Shuffle tracking is a nontraditional blackjack strategy technique that you might not often hear about it. Shuffle tracking is a derivative of card counting but you usually won't find much information on the subject. This is a more advanced technique which can be extremely difficult to master but will often yield very high results and large profits if executed correctly.

How Shuffle Tracking Works

To properly explain how blackjack shuffle tracking works, we will use a fictitious example. Let's pretend you are a fairly experienced blackjack player and card counter, and that you're playing in a six-deck blackjack game. You've had a great count throughout the shoe but the paint cards never made the table. When the shoe finished, you have a high count of +13.

Since the paint cards never hit the table, the one deck left behind the cut card obviously contains the majority of the larger cards you've been waiting on. If it was possible to track that one particular deck full of the paint cards through the shuffling process, you would obviously have a very large advantage during the next shoe, by knowing the position of the cards that help you most.

There are several variations of shuffle tracking strategies but the main underlying principle is to find the very simple shuffles, so the large amount of paint cards will still end up together and don't get too overly diluted throughout the shoe. This can be a very difficult strategy to properly learn and use but it can have very high results when executed completely correctly. Making just a few small mistakes using this strategy can quickly rid you of the edge it provides you.

How to Practice Shuffle Tracking

Before even considering using shuffle tracking you must make sure you have completely mastered basic strategy and some method of card counting. Remember to practice, practice, and practice, before ever trying to use blackjack shuffle tracking in a real casino game. With the limited amount of strategy information written on shuffle tracking in blackjack, it's often difficult to find ways to practice this strategy.

However, there are a few resources available to you. If you are interested in seriously learning this technique, you should look into getting the computer software package called Casino Verite Blackjack. This software package allows you to practice shuffle tracking on your computer to make certain you aren't making too many mistakes before actually trying the technique in a real blackjack game where you have the chance of losing large amounts of money.

See also:

Card Counting in Blackjack

Gambling online, including blackjack online for real money, is illegal in some jurisdictions, so be aware of the situation where you live before deciding to play.