Luxor Casino Las Vegas

By Steve Beauregard

Nearly every curious visitor to Las Vegas makes it a point to visit the Luxor at some time during their stay. If you’re like me, you have to go inside the Luxor just to satisfy your curiosity about what the inside of the Strip’s pyramid hotel and casino looks like.

While the Luxor is home to the world’s largest atrium, the casino itself is surprisingly intimate. In other words, not all of the casino space is under an open, monstrous space stretching to the top of the pyramid. The casino floor is attractive, hip, and well-designed, but not in an obstinate way. It’s a casino that is modern, but where low-rollers like me will feel comfortable playing.

While it’s the second largest hotel in Las Vegas (behind the MGM Grand), the Luxor casino is much more relaxed than its giant green cousin to the north and east. You’ll see more casual dress, and more kids here than at the fancier MGM Grand. However blackjack and other table game minimums at the Luxor, are still $10 at night. Depending on the day or time, you may be able to find a $5 dollar table, but it’s becoming increasingly rare at the Luxor.

Because Luxor is part of MGM Resorts, you can use your M-Life Players Card here.

In total, the Luxor has 120,000 square feet of casino space. There is a total of 2,000 slot machines/video poker/other types of games, of which 1,300 are slot machines. You’ll find all of your favorites here, including the Wheel of Fortunes, MegaJackpot, Spin and Win, Triple Diamonds, etc.

Table games include blackjack (shoe and two deck versions), blackjack switch, craps, Roulette, Mini Baccarat, Pai Gow Poker, Let It Ride, Three Card Poker, Caribbean Stud, and Texas Hold’em Bonus Progressive poker, which is a table game against the house, and not the Texas Hold’em you’ll find in the poker room.

They also have the increasingly popular video roulette, video blackjack and $2 video craps.

Like many other Strip properties, every Friday and Saturday night, the Luxor casino has the “Party Pit” going, where you can play blackjack while watching beautiful, scantily-clad women dance just feet away from you on a stage. (Only in Las Vegas would this not seem strange).

Luxor Sports Book

The sports book offers seven different types of teasers and parlay bets with all of the futures bets for the major professional and college sports. As with other sports books in Las Vegas, you can place a sports bet while there, then cash it in later when back home simply by mailing your winning ticket into the Luxor’s sports book.

The Luxor’s 110 seat sports book has 128 individual TVs, along with the giant screens.

While TVs are running and odds are posted 24 hours, the sports book is manned by an actual person able to take bets Sunday through Thursday, from 8 a.m. to 10 p.m., and on Fridays and Saturdays, from 8 a.m. to 11 p.m. The room is non-smoking.

Luxor Poker Room

The poker room is a pleasant, if not splashy den of tourists like me, looking for free drinks and “the nuts” during games of $1/2 no-limit Texas hold’em. Along with the Linq Poker Room and the Flaming, amongst a few others, the Luxor poker room spreads the lowest limit game in town, $2/4 limit.

Those of you playing five hours or more of poker at the Luxor will qualify for the special poker room rate, (call the room at (702) 730-5511 for the latest poker room rate). Players in cash games get $2 per hour in Luxor food comps for every hour of play.

As a room for low-limit players, the Luxor offers affordable, $45 buy-in no-limit hold’em tournaments, five times daily, starting at 10:30 a.m. There are also high-hand bonuses, and a modest bad-beat jackpot that starts at $2,500.

My experience at the Luxor poker room has been nothing but fun, with friendly, low-rolling tourists (like myself) just looking for a fun time at the card table.

Back on the casino front, those of you who are high rollers can apply for a marker (a “marker” is basically credit loaned to you by the casino) online at their website at Luxor.com.

Overall, the Luxor is a fun place to check out, if nothing else but for the fact it’s different than all of the usual-looking Las Vegas Strip casinos. Plus, if you get bored, or find your luck to be lacking, you can always head on over (via the walkways or free Luxor tram to the Excalibur or Mandalay Bay casinos next door. (Photos courtesy of Patrick Rudolph and Graeme MacKay via Flickr).