Our Top 10 Female-Orientated Gaming Sites
Recent studies and figures are showing that women of all ages are increasingly participating in online gaming. With many women juggling careers, social lives and often family commitments as well it comes as no surprise that many of them are enjoying the escapism and excitement offered on the slots and tables. Not all the casino operators have recognised this yet though, and still offer sites that are clearly male-orientated – so to make things a little easier for aspiring women gamers, here are our top 10 female-friendly sites to play at:
Mr Green’s
The female appeal of this site isn’t that it’s girly in any way: It isn’t at all, but by making it non-specific to either gender they’ve actually done what any self-respecting, contemporary career girl actually wants, which is not to be patronised. In the same way that kids generally hate it when products are cynically tailored to suit what marketing focus groups think they want, many women just want gender to be left out of the equation and that’s exactly why this site is ideal for female gamers. It’s played in your browser, allowing you to shop around easily – and they’ve a top-notch reputation for payout speeds, minimal small print and good customer service.
Freya Bingo and Casino
Tastefully rendered with an impressive autumnal feel, Freya Casino and Bingo is easy on the eye for all the right reasons. Obviously aware of the casino-playing potential of existing female bingo players, this site offers a non-macho, comforting environment to learn the ropes with dozens of slots and a bloke-sized complement of table and videopoker offerings, all from Microgaming. There’s even an abnormally easy-to-find tuition section, but what you won’t find is the usual download prompt you generally get with Microgaming. It’s actually the most tasteful and user-friendly site Flash site we‘ve ever seen from the software giant, and won’t drive the men away either – once they’ve got past the name of the site and it’s bingo tie-in…
21 Nova
Aimed squarely at the youth market, this is where aspiring models, celebrities and WAGs should play. It administers a healthy injection of hedonistic glamour without any patronising bling, helping it stay the right side of the taste barrier without resorting to too much unnecessary sobriety. If 21 Nova were a drink it would be a glass of white wine – but definitely not a cheap Aussie Chardonnay…
Foxy Casino
Foxy have a head start over all their competitors in the UK market that they’re clearly aiming for: Their bingo sister site sponsors The Jeremy Kyle Show, making Foxy one of the best-known gaming brands in the UK, period. It’s unashamedly glitzy, fun and brash but delivers on all fronts with 9 types of Roulette and Blackjack plus 14 videopoker games on top of 50-odd slots from IGT/Wagerworks. Any young or young-at-heart females who enjoy painting the town red every Friday night and need a guilty pleasure for those hangover days need look no further.
Ruby Fortune
This site may have more shades of purple than a day-old bruise, but it’s actually really something to look at, and makes a point of telling us that it’s fair, easy, safe and fun. Females looking to start gaming will invariably be wise to some of the online retail tricks that are employed to lure shoppers into dodgy deals, and will often be understandably wary of signing up to a casino site so Ruby, with it’s reassuring strapline, makes a natural choice – and that’s before you realise that it’s a member of the Palace Group, easily the most well known Microgaming operator with several casinos to its name, all sharing the same economies of scale in respect of customer service, security and gaming ethics.
Maria Casino
Fresh and contemporary, with no hint whatsoever of dark colouring or neon-lit promises of illicit pleasure, Maria is a real breath of fresh air – and what’s more it’s a Net Entertainment site as well. Net now offer what are considered by most industry pundits to be the best slots and table games on the web, and as they use Flash technology you can play without having to download. The games are inspired by all manner of ideas with no gender bias, and the site even has its own tabs for chatting, sharing recipes and more…
Betvictor
High street betting legend Victor Chandler has been synonymous with a traditional target audience of male punters for as long as any of us can remember, however the Gentleman Bookmaker’s site actually has a female-only section: Go to the slots tab and you’ll find Ladies Night, offering games like Flowers, The X-Factor, Hot City, Cherry Blossoms and Secret Admirer. Using an established bookie like Chandler also gives that extra reassurance that you’re dealing with an outfit that know exactly what they’re doing and will pay up promptly when you win.
Spin and Win
The byword for this site is Fun, with a capital ‘F’. It’s a no-download Microgaming site dressed up in a cartoon, tabloid style that’s like nothing else out there and is as far as you can get from the traditional, chrome and leather vibe that puts so many women off gaming sites. There’s even a 3d world due to make its debut shortly, allowing you to roam and chat in a virtual lobby whilst wearing your own, custom-designed avatar. There’s a whole host of fun promos and some enticing scratchcard giveaways when you sign up, as well as a £20 free cash award to start playing with before you’ve even deposited.
Pink Lady
The name says it all here: This welcoming site uses pink and white backgrounds exclusively with a host of fun, original games from little-known games maker GCTV. There are about 50 slots, a great horse racing game and a full quota of table games. Female-orientated sites can sometimes be a little short of decent table and card games, but not this one: Apart from the usual games there’s Pai Gow Poker, Red Dog, Casino War and even Craps, which you’ll struggle to find elsewhere except on selected Playtech sites.
The outstanding feature here, though, is the mobile application facility: Pink Lady let you download any of their game apps onto your iPhone via iTunes, lifting their site head and shoulders above the competition who generally only offer a maximum of 18 or 19 games for phone use. With female mobile gaming use exploding at present, this serves as a major plus point.
Manhattan Slots
This is the Sex and the City casino in everything but name, as the snapshot below demonstrates. Aimed at ladies who lunch, girls who shop and women of all ages who love their credit card as much as they love chocolate cupcakes, this highly-original site is unashamedly feminine in every way. Other sites may market themselves at females but men can play as well: Not here. Any regular guy winning a jackpot here would rather forgo the cash than admit he played here, so hats off to the designers for coming up with a genuine women-only site. With a full range of games including slot titles like Food Fight and Mid-life Crisis they’ve hit a winner, and we predict that this site will grow exponentially as word gets out that there’s a new girl on the block.
Sites like these could easily become all the rage soon, but we suspect that the increased number of female gamers betting from Smartphones and similar devices will result in more female-friendly sites that are mobile-only. Our advice to aspiring lady gamers, though, is simply to find a non-download site that offers practice play and a welcome bonus with low playthrough requirements. Then, once you’ve learned the ropes the gaming world will be your oyster…
