Table of Contents
Written by
Mike Waters
Edited by
Matthew Scott
What Are Online Scratchies?
Online scratch cards are the digital version of the classic scratch cards you buy at the newsagent’s or kiosk. Instead of physically scratching the silver panel, you ‘scratch’ the digital silver panel on your screen with a tap or a click, and you need to match the required symbols to win a prize.
Most online casinos in Australia have a few scratchies, and they’re usually placed in the instant-win or specialty games section. They’re as quick and simple as it gets, with no complicated rules and very short rounds.
Some games allow you to choose the stake, while in others, the stake is fixed, which means that the prizes are fixed too. In some versions, you can also set Autoplay and have the game automatically scratch the panel for a selected number of rounds.
The bet usually ranges from A$0.50 or A$1, but some games allow a higher bet of up to A$10 or more. The prizes largely depend on the game, but from the dozens of online scratchies I tried, I can conclude that the maximum is often around A$75,000 (with a A$1 wager), which means that the maximum payout is 75,000x.
Note from Australian Gamblers: Scratchies often have a very high max payout that even dwarfs the max payout of many jackpot pokies, which means that the volatility is extremely high. The RTP is usually very low (compared to other casino games), at around 65%, so they’re definitely not the best choice for long-term play.
Physical vs Online Scratchies
Physical scratchies are the version most Aussies grew up with. You buy them at a newsagent’s, scratch off the panel, and hope the symbols line up to win something. Online scratchies are the same, but digital. You pick the bet, scratch with a click or tap, and reveal if you’ve won something or not.
One of the biggest differences between the two is who creates them. Physical scratchies are often issued by state lotteries, while online scratchies are built by the same studios that make online pokies and instant-win games.
There are probably over a dozen casino game studios that create scratch card games, and some of the names I came across include Hacksaw Gaming, Pragmatic Play, and BGaming. These are the same studios that supply the lobbies of many Australian casinos, so online scratchies is just another game category they cover.
RTP is another major difference between the two. Physical scratchies in Australia usually have a theoretical Return to Player ratio of around 50%, sometimes even lower depending on the ticket. Online scratchies, on the other hand, usually range from 60% to 70%, meaning the expected return is higher in the online versions.
For tax, scratchie wins in Australia aren’t taxed for regular players, whether the win comes from a physical ticket or an online game. Lotteries and instant-win prizes fall under tax-free windfalls, so there’s no difference here.
Still, physical scratchies do have their own appeal. They’re a common gift, and scratching the ticket yourself is part of the fun. And while their RTP is low, they’re one of the few gambling products where playing offline actually makes sense because the experience itself is the charm.
Online Scratchies: Game Layout and Basics
Online scratchies will feel familiar even if you have never played a digital scratchie. To be perfectly honest, you’ll know what to do even if you have never played any type of scratch card before. You just ‘buy’ a scratchie and scratch to reveal the hidden panels. If you hit a winning combination, the game will automatically notify you that you’ve won.
The layout is simple and is usually very similar regardless of which game you choose. When you open an online scratch card, you’ll usually see a fixed area with covered panels, a themed background, a ‘Reveal All’ or ‘Scratch Button’, and the potential prizes.
The Playing Area
Each game has its own theme, but the structure is usually very similar. Some online scratchies use the classic 3-panel layout you’re probably familiar with (3 rows with 3 symbols each), but some scratchies use different layouts, for example, 9 or 12 rows. The playing area is usually in the middle, and after you buy the ticket, you can scratch it manually with a mouse click (or tap), or click on Scratch All to scratch it all.
There’s either one number that you have to match, or score 3 matching symbols to win a prize. Usually, there’s a larger ‘scratcher’ that you can use by moving your mouse, and some games have different modes (for example, Bronze, Silver, and Golden cards in Peter & Sons’ scratch cards) that are differently priced, but offer different prizes too.
Bet Settings
Before starting a round, you choose how much you want to wager. There are two types of online scratchies: those that allow you to wager manually, and more traditional scratchies that you buy for a fixed price.
The cost of the scratchie directly affects the potential payouts. For example, if the top prize is 75,000x, if you buy a A$1 scratchie, the maximum you can win is A$75,000. If you bet A$5, the top prize becomes A$375,000.
It’s not uncommon for scratchies to allow bets of up to A$20 or A$50, with crypto scratchies sometimes going even higher. In Auto mode, you can set up multiple rounds to play out automatically. For example, you can set up 10, 20, or 100 rounds, and the game will automatically run for the preset number of rounds.
Note from Australian Gamblers: Some scratchies, like EvoPlay’s Adrenalin Rush and many similar ones, allow you to set the bet size yourself. With the option to reveal all the symbols at once, the game looks a lot like a classic 3×3 pokie, but instead of spinning reels, the symbols here are revealed instantly. However, scratchies often have a much lower RTP than pokies, so I suggest you choose a standard high-RTP pokie rather than a scratchie.
Win Reveal & Triggering Prizes
Online scratchies work in a very simple way: you load the game, buy the scratchie (or set the bet level), and uncover the hidden panels to see if you’ve hit a prize. Every round starts with a covered play area, and you can reveal it in whichever style you like.
The first option is to drag the cursor or finger across the surface like with a real scratch card (they even make a scratching sound), or the faster option is to reveal all the symbols at once.
After all the panels are revealed, the game checks for one (or multiple, although that’s very rare) wins. The most common way to do it is by matching 3 symbols, where you need to uncover 3 identical icons and get paid according to the prize displayed on them.
Another way to do it is by matching a number. There’s a number displayed on the scratchie, and if any of the symbols have the same symbol, you win based on the prize displayed below it. This is common practice for Hacksaw’s scratchies, like the popular It’s Bananas.
How to Play Online Scratchies
You probably realise by now that online scratchies are one of the simplest games to play in the casino. There’s absolutely no learning curve or a strategy to memorise. If you think that pokies are simple, consider that scratchies are even simpler, so you’ll have absolutely no trouble playing them.
In fact, I can confidently say that the bigger struggle is finding them in the lobby than playing a scratch game once you launch it, so here’s how a typical round of scratchies works:
1
Choose the game you want to play
Most scratchies are in the Fast Games, Instant Win, or Others category, but oftentimes, you can use the search bar and just type Scratch. Choose a game that looks fun and launch it, and that’s it.
2
Choose the bet size or buy the ticket
Most online scratchies either let you pick your stake manually or sell the card for a fixed price. Bets usually start at A$0.50 or A$1, but some titles allow higher stakes of A$5, A$10, or even A$20+. If it’s a fixed prize, the payouts are also fixed.
3
Click Buy, and the scratch card will load
Once you confirm the stake, the game presents a covered play area. As I explained, there’s usually a larger cursor that you can use to scratch, but you can also click on Scratch All or Reveal All to reveal all the symbols at once.
4
Check the symbols
Once all the panels are uncovered, the game automatically checks if there are any winning patterns on the grid, like three matching symbols or a matched number. The game automatically highlights the winning symbols and displays the payout on the screen.
5
Repeat
That’s the whole procedure. Once a round ends, you can either buy another scratchie and repeat the process or turn off the game.
How RTP Works in Online Scratchies
The RTP in online scratchies works very differently from that of standard scratchies. In standard scratchies (the ones you can buy from newsagents or kiosks), there’s a pre-determined prize pool and number of printed scratchies, so there’s, for example, one grand prize of A$100k, 10 smaller prizes of A$50k, 20 even smaller prizes of A$10k, etc.
With online scratchies, the RTP is calculated using the same maths model as pokies and other instant-win games like Keno or Plinko. There’s no stack of pre-printed tickets, but every time you buy a scratchie, the RNG (Random Number Generator) software determines if the ticket is a winning one or not.
Each prize has a probability level, so for example:
- A 10x win might have a probability of 1 in 50 (2% chance of hitting)
- A 50x win might have a probability of 1 in 500 (0.2% chance of hitting)
- A 100x win might have a probability of 1 in 5,000 (0.02% chance of hitting)
- The grand prize (for example, 100,000x the bet) might have a probability of 1 in several million
To calculate the exact RTP, the developer multiplies each prize by its probability, adds all those expected returns together, and the final value is expressed as a percentage. For example, if a scratchie has an expected return of A$0.67 for every A$1 wagered (or every A$1 ticket that’s been purchased), the RTP is 67%.
I find it funny how some developers present the paytable as if there’s a fixed number of tickets, just like physical scratch cards you’d buy at the newsagent. You’ll see tables showing things like “1 prize of 300,000x,” “400 prizes of 3,000x,” or “2,000,000 prizes of 1x,” and they make it seem like there’s a finite print run. But in reality, online scratchies never use a fixed pool of pre-made tickets, so I’d go as far as to say that this information can be misleading.
The prize table is simply a visual way to show how the game weights the prizes behind the scenes. Those “Prizes Available” numbers don’t actually represent a stock of printed tickets waiting to be sold. Instead, they represent the probability model the RNG follows every time you play. If the table says there’s “1 prize of 300,000x” and “2,000,000 prizes of 1x,” it doesn’t mean those prizes can be used up or become unavailable. It just means that the top prize is extremely rare, and the lowest prize is the most common one.
While physical scratchies really are printed in advance and the number of big wins truly is limited, online scratchies are based on an RNG software, and even if the paytable looks like it’s a lottery, the actual payout structure is more similar to pokies.
Note from Australian Gamblers: I find it a bit misleading when studios present online scratchie paytables as if there’s a fixed number of tickets or a limited pool of prizes. It gives the impression that you’re buying into a real batch of scratchies where you could track how many wins are left, which isn’t the case. There’s no way to know how many players have played the game or whether the top prize has already been hit, and it wouldn’t matter even if you did because online scratchies use an RNG, so every round is generated independently.
Volatility in Online Scratchies
Studios often claim that the volatility of their online scratchies is ‘medium’, but in reality, it feels much higher than that. The reason is that most of them offer huge top prizes for a very small stake, so the maths has to compensate for that.
This means that most rounds return either nothing or very small returns (which often don’t even cover the price of the scratchie). Medium-sized wins are rare, and big wins almost never happen. What was the last time you remember someone winning a big prize on a scratchie? Exactly. Obviously, it’s not impossible to win a big prize, but chances are very slim.
Some games allow you to change the volatility yourself, like most Peter & Sons’ scratchies that have three different cards – Bronze, Silver, and Golden. The Bronze one offers the lowest prize (but has the lowest volatility), while the Golden has the highest prize and the highest volatility.
My 200-Round Test on Online Scratchies
Since I’m already in summer mood, for my usual 200-round test, I chose a popular scratchie from Hacksaw named Summer Scratch. It’s a typical scratchie that has 9 symbols on a 3×3 grid, and you need three matching amounts to win a prize. It costs A$2, and you cannot change the bet size, with the maximum win being A$200,000. The RTP of the game is 70.10% and I started with a bankroll of A$5,000, so let’s see how it goes.
To be perfectly honest with you, I got bored with manually scratching each scratchie after just ~20 rounds, so I decided to use the built-in autoplay option for 100 rounds. There’s also a Turbo option that speeds up things even further, but I decided not to use it because then the game feels too fast and you can’t really monitor what’s going on.
Each round takes approximately 3 seconds (unless you win), and you watch the scratchie being scratched. If you win, the win is displayed in the middle of the screen.
After 100 rounds, my bankroll was A$4,889, which means that I lost A$111 (and wagered A$200 in total). Most of the wins were very small (A$1 or A$2), with occasional A$6 wins, but during the first 100 rounds, I never won anything higher than A$6.
Time to go for another 100 rounds. Since you can’t change the bet level, there are no other options to alter, so I had to run the same test again.
This time, however, I had better luck and won A$40 once and A$20. So, my final bankroll after testing the Summer Scratch scratchie was A$4,810, after wagering A$400 in total, indicating an RTP of over 50%. That’s still lower than the claimed 70.10%, but this is an expected outcome for a high-volatility game like this one.
After testing this one and several other scratchies for over 1,000 rounds in total, I never ever came on top, and I never won anything bigger than A$100. Considering that these are all games by reputable providers and I can’t argue that they are rigged, the only conclusion is that their RTP is very low, and unless you get really lucky and win one of the grand prizes, you’ll likely end up in the red. In other words, I wouldn’t play them for more than 10-20 rounds.
Summary: Are Online Scratchies Worth Playing?
In short, no. Online scratchies are not worth playing. It’s not because they’re worse than physical scratchies – they’re equally bad if you ask me, and somehow even more boring. My real issue with them is that the RTP is just much worse than almost any other casino game.
While I see their appeal as a simple game of luck where you might want to try your luck to win a big prize, it doesn’t make any sense to play them longer than that. Admittedly, scratching physical scratchies can be fun, but scratching online scratchies for prolonged periods is not.
Other instant-win games like Crash, Plinko, or Mines can be a lot of fun, and they actually have a higher-than-average RTP, so if you want a break from pokies and table games, you’d be better off playing virtually any other casino game than scratchies.
FAQ
It depends on the game, but most online scratchies have top prizes between 10,000x and 100,000x your stake. On a A$1 scratchie, that usually means a maximum win of around A$50,000 to A$100,000. Obviously, these wins are extremely rare.
Online scratchies usually have a higher RTP than physical ones, but they’re still very low compared to pokies, blackjack, roulette, poker, and almost any other casino game. Physical scratchies often sit around 50% RTP, while online scratchies usually fall between 60% and 70%.
No. Online scratchies don’t use a fixed pool of tickets like standard scratchies. The top prize doesn’t disappear when someone else hits it because each round is generated independently by the RNG.
Latest Articles
Disclaimer: Gambling in Australia is strictly for individuals aged 18+. Our editorial team adheres to a strict policy to ensure that our reviews, recommendations, and content remain objective and free from external influence. We strongly encourage responsible gambling at all times. If you or someone you know is struggling with gambling addiction, visit the following gambling resources:
- https://responsiblewagering.com.au/
- https://www.gamblinghelponline.org.au/
- https://gamblershelp.com.au/get-help/
