Card Rooms
There are more than 100 card rooms in California ranging in size from one table to over 200 tables. There are eight large card rooms in the metropolitan Los Angeles area and seven large card rooms in the San Francisco Bay Area. California law allows card rooms to play a variety of card games and the rooms have no stake in the outcome of any of these games. Players play against each other and pay a fee for use of the facilities. The three main types of games are: variations of poker such as Hold Em and different variations of stud poker; California (Asian) games such as pai gow and two-handed poker; and different versions of a game resembling Blackjack that is called California Blackjack, 21st Century Blackjack.
California law allows player banked games, whereby one player can act as the banker and play against the other players at the table. This format is used in the California (Asian) games and the Blackjack type games. There are no limits on stakes in most card rooms in California, so games range in size from $1-2 up to pot limit Hold Em games. Many of the card rooms have full food and beverage services and are located close to major airports and freeways. Following is a list of the major card rooms in California. In parentheses after the name of each card room is the number of tables available at each facility.
