Pressing means taking some or all of your winnings from a bet and adding them to that same bet instead of pocketing them. It's one of the most common moves at the craps table — the dealer will ask "press it?" after nearly every win on a place bet. Done with some judgment, pressing lets you scale up during a hot roll without reaching back into your pocket. Done mindlessly, it just inflates your exposure until a 7-out wipes everything out. This page covers what pressing is, the different amounts you can press, how to communicate with the dealer, and the honest math behind the decision.
What Pressing Means
When a place bet wins, you collect your winnings and your original bet stays on the number. Pressing means you redirect some or all of those winnings back onto the bet to increase its size, rather than taking them off the table.
Example: you have $6 on the 6. It hits and pays $7. If you press, the dealer takes $6 of that $7 and adds it to your bet — your 6 is now working at $12 — and hands you $1 in change. Your bet doubled. You put up $6 originally and added nothing from your own pocket; the press was funded entirely by the win.
The dealer will often prompt you after a hit — "same bet or press?" — but you're never obligated to press. Pressing is always optional and always your call. You can also specify exactly how much you want to press rather than accepting the default double.
Types of Presses
There's more than one way to press, and the difference matters to how fast your bet size escalates.
Full press (double up): Add your entire win back to the bet. A $6 place bet wins $7 — press to $12, take $1 change. That $12 wins $14 — press to $24, take $2 change. Each press doubles the bet. This is the most aggressive version: you're maximizing upside during a hot roll, but each level roughly doubles what you lose on a 7-out.
Half press: Add half the win to the bet and pocket the other half. A $6 bet wins $7 — add $3, take $4, bet is now $9. Slower escalation with more profit secured along the way. The bet grows, but so does your guaranteed take if things end here.
Up a unit: Add one standard betting unit to the bet regardless of the win amount. On a $6 place bet on the 6 or 8, "up a unit" means add $6: $6 becomes $12, then $18, then $24. The step size stays consistent rather than compounding. Most experienced dealers recognize "up a unit" without further explanation.
Power press: More aggressive than a full press — you add more than your win to the bet, pulling extra chips from your own rack. This gets your bet size up faster than winnings alone allow. It requires putting new money at risk, so it's worth being deliberate about when you use it.
The Math — What Pressing Actually Does
Pressing does not change the house edge percentage. A place bet on the 6 or 8 carries a 1.52% house edge whether you have $6 on it or $60. The percentage is fixed by the payout structure, not the bet size.
What pressing changes is the dollar cost of that house edge. A $6 place bet on the 6 costs roughly 9 cents per roll in expected value. Press to $12 and it costs 18 cents per roll. Press to $24 and it's 36 cents per roll. The house edge is the same; you're just applying it to a larger number each time.
The upside of pressing during a genuine hot roll is real. If the shooter rolls the 6 four times while you're pressing from $6:
- First hit: win $7, press to $12 (take $1)
- Second hit: win $14, press to $24 (take $2)
- Third hit: win $28, press to $48 (take $4)
- Fourth hit: win $56, collect (or press again)
Total collected from wins and change: $1 + $2 + $4 + $56 = $63 on a bet that started at $6. That's the appeal.
The downside is also real. After three presses you have $48 at risk. One 7-out at that point costs you $48, plus whatever you had left on other bets. The fourth-hit scenario is genuine — so is the shooter sevening-out on the second roll after you've pressed to $24.
Pressing is not a mathematical edge. It's a risk management decision about how aggressively to scale up when a number is rolling. The house edge still grinds in the same direction; pressing just determines how large the bet is when it does.
How to Tell the Dealer
Communication at the craps table is straightforward. After a place bet wins, you have a few seconds to say what you want before the next roll:
- "Press it" — dealer doubles the bet, gives you change if the win doesn't divide evenly
- "Press me up to $18" — you get a specific bet size; the dealer adjusts and returns the difference
- "Same bet" or "collect" — take the full win, leave the original bet working
- "Up a unit" — most dealers know this; adds $6 to a 6/8 place bet, $5 to a 5/9 place bet
- "Add $6 to it" — works fine if you're unsure of the terminology; say what you mean and the dealer will handle it
If you miss the window and the dice are already out, wait until the roll resolves. Don't reach toward the felt while the dice are in play.
When Pressing Makes Sense
Pressing is a tool for a specific situation: a number is hitting repeatedly and you want your bet size to grow with the roll rather than staying flat. A few conditions where pressing fits naturally:
- The same number has hit twice and the shooter looks like they have a hand going — pressing from the second or third hit forward captures the upside without putting too much at risk early
- You're already ahead on the session and willing to let some winnings ride — the psychological cost of losing a pressed bet is lower when you're already in positive territory
- Your session bankroll is healthy enough that a 7-out after a couple of presses won't hurt your ability to continue playing
The key word is judgment. Pressing makes sense as a decision you make roll by roll, not as a rule you apply automatically. Deciding to press every single win regardless of context removes the one thing that makes pressing useful: reading the table and choosing when to scale up.
When Pressing Doesn't Make Sense
There are situations where pressing is the wrong move regardless of how hot the table feels:
- When you're already down and trying to recover. Pressing to get even is just increasing your risk. It feels like momentum but it's the same math — more money at a 1.52% disadvantage per roll.
- When a 7-out would leave you worse off than if you'd simply collected. Before each press, take a second: if the next roll is a 7, how do I feel about that outcome? If the answer is "pretty bad," that's information.
- When the pressed bet no longer matches your session bankroll. If you started the session with $200 and you've pressed a single place bet to $48, a 7-out costs you nearly a quarter of your buy-in on one roll. That's a position that probably isn't worth it.
Pressing is emotionally seductive because it feels like playing with house money — the bet grew from winnings, not from your own pocket. That framing is misleading. Every chip on the felt is your money, regardless of where it came from. There is no house money. There are just chips you've chosen to leave at risk.
The Same-Bet vs. Press Decision
If you're ever unsure whether to press, the default answer is: collect and leave the same bet. It's never the wrong move. You take the win, your bet stays active, and if the number hits again you can start pressing from there with fresh information.
The worst outcome in pressing is pressing aggressively on a number that hits twice and then goes cold. After two presses you've built a larger bet funded entirely by those two wins — and then a 7-out takes the bet and what's left of your table position. Had you collected both wins and left the original $6, you'd be up $14 and still have your $6 on the number.
A reasonable middle path: collect the first win, press on the second hit, and decide from there. You've secured a profit, confirmed the number is hitting, and now you're scaling up with some runway already banked. That's a more defensible structure than pressing from win one without knowing whether the roll has legs.