Here at CDN we like to keep our clients happy on both sides of the ‘divide’, if that’s the right word.

Actually divide isn’t the best choice of word because it implies some sort of tension or opposition, which is precisely what the online casino welcome bonus avoids – in fact it aims to bring us all together, players, casinos, and those in the middle.

What do we mean by casino welcome bonuses though? You may have heard the axiom ‘don’t have money? Use other people’s money’ – and as some of you already know, but for others it might still come as a surprise, online gambling sites actually do just that, offering you money to play for free.

But that’s precisely what the best casino welcome bonus does. In other words, you join, register, make a deposit and get money to play with!

Here’s how it works: you find a free welcome bonus casino with our site, and depending on the terms and conditions (which we’ll explain in plain terms by the way) the casino matches the amount of money you deposit with an equivalent amount.

Typically amounts would be 100% up to around €250. So if you made a €50 deposit, the free welcome bonus would be €50 as well, giving you €100 to play with.

Similarly if you deposited €250 it would be topped up with a further €250, giving you €500 to play with.

Of course, if the limit is €250, you can still deposit more, it just means that the free money you get to play with will not exceed €250, so if you deposit €1,000 you’d then have €1,250 to play with!

That’s not all, there is also such thing as a no deposit welcome bonus out there. This is exactly as the name would suggest, a welcome bonus which doesn’t even require you to make a deposit – you just open up an account and start playing at the casino with the free money you received!

But wait a minute we hear you cry, surely a free welcome bonus no deposit required comes with strings attached? The casino isn’t just going to give you money with no catch?

Well, yes and no. Yes, in the sense that you can’t simply withdraw the welcome bonus no deposit (or with a deposit for that matter) which a casino gives you straightaway. Otherwise what would stop players from simply opening up an account, withdrawing the bonus from their account and never visiting the casino site again!

Casinos have to make a living too, and pay their staff and welcome bonus ‘abuse’ is something which we can all do without. And unfortunately there are a few unscrupulous characters out there who do just that and who spoil it for the rest of us. So there are a few small hoops when it comes to a welcome bonus online casino which we need to jump through.

Principally, you will usually see in a casino’s terms and conditions something called ‘wagering requirements’ with usually a multiplier, typically from around x15 to around x40 or so, before you can withdraw any bonus money or any winnings from the bonus money.

This means that you have to ‘play through’ the bonus a set number of times. So for instance if there is a x20 wagering requirement on your welcome offer of €100, that means you have to wager that €100 a total of 20 times.

That sounds like a lot? 20 x 100 is €2,000, so that means I have to in fact put in €2,000 right? Wrong – it means you have to wager that much money, not that you have to deposit more money – after all, what would be the point of having a welcome bonus if it was simply a prerequisite to get you to dposit more money before making any gains?

Think of the wagering requirements like this: you have to wager 100 over 20 times, say you are playing slots (slots are best for getting through the wagering requirements rapidly, by the way), at €1 stakes. You put in €1, spin the reels, nothing happens…do that 3 more times, so you have wagered €4, then you get a modest win of €10.

Continue wagering that 10 that you have won, €1 per spin 9 times, by that time you have made 13 spins (the original 4 spins before your €10 win, plus 9 more spins from that €10 winning) yet put in only €4.

So in other words in the above example you have wagered €13, even though you only staked €4 of your own money. Then let’s say on the 10th spin from your previous win, you make another win of €200…you play that through at 1 per time and you have wagered 200 without making a single further deposit. So by that time you’ve wagered €213, with only putting €4 in the slot! And that’s not taking into account further winnngs which can accrue during those 200 spins (which with a high variance slot game in particular, will happen plenty of times).

In short, you can get through the wagering requirements using winnings from a slot, and everything after that is yours to keep – so if you have a 1000 bankroll at the end of the x20 wagering, it’s your money to withdraw!

Don’t worry if all this seems a bit mind-boggling or if you are worried about the varying terms and conditions; we outline all that on our site both for individual casinos and any special offers a casino can make at any time.

So be sure to regularly check back for news about any casino welcome bonus no deposit and welcome offers with a deposit for that matter, and kick-start your gaming career using bonus money!