Should We Use a Bonus Buy or Booster in Slots? The Ultimate Guide
I ran millions of spins to find out what boosters and bonus buys really do
Introduction
Most modern online slots come with built-in Bonus Buy features — and in many cases, multiple types of bonuses are available for purchase. Prices can range from 50x your base bet to 1,000x or more. On top of that, many games also include boosters or enhancers that increase your chances of triggering a bonus or landing a big win.
These features are widely used by streamers. The more expensive the buy or booster, the more frequently they’ll hit flashy wins, generate screenshot-worthy moments, and produce content that grabs attention.
Among regular players, opinions are split. Some swear by Bonus Buys and boosters for the adrenaline rush or perceived +EV, while others avoid them entirely — citing risk, bankroll management, or game flow.
In this guide, we’ll strip away the hype and break things down mathematically. What exactly are you getting when you buy a bonus or activate a booster? When (if ever) is it worth it? And what are the long-term consequences of using these features?
Let’s dive in.
Boosters
Just look at this screen: five different Bonus Buys, five boosters, and in every case — except for God Mode — you also have the option to buy extra spins. That gives you 21 different ways to play this one slot. And depending on which path you take, the experience (and the math) changes dramatically.
Let’s start with the base game — the simplest form of play. No boosters, no Bonus Buys, no extra spins. Just click spin and see what happens.
I ran 9,290,596 demo spins to find out. No, I didn’t waste years of my life doing it manually — an algorithm handled it just fine.
During that time, I hit 4 max wins, giving a hit rate of 1 in 2,322,649.
That’s actually better than the provider’s advertised 1 in 2.9 million — but it’s just variance. With a bigger sample size, we’d likely see it regress to the mean. If we wanted true statistical precision, we’d need hundreds of millions of spins.
Volatility came out to 8.71 — slightly higher than betting on a single number in European roulette. But everything is relative.
Next, I ran the same kind of simulation for the other boosters and summarized everything in a comparison table.
Here we can clearly see that boosters reduce variance and increase the odds of hitting a max win. With the most expensive booster enabled, a max win occurs once every 105 spins on average — but the cost of each spin also skyrockets to 270x your base stake.
Extra spin
Now let’s look at the exact same setup — but this time, we keep buying extra spins until we either hit the max win or go bust.
Interestingly, the game’s official rules mention that “buying extra spins is not optimal” — but they don’t tell you just how suboptimal it really is.
For context
Here are some x5,000 hit rates from other popular slots:
Dead or Alive 2: High Noon Saloon (NetEnt) — 1 in 118,000
Tombstone: Slaughter Spins (NoLimit City) — 1 in 162,956
Gates of Olympus (Pragmatic Play) — 1 in 718,391
Bigger Bass Splash (Pragmatic Play) — 1 in 1,683,555
Sugar Rush (Pragmatic Play) — 1 in 2,340,000
Bonus buy
Now let’s do the same with the Bonus Buys. I ran several million bonus rounds in demo mode and analyzed the average results.
What we see here is that the volatility in most Bonus Buy modes is close to 1 — roughly equivalent to betting on red or black in roulette. You’re not likely to hit life-changing wins, but you’re playing at significantly higher stakes.
One mode worth highlighting is God Mode, where you either hit Max Win once every 6 buys or get nothing at all. But there’s a catch: it costs 911x to enter. That means your 5,051x Max Win is effectively just a 5.5x return when you factor in the cost of entry.
So what does this tell us?
Bonus Buys massively reduce volatility — almost to zero. That makes it much harder to significantly grow your balance, but it also pulls your results quickly toward the expected RTP. In other words, variance fades, and the long-term math takes over much faster — just like betting on red or black in European roulette: you won’t double your bankroll anytime soon, but you also won’t face long dry spells or wild swings.
The trade-off? You’re forced to play at much higher stakes — often 10x to 100x higher than in the base game. On the upside, Bonus Buys give you a much higher chance of hitting a Max Win, and they’re also a safe way to clear wagering requirements. For example, you could theoretically wager a million with only ~4% expected losses if the Bonus Buy RTP is 96%.
Now, let’s see if these patterns hold across other slots.
Key Takeaways
There’s no simple yes-or-no answer to whether you should use Bonus Buys or boosters. But here’s what you need to know from a mathematical standpoint:
Some boosters — especially extra spins — can quietly reduce RTP by up to 20%, and this isn’t disclosed anywhere in the slot’s info panel.
Many Bonus Buys — particularly high-cost, high-volatility options — are well-suited for chasing max wins quickly, often giving you a shot at 5,000x+ payouts within just a few hundred attempts.
All Bonus Buys accelerate bankroll depletion, due to lower variance and significantly higher bet sizes compared to the base game. You’re paying more for more frequent action — and burning through your balance faster.
In some low-volatility Bonus Buys (SD < 3), hitting a Max Win is virtually impossible, even across millions of spins. These modes offer smoother play — but severely cap your upside.
Do You Buy Bonus Features or Boosters?
Does your experience line up with the math?
Have you found certain modes more profitable — or more punishing — than expected?
Share your thoughts in the comments — I’d love to hear how your results compare.
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