7 = €11, so if that lost, the 11 would be added after the 7. Here you can see how the bets begin to progress and increase in size with each losing spin.


Can I Beat The House With The Labouchere Roulette Method

On the face of it, the Labouchere strategy looks like a tidy method that can result in your own personally selected profit being won, which can be a very accurate representation of the process when luck is on your side. However, as with most roulette strategies, once you hit a dreaded losing streak, the wheels soon come off. As an example, I’ll put down my starting sequence but add ten losing spins to it, which is entirely possible when playing roulette, as we all know.

4 – 3 – 6 – 5 – 3 – 6 – 3 – 7 – 11 – 15 – 19 – 23 – 27 – 31 – 35 – 39 – 43

Now you can see that not only are you left with a considerably long sequence of numbers, but within the space of 10 bets, you have gone from a €7 stake to a €47 stake.

To summarise, the Labouchere Roulette Strategy is a little different to most other methods, and it’s very simple to follow, as well as being quite fun itself with having to keep track of your numbers and trying to work toward your targeted profit. So starting with some low stakes would be an excellent way to see how you got on with this strategy, and as I always say, if you do manage to get in front and find yourself with a profit, then cash out and run before the house edge inevitably catches up with you.


Can I Try This Strategy For Free?

Utilising our free roulette demo game and looking at our top tips for roulette article is a great way to practice all the strategies you have learned and further increase your knowledge of the game.


Labouchere Roulette System Video