The Dealer 22 Push: How It Changes Free Bet Blackjack and Switch

The rule turns one kind of dealer bust into a tie. If the dealer's final total is 22, every player hand still in play pushes, and the player's stake is returned. If the dealer reaches 23 or more, the bust pays as it always does. The push is for a total of exactly 22 and for no other.

Three parts of a round stay untouched.

• A hand that has already busted. It lost when it went over 21, and the dealer's total does not bring it back.
• A player blackjack. It is paid as a blackjack, at 3 to 2 in Free Bet Blackjack and 1 to 1 in Blackjack Switch, and it is not affected by the dealer's total afterwards. The Nevada Free Bet Blackjack document says so directly: the player still wins when he has a blackjack and the dealer has a total of 22.
• A dealer who does not reach 22. A dealer who stands on 17 to 21 is compared with your total as normal, and a dealer who busts on 23 or more pays every hand still in play.

Since the rule reaches every hand still in play, it reaches doubled and split hands too. That is where it bites: a hand doubled for a full extra bet, or doubled for free, and brought to a strong total wins nothing when the dealer lands on 22.

A worked case with a bet of 10 shows the size of the change. You stand on a total of 16 against a dealer 6 with a ten in the hole. The dealer draws a 6 and finishes on 22. In ordinary blackjack you win 10. Under the dealer 22 push you win nothing and keep your 10. The same dealer hand against your 20 gives the same answer: 10 in regular blackjack, nothing under the push.

The regulator documents present the push as the price of the free bets. The Nevada Gaming Control Board says the game offers free double-downs and free splits under certain conditions, and that in return the dealer pushes instead of busting on a dealer total of 22. A dealer 22 pushes all remaining hands except a player blackjack, which is still paid.

The wording in the other documents is close. Washington states that if the dealer busts with a point total of 22, all player blackjack bets in action are pushes, and that player blackjacks are paid before the dealer draws, so the rule does not touch them. Pennsylvania has the dealer return all remaining wagers when the dealer's hand is 22, and collect the free bet lammers, the markers that stand for the free double or split. So the house takes back the free portion and returns the money you staked yourself.

Two practical details follow from the documents.

First, the dealer sometimes has to keep drawing when it does not affect the players. In the Washington and Pennsylvania texts, if every player hand has busted or holds a blackjack, the dealer still draws when a Push 22 side wager is on the table, so that the side wager can be settled. Without a Push 22 wager on the table, the usual rule applies that the dealer stops drawing once the result no longer depends on the total.

Second, the games differ on soft 17. The Pennsylvania text has the dealer stand on soft 17, while Washington and Nevada have the dealer hit. The push itself is identical in each.

Blackjack Switch pairs the swap with two rules: a natural pays 1 to 1, and a dealer 22 pushes. The Washington document states that a dealer total of 22 will push all non-bust player hands, with exceptions noted, and that if the dealer draws a total of 22, all remaining base wagers push except blackjack. Massachusetts words it more closely: if the dealer's point count is 22 and the player's is 21 or less, the wager is a push unless the player has a blackjack without switching cards, in which case the wager wins.

That last clause matters. A blackjack made by switching is not a blackjack. Washington and Pennsylvania treat it as a 21, which loses against a dealer blackjack and is returned against a dealer 21 or 22. A natural you were dealt and kept still wins against a dealer 22, paid at 1 to 1. The Blackjack Switch page explains how the swap works.

The explorer follows the drawing rule exactly. The dealer draws to 16 or less, and to soft 17 when the rule is set to hit. Ace counts as 11 unless that would take the hand over 21. Build a hand such as 10, 6 and 6 and the panel changes to a dealer 22, with each of your possible final hands listed in two columns: what it gets under the push and what it would get if 22 were an ordinary bust.

Try the second example, an ace, a 5, a 6 and a 10. The dealer starts with a soft total of 16, draws a 6 for a hard 12, then a 10 to finish on 22. A soft hand that turns hard is easy to miss at the table, and it is one way a dealer lands on 22.

Nothing in the explorer is a chance. It shows what a chosen dealer hand does, not how often that hand comes up. The site does not publish how often a dealer ends on exactly 22 because the odds data reports the bust chance as a whole. At six decks with the dealer standing on soft 17, a dealer bust of any kind is 28.19% (Chance that a dealer hand finishes with a bust, before any card is seen (every up card weighted by how often it comes up). Rules: 6 decks, the dealer stands on soft 17, and the dealer checks for blackjack with a hole card. Worked out exactly by following every possible order of cards from a full shoe, removing each card as it is drawn. The dealer's hole card counts as the first card the dealer draws, so a natural is one of the outcomes.), and a dealer 22 is only part of that.

Free Bet Blackjack has a calculated house edge, and it includes the dealer 22 push together with the free doubles and free splits. The figures are for correct play from a full shoe, with no insurance or even money:

• Dealer hits soft 17, six decks: 1.02% (Free Bet Blackjack, dealer hits soft 17. House edge per starting bet: the average loss per round as a share of the bet placed before the cards are dealt, doubles and splits included in the result. Rules: 6 decks, dealer hits soft 17, dealer checks for blackjack with a hole card, blackjack pays 3:2, double on any first two cards, double after split, split up to 4 hands, aces may be resplit, one card to each split ace, no surrender, a dealer 22 pushes every hand still in play, free doubles on hard 9, 10 and 11 (first two cards), free splits on every pair except tens. The player follows the printed strategy chart for these rules from a full shoe, and never takes insurance or even money. Free doubles and free splits are paid by the house, so they add to the result but not to the chips the player wagers.).
• Dealer stands on soft 17, six decks: 0.71% (Free Bet Blackjack, dealer stands on soft 17. House edge per starting bet: the average loss per round as a share of the bet placed before the cards are dealt, doubles and splits included in the result. Rules: 6 decks, dealer stands on soft 17, dealer checks for blackjack with a hole card, blackjack pays 3:2, double on any first two cards, double after split, split up to 4 hands, aces may be resplit, one card to each split ace, no surrender, a dealer 22 pushes every hand still in play, free doubles on hard 9, 10 and 11 (first two cards), free splits on every pair except tens. The player follows the printed strategy chart for these rules from a full shoe, and never takes insurance or even money. Free doubles and free splits are paid by the house, so they add to the result but not to the chips the player wagers.).
• Nevada rules of play: 0.63% (Free Bet Blackjack, Nevada rules of play. House edge per starting bet: the average loss per round as a share of the bet placed before the cards are dealt, doubles and splits included in the result. Rules: 6 decks, dealer hits soft 17, dealer checks for blackjack with a hole card, blackjack pays 3:2, double on any number of cards, double after split, split up to 4 hands, aces may be resplit, one card to each split ace, no surrender, a dealer 22 pushes every hand still in play, free doubles on hard 9, 10 and 11 (any number of cards), free splits on every pair except fours and tens. The player follows the printed strategy chart for these rules from a full shoe, and never takes insurance or even money. Free doubles and free splits are paid by the house, so they add to the result but not to the chips the player wagers.).

For context, the comparison rules used across this site, ordinary blackjack at six decks with the dealer hitting soft 17, come to 0.62%, and the same game with the dealer standing on soft 17 comes to 0.41%. Free Bet Blackjack comes out higher in both cases. The details of each rule set differ, and the Free Bet Blackjack page lists them. The point here is that the free bets do not give back everything the push takes.

The published number is for the whole game. This site has not calculated the dealer 22 rule on its own, so no figure here says what the push costs by itself.

Blackjack Switch has no published house edge on this site. Its rules are documented, but no calculation is published yet, and a figure from Free Bet Blackjack is not a substitute. Do not carry one game's number over to the other: the two games share one rule and differ in almost everything else.

The regulator texts for Free Bet Blackjack also describe a Push 22 wager. It is an optional bet made before the deal that wins if the dealer's hand finishes with a total of exactly 22. Nevada and Washington describe it, with a progressive prize, and Pennsylvania has it as a separate wager in its own chapter. It is settled on the dealer's total alone.

The base-game push and the side bet share a trigger and nothing else. The push is a rule of your main hand: it returns your bet. The side bet is an extra stake that pays if the dealer reaches 22. You can play the main game without ever placing the side bet, and a player who does not bet it is still subject to the push. This site publishes no house edge for the Push 22 wager. The side bets page covers the bets with published pay tables.

A dealer bust is the way a weak hand of yours normally gets paid. In ordinary blackjack you can stand on a 13 to 16 against a dealer 2 to 6 because the dealer's bust pays you. Take away the bust at 22 and those stands earn less. That is the reason the strategy for these games differs from the ordinary game, and the game pages carry the strategy.

For a player choosing between tables, the useful comparison is the whole rule set. Look at what is on offer next to the push: free doubles and free splits in Free Bet Blackjack, the swap in Blackjack Switch, the payout on a natural, the dealer's rule on soft 17. The published house edge for Free Bet Blackjack lets you compare it with ordinary blackjack. For Blackjack Switch the comparison has to be made from the rules alone until a figure is published.