1. A slit or narrow opening, especially one for receiving something such as a coin or letter. 2. A position in a team’s offense, usually between the wide receiver and the tight end. Also called slot corner.
3. A space in a vehicle or airplane for stowing cargo. 4. A place to put money in a machine, such as a casino.
Until recently, most slot machines accepted only cash or paper tickets with barcodes as payment, but today, you can also use advance deposits of credit to play games. In either case, the machine converts them into game credits that activate motors to spin the reels. A random-number generator decides where the reels stop, but it does so based on the randomized odds for each possible combination of symbols, and no two players are ever guaranteed to hit the same jackpot in the same amount of time. It is not uncommon to see the same jackpot winner several times within minutes, but it’s not a sign that they had the split-second timing advantage that would guarantee they’d win every time they played.