How We Rate and Review Casinos, Sportsbooks & Other Gambling Sites
Here at PlayMichigan, we cover online gambling in MI from a variety of angles, including providing thoughtful, detailed reviews of all the sites currently available in the state. Our expert staff tests each site we review, often over a long period, then shares what we find to guide Michigan players toward the best, most entertaining, and safest online gambling sites. We aren’t just compiling information about sites you can find somewhere else — we share with you our firsthand experience and tell you what we really think.
We create accounts, deposit our own money, play the games, try to take advantage of bonuses and promotions, request withdrawals, and interact with customer support as part of our overall testing. Our reviewers have extensive and varied backgrounds in the gambling industry and so understand in great detail how sites are created and presented, how games work, and other aspects of the business of online gambling. We’re also gamblers who have played many casino games, bet on sports, competed in poker tournaments, and gained extensive hands-on experience that we draw on to provide trustworthy, thorough, and genuinely useful reviews.
Read on to learn more about our reviewing process and what goes into our ratings of Michigan online gambling sites on PlayMichigan.
Our criteria for evaluating online gambling sites
We always review online casinos, online sportsbooks, poker sites, and other types of online gambling from the customer’s perspective. We are ourselves casino game fans, sports bettors, and poker players. Some of us like to buy lottery tickets, bet on horse races, and engage in other forms of gambling, too. We enjoy gambling on these sites and, like everyone else, are focused on the value and entertainment that can come from such activities.
Like most users, we are concerned about the safety and integrity of these sites and mindful of the importance of avoiding undesirable risks. We know responsible gambling is a two-way street. No matter the stakes, gamblers must always be disciplined and careful. Meanwhile, the sites that provide gambling opportunities should also always do so in ways that promote gambling responsibly. All of these factors are considered in our review process.
When it comes to specific criteria, these differ somewhat depending on whether we are reviewing an online casino, an online sportsbook, an online poker site, or another type of gambling product. That said, there are a few common areas we tend to always focus on. These include:
How we rate different types of online gambling sites
Most of our reviews are of online casinos, online sportsbooks, and online poker sites. Michigan has many of each site type, so we aim to help readers discover the best examples through our detailed reviews. Below, I’ve broken down some of the more specific measures we look at regarding these different types of sites.
Online Casinos Review Criteria
Welcome Offer & Ongoing Promos
Quality of sign-up offer and other casino bonuses, free spins, deposit match offers, wagering requirements, recurring promotions, and loyalty rewards.
Getting Started
Registration process, account verification, ease of use, licensing information, security measures, and responsible gaming tools.
Website & App Experience
Site speed, game loading times, navigation, mobile performance, geolocation accuracy, and overall reliability.
Game Variety & Quality
Library size, game diversity, stake ranges, slots, jackpot games, table games, live dealer titles, and exclusive content.
Payments & Banking
Deposit and withdrawal methods, processing speeds, minimum and maximum limits, transaction reliability, and account security.
Customer Support
Support channels, live chat availability, response times, quality of assistance, self-help resources, and overall accessibility.
Online Sportsbooks Review Criteria
Welcome Offer & Ongoing Boosts, Promos & Features
Sign-up offer value, bonus bet structure, deposit match terms, odds boosts, profit boosts, free-to-play contests, and recurring promotions.
Website & App Experience
Site design, ease of navigation, betslip functionality, account management tools, streaming features, and overall performance.
Bet Types & Markets
Sports coverage, league selection, market depth, player props, futures, same-game parlays, and overall betting variety.
Live Betting Experience
Live market availability, in-play odds updates, cash-out options, speed of wager acceptance, and overall usability during live events.
Payments & Banking
Deposit and withdrawal options, processing speeds, transaction limits, payout reliability, and account security measures.
Customer Support
Support availability, live chat responsiveness, contact methods, self-service resources, issue resolution, and overall accessibility.
Online Poker Sites Review Criteria
Welcome Bonus & Ongoing Promotions
Deposit match bonuses, tournament tickets, freerolls, leaderboard races, loyalty rewards, and other recurring player incentives.
Software & Mobile Experience
Lobby organization, game filters, customization options, multi-tabling functionality, software performance, geolocation accuracy, and overall usability of both the website and poker app.
Poker Variants
Availability of Texas Hold’em, Omaha, Stud, mixed games, specialty formats, and the overall variety of poker options.
Cash Games & Tournament Selection
Table formats, stake ranges, Sit & Go offerings, tournament schedules, guaranteed prize pools, and special tournament structures.
Game Integrity & Player Security
Anti-collusion measures, bot detection, account security, fair-play policies, responsible gaming tools, and overall trustworthiness.
Payments & Customer Support
Deposit and withdrawal options, payout speeds, transaction limits, support availability, response quality, and issue resolution.
Mobile apps, websites & overall user experience
We believe a great gambling site should provide a smooth, reliable experience regardless of how you choose to play. Whether you’re spinning slots, placing sports wagers, joining a poker tournament, or horse-betting, the platform should be intuitive, responsive, and easy to navigate from the moment you log in.
When evaluating web-based platforms on desktop or laptop computers, we focus on speed, organization, and usability. We assess how easily users can find games, betting markets, promotions, account settings, and cashier options, and test overall performance and stability in real-world use.
Mobile apps are just as important, if not more so, for many players today. We test each platform on phones and tablets to assess app quality, loading times, navigation, live betting functionality, and whether the mobile experience delivers the same features and reliability available on desktop.
Hands-on testing and expert analysis
When I say our reviews are “hands-on,” what does that mean? First of all, you’ll notice that our reviews all have bylines and are written in the first person. When you read one, you can tell the reviewer has actually played on the casino site, or placed wagers at the sportsbook, or taken a seat at the virtual poker tables. These are “firsthand” reviews, resulting from the writer actually signing up, risking real money playing games or making wagers, and sharing thoughts about the experience and how the site compares to others.
1. Registering an account and making a deposit
We go through the hoops, create an account, deposit funds, and approach the entire experience as any new customer would. You can learn a lot about a site simply by trying to create an account, including important information about its security. You can be assured that if we encounter anything unusual during this stage, we’ll report it in the review.
Making a deposit helps us become familiar with the site’s available banking methods and the process it uses to facilitate transactions. Most legal and regulated sites (which are the only ones we review) tend to handle banking similarly, but we’ll definitely let you know if anything out of the ordinary happens. We’ll also often make a withdrawal later to test any extra verification steps and payout speeds.
2. Testing the site
We don’t simply open up a site and look it over. We actually gamble on the sites. If it is an online casino, we play the slots, table games, and live dealer games (and whatever else is there). If it is a sportsbook, we’ll place some wagers. If it is one of the Michigan poker sites, we’ll sit down at some cash tables and enter some tournaments.
Going through these steps helps reveal the variety of offerings a site offers and its functionality. We also always check both the web-based platform and the mobile app to see how well the site performs each way.
3. Verifying site claims
I have personally spent more time than I’d care to admit actually counting the number of games on a given online casino. (It’s not as hard as it looks, by the way, but it can be tedious.) I remember once seeing a site advertise that it had “over 1,200 games,” but after counting all the slots, table games, and live dealer titles, finding out it actually only had about 700.
All of which is to say, we double-check any claims a site makes about its various features. We don’t just pass along information as provided by the operator. We make sure.
4. Judging value and potential risks & rewards
Gambling always involves risk, and it would be irresponsible to suggest otherwise. Even so, if you spend time on a gambling site and study it closely, you can usually figure out if there is any value to be had. Helping readers learn how a particular gambling site presents risks and rewards can be one of the most important things we can share in a review.
I’m a big fan of bonuses and promotions that let me “stretch” my playing bankroll in different ways. When betting on sports, I always check the current promos before submitting a wager to see if there are any boosts I can apply to the betslip. Our reviewers always do the same by seeking out the best RTP slots (for example), special promotions, loyalty programs, and more, and evaluating whether they really offer added value.
5. Asking questions of customer support
We make it a regular feature of our reviews to share exchanges with customer support via live chat, phone, or email. Checking with support about various site features does double-duty, really, as it helps us confirm certain details about the site while also letting us test how responsive and useful support is (or isn’t).
We love it when we can interact with a real, live human agent right away, and when we do, we’ll share notes from that interaction in our reviews. We’ll also let you know if the FAQ section on a site is comprehensive and up-to-date or just a superficial collection of unhelpful or overly general pages.
Keeping our reviews accurate and current
You might have noticed near the top of each of our reviews how we include details letting you know:
- who wrote the review
- who fact-checked the review
- when the review was last updated
The reviewer’s name is always listed, along with a photo. That is to say, you’ll never encounter anonymous reviews by “PlayMichigan Staff” or the like. The person who fact-checked the reviewer is also named, with a photo.
We additionally let you know when the review was last updated, since we regularly revisit reviews to reflect any changes to the sites. We’ll also revise our ratings if the changes to a site affect how we evaluate it.
Online casinos, in particular, are always adding new games and features, and we try to keep this information up to date. Hard Rock Bet Casino (for example) went live in Michigan at the end of 2025 and has been adding games at a rapid pace. We’ve been reporting on that growth in our News section, but we have also been updating the review so new readers get an accurate picture of just how big the library has become at Hard Rock Bet Casino.
Sportsbooks and poker sites are constantly evolving, and major changes can significantly affect the user experience. Recent examples include the rebranding of ESPN Bet Sportsbook as theScore Bet and the launch of PokerStars on FanDuel, both of which introduced substantial changes to site navigation, account management, and overall platform design. All sites add new sportsbook promos and other features (hopefully) to improve bettors’ experiences.
Also, we’re always updating the welcome offers and promotions as described in all of our reviews. That way, you know when you see a particular offer, it is current at the time you’re reading it.
The 5-star system: How we calculate our ratings
You’ve probably noticed that our reviews include both an “Overall Rating” and separate ratings for the most important categories that matter to users. Each of these ratings is on a 5-star scale, with 5 stars being the highest.
For example, to the left is an image showing our grades for one of our top recommended Michigan online casinos. All categories have ratings, and the overall score is the average of those ratings. We list these ratings at the top of all our reviews, and again down the page as we explore each category separately.
The overall rating (4.6) for this online casino is good, and you can see that in some areas the site ranks even higher. The welcome offer for this site, for example, is one of the absolute best we’ve seen, so it earns an especially high mark (4.9).
By the way, since welcome offers change, we will often update the review not only to reflect the current offer but also the rating if the new offer is better or worse. That’s true for other categories as well. If a casino greatly expands and improves its game library, for instance, we may revisit and perhaps revise that category rating.
To give you an idea of what the different figures tend to mean, below is our general grading rubric:
- 4.6 to 5.0 — Best-in-class performance with few, if any, meaningful drawbacks. These sites excel across nearly every area we evaluate and stand out as leaders in their category.
- 4.3 to 4.5 — Strong, well-rounded sites that perform above average in most areas. While they may have a minor weakness (or a couple), they still provide an excellent overall experience.
- 4.0 to 4.2 — Good, reliable sites that meet or exceed expectations in key areas. We recommend them with confidence, though they do not quite match the strongest performers in the market.
- 3.5 to 3.9 — Solid and functional, but missing a notable feature, benefit, or area of quality that many competing sites provide. Most users will find them satisfactory, though there is clear room for improvement.
- 3.0 to 3.4 — Below-average performance in one or more important categories, such as features, content selection, usability, promotions, or customer support. While still usable, these shortcomings significantly impact the overall experience.
- Below 3.0 — A failing grade that indicates serious deficiencies or concerns. We generally do not recommend sites that receive ratings in this range.
Transparency and editorial integrity
At PlayMichigan, we believe readers deserve to know who is reviewing gambling sites and how those reviews are created. That’s why our reviews include the author’s byline, reviewer bio, and the date the page was last updated, giving you clear information about who conducted the review and when the content was last verified.
We also believe in being transparent about our business model. As an affiliate website, we may earn a commission when readers click through to a gambling site and sign up, but our reviews remain independently written and editorially controlled. We evaluate every site using the same criteria, highlight both strengths and weaknesses, and assign ratings based on our genuine assessment of the overall experience.
Responsible gambling is another important part of our review process. We look for tools such as deposit limits, self-exclusion programs, time reminders, and other responsible gaming features, while also evaluating how effectively operators promote safe play. Our goal is not only to help readers find quality gambling sites but also to encourage informed, responsible gambling habits.
What we don’t do in our reviews
I’ve spent a lot of time talking about what we do in our reviews. By way of further clarification, here are things we don’t do when reviewing online gambling sites:
- We don’t review unregulated or illegal gambling sites. Every site we review must be legal and licensed for Michigan players.
- We don’t publish reviews of sites we can’t test ourselves. Our evaluations are based on firsthand experience and real-world testing, not assumptions or marketing claims.
- We don’t give high ratings simply because a site is a partner or advertiser. Our review scores are based on our testing and evaluation criteria, not commercial relationships.
- We don’t ignore weaknesses or negative user experiences when evaluating a site. We aim to present a balanced assessment that highlights both strengths and areas for improvement.
- We don’t rank sites based solely on the size of their bonuses or promotions. Factors such as usability, game selection, betting options, banking, and customer support are equally important.
- We don’t recommend sites that fail to meet our standards for safety, security, or responsible gambling. Protecting players and promoting safe gambling practices are essential parts of our review process.
Putting players first: Our approach to reviews and ratings
At PlayMichigan, our goal when evaluating operators is simple. We aim to help Michigan players find safe, reliable, and entertaining gambling sites through honest, well-researched reviews. By combining hands-on testing, clear evaluation criteria, ongoing updates, and editorial independence, we strive to provide information readers can trust. Whether you’re looking for an online casino, sportsbook, poker site, or another gambling platform, our reviews are designed to help you make informed decisions with confidence.
