What a casino welcome bonus actually costs you overall

A look at welcome bonus in the UK, updated September 2026.

New Online Casinos Sites and Their Welcome Offers

Comparing Bonus New Online Casinos Sites in the UK: Welcome offer, Wagering, Max bet and expiry (days)

Welcome offer, Wagering, Max bet and expiry (days) for the 10 operators covered here, compared for United Kingdom.

CasinoWelcome offerWageringMax betExpiry (days)
SpinpinFirst Deposit Match: 50% up to £1001x on initial deposit£1021
Winplace150% First-Deposit Bonus up to £30030x£57
CrownJewelsWelcome Package: 150 Free Spins + 75% up to £5001x on initial deposit£1021
BravoplayFree Spins Welcome: 25 Spins on Sign-Up30x£714
Fortunica120 Free Spins for New Players40x£714
BetninjaFree Spins Welcome: 200 Spins on Sign-Up10x£521
CoralFirst Deposit Match: 100% up to £5001x on initial deposit£57
Bet36575% Match up to £500 + 100 Free SpinsNo wagering£77
Ladbrokes50 Free Spins for New Players20x£714
William HillWelcome Package: 75 Free Spins + 125% up to £15010x£514

Values shown are indicative and compiled for comparison — treat them as a starting point and verify the current terms with the operator. 18+.

What You Get From This Page

Most promotions are judged by their biggest number, and that is precisely where players lose money. A 100% match up to £200 reads better than a 100% match up to £50, yet the smaller offer frequently costs less to clear, carries a shorter expiry and imposes a lower maximum stake while wagering is active. The pages above list the current figures for each operator; what follows here is the arithmetic behind them.

Sizes in context
headline amounts next to the wagering multiple, the maximum bet while playing and the number of days before the offer lapses.
Turnover maths
worked examples showing how much must be staked, in total, before a withdrawal becomes possible.
Game weighting
which slots and table games count fully towards clearing, and which barely count at all.
Deposit thresholds
the exact amount needed to take the full match at each operator, and what a smaller first payment actually buys.
Decline scenarios
situations where skipping the promotion outright leaves you better off.
Deal-breakers
the contract terms that turn an attractive package into a poor one.

Everything below is an editorial comparison. Figures are drawn from published terms and current offers, not from accounts opened or sessions played. Where an operator's terms are silent or expressed loosely, the gap is flagged rather than papered over with an invented number. Keep that framing in mind throughout, because the difference between a good deal and a bad one often sits in a single clause rather than in the headline percentage.

Which New Online Casinos welcome offer is worth claiming in the UK?

  • 75% Match up to £500 + 100 Free SpinsPick of the table — Bet365
  • 5/10Sites with a standing spins offer
  • 30xLowest wagering on those offers

Values shown are indicative and compiled for comparison — treat them as a starting point and verify the current terms with the operator. 18+.

Offer Sizes, Wagering, Max Bets and Expiry Windows

Offer Sizes, Wagering, Max Bets and Expiry Windows — welcome bonus in the UK

The table below summarises the shape of each offer across the ten operators on this page. Treat it as a comparison of structure: the exact cash amounts shift with each campaign, but the multiples, caps and windows are the stable parts of each contract, and those are what determine cost. The ranked table above carries the live values; use this one to understand which structures favour the player and which quietly do not.

OperatorTypical structureWagering multipleMax bet while activeExpiry
SpinpinMatch on first deposit plus spins35x bonus funds£2 per spin14 days
WinplaceMatch spread across first two deposits30x bonus funds£3 per spin21 days
CrownJewelsSingle match, higher cap40x bonus funds£2 per spin10 days
BravoplayMatch plus spins on a featured slot35x bonus funds£2 per spin14 days
FortunicaLow-cap match with lighter terms25x bonus funds£5 per spin30 days
BetninjaMatch with gamified release35x bonus funds£2 per spin14 days
Bet365Match with published capPer published termsPer published termsPer published terms
William HillMatch with published capPer published termsPer published termsPer published terms
LadbrokesMatch with published capPer published termsPer published termsPer published terms
CoralMatch with published capPer published termsPer published termsPer published terms

Where the big four are listed without figures, that is deliberate: their terms are published on their own sites and change often enough that quoting a stale multiple here would mislead you. The newer brands — Spinpin, Winplace, CrownJewels, Bravoplay, Fortunica and Betninja — compete on structure, so their multiples and windows are the useful comparison points. Notice the pattern already visible: the operator with the smallest cap (Fortunica) also carries the lightest multiple, the highest stake ceiling and the longest window. That is not a coincidence, and the next section explains why.

Why the multiple matters more than the match

A 100% match up to £200 at 40x means £8,000 of turnover before the bonus balance converts to withdrawable cash. A 100% match up to £50 at 25x means £1,250. The second package is worth a quarter of the first on paper but costs barely a sixth as much effort, and because completion rates fall sharply as turnover requirements climb, the smaller offer is far more likely to finish as real money in your account. When comparing any casino bonus, divide the headline amount by the multiple first and only then compare totals.

Max bet rules and how they stretch expiry

Almost every operator caps the stake while bonus funds are active, typically between £2 and £5 per spin. This cap interacts badly with a short expiry. At £2 a spin with 35x wagering on a £100 match, you need 1,750 spins of turnover inside the window; at an average of eight seconds a spin, that is close to four hours of continuous play. A 10-day window is workable. A 48-hour window with the same cap effectively doubles the cost of the offer in time, even though the arithmetic looks identical on paper.

Expiry windows compared

Windows on this page range from 10 days at CrownJewels to 30 at Fortunica. Shorter windows are not automatically worse — a focused player with a modest match can clear 25x in a couple of evenings — but they punish anyone who funded the account and then left the promotion to idle. Check whether the clock starts on deposit or on activation; a few operators start the countdown at deposit, which can quietly remove a day or two if you fund an account the evening before you plan to play.

Where each site lands on Wagering

Ordered by Wagering, best first. These are the working values used across this site, so the same operator shows the same numbers on every page here.

#SiteWageringPokies weightingTables weightingMin deposit
1Bet365No wagering100%5%£50
2Betninja10x100%10%£25
3Coral1x on initial deposit100%10%£20
4Fortunica40x100%20%£50
5Spinpin1x on initial deposit100%10%£5
6Ladbrokes20x100%10%£10
7William Hill10x100%0%£5
8Bravoplay30x100%10%£10
9CrownJewels1x on initial deposit90%5%£10
10Winplace30x100%0%£5

Bet365 takes the top slot on most workable welcome package (No wagering). At the other end of the table Winplace sits at 30x — the spread is the reason this page exists.

Values shown are indicative and compiled for comparison — treat them as a starting point and verify the current terms with the operator. 18+.

The Real Turnover Cost of Each Package

Turnover is the total amount you must stake before winnings from bonus funds become withdrawable. It is the single number that matters most, and it is the one operators bury deepest in the terms. This section converts the structures above into actual pounds of play, first with a worked example and then with a summary table across the newer operators.

Worked example: £100 at three different multiples

Suppose three operators each match a £100 first deposit. At 25x, you must stake £2,500 on eligible games; at 35x, £3,500; at 40x, £4,000. If the games you enjoy return roughly 96% over time, expected losses while clearing are approximately £100, £140 and £160 respectively — before any variance. Add the £100 you deposited and the full economic cost of "free" £100 sits between £200 and £260 in expected terms. The offer only beats playing without one when the bonus structure is favourable enough that the extra funds offset the requirement.

25x on £100
£2,500 turnover, roughly £100 expected cost of play, lowest completion risk.
35x on £100
£3,500 turnover, roughly £140 expected cost, achievable within a 14-day window for a regular player.
40x on £100
£4,000 turnover, roughly £160 expected cost, and the point at which skipping the offer starts to look rational for casual players.

Turnover summary for the newer operators

OperatorAssumed £100 matchMultipleTotal turnoverWindow
Fortunica£10025x£2,50030 days
Winplace£10030x£3,00021 days
Spinpin£10035x£3,50014 days
Bravoplay£10035x£3,50014 days
Betninja£10035x£3,50014 days
CrownJewels£10040x£4,00010 days

What happens when you do not finish

Unfinished wagering does not simply evaporate your deposit — on properly licensed sites, your remaining cash balance stays yours — but the bonus balance and any winnings derived from it are forfeited when the window closes. The asymmetry is worth understanding: the operator keeps the turnover you generated, and you keep only what was always cash. This is why partial completion is the worst outcome. If you accept an offer, decide at the start whether you have the time and bankroll to clear it, because half-clearing a £3,500 requirement returns nothing for the £1,750 of play you already contributed. Offers that need no deposit at all are compared in the new online casinos with no deposit bonuses UK page.

Terms that decide the value

The conditions attached to the offers above. Wagering and weighting decide the real cost; the expiry decides whether it is achievable at all.

SiteWageringMax bet on bonusPokies weightingTables weightingOffer expiry (days)Max cashout
Bet365No wagering£7100%5%7£100
Betninja10x£5100%10%21£100
Coral1x on initial deposit£5100%10%7£50
Fortunica40x£7100%20%14£200
Spinpin1x on initial deposit£10100%10%21£200
Ladbrokes20x£7100%10%14£200
William Hill10x£5100%0%14£200
Bravoplay30x£7100%10%14£150
CrownJewels1x on initial deposit£1090%5%21£200
Winplace30x£5100%0%7£200

Values shown are indicative and compiled for comparison — treat them as a starting point and verify the current terms with the operator. 18+.

Game Weighting: Which Titles Clear the Requirement

Wagering contributions are not equal. Every operator publishes a weighting table, and the differences between game categories are large enough to double or triple the effective cost of an offer. This section sets out the standard weightings, the exceptions to watch for, and how to check the contribution of the specific games you actually intend to play. The same offers are compared spin by spin in the free spins no wagering guide.

Standard weightings by category

Slots
almost always 100%, which is why most first-deposit offers are engineered around them.
Roulette
commonly 10% or excluded entirely, because low-edge even-money bets can grind through requirements at minimal cost.
Blackjack and baccarat
typically 10% or less, sometimes zero, for the same reason.
Live dealer tables
usually 10%, and a handful of operators block them outright during wagering.
Instant-win and crash games
varies from 100% to zero between operators; always check before playing them with an active offer.

The practical consequence is stark. A player who takes a £100 match at 35x and plays exclusively blackjack at 10% weighting does not face £3,500 of turnover — they face £35,000, because only a tenth of each stake counts. At £5 a hand that is 7,000 hands. Nobody completes that inside a 14-day window by accident, and most do not complete it at all. Weighting, not the multiple, is where unsuitable offers hide. The cost of play is broken down in new online casinos in UK.

Featured slots and excluded titles

Even within slots, exclusions exist. High-RTP titles — anything publicly listed above roughly 97% — are frequently removed from eligible play while an offer is active, because they erode the house margin during clearing. Jackpot slots are another common exclusion, and some operators restrict the spins portion of a package to one named game. Bravoplay and Betninja both tie part of their packages to a featured title; if you have no interest in that game, the spins element is worth little regardless of its face value, since spins are typically fixed at 10p each. For more context, see the new online casinos accepting UK players page.

How to verify contribution before you deposit

Every licensed operator publishes its weighting table in the bonus terms. Before funding an account, open those terms and search for "game weighting" or "contribution". Confirm three things: the percentage for your usual games, the list of excluded titles, and whether the weighting differs between the match funds and any spins winnings. Two minutes of checking here saves the frustration of discovering, mid-wagering, that your preferred table game was never counting at all. This is picked up again in the best betting sites guide.

How Much You Must Deposit to Take the Full Match

welcome bonus in the UK — How Much You Must Deposit to Take the Full Match

Match percentages create a temptation to over-deposit: a 100% match up to £200 feels incomplete at £80. The correct question is whether the full match is actually worth taking, and that depends on the turnover it triggers. This section walks through deposit thresholds, the value of a smaller first payment, and the point at which adding more money stops improving your position. The related figures are collected in our live casino rundown.

Deposit requirements at the operators on this page typically start between £10 and £20 for the match element, with some brands positioned in the low-deposit space where a first payment of £5 or even less activates a reduced package. Readers comparing a low deposit casino uk should note that the smallest thresholds usually buy fewer spins or a lower match cap rather than the full headline offer — the entry point and the maximum are rarely the same thing. The same operators are compared from a different angle in the bingo sites guide.

Deposit thresholds and what they unlock

OperatorMinimum to triggerDeposit for full matchWhat a smaller deposit buys
Spinpin£10£100Proportional match up to the cap
Winplace£10£100 (per stage)Reduced stage-one match only
CrownJewels£20£150Proportional match below £150
Bravoplay£10£100Match plus fewer spins
Fortunica£10£50Proportional match to £50 cap
Betninja£10£100Match with fewer release rewards

The £10 question: small deposits versus full matches

Because the match is proportional up to the cap, a £10 deposit that triggers a £10 bonus at 35x costs £350 of turnover to clear. That is a sensible trial size: it tests the operator's cashier, game lobby and withdrawal process with modest risk. The mistake runs in the other direction. Depositing £100 to take a full £100 match at a 40x operator means committing to £4,000 of play from day one, and for most casual players that commitment is never honoured — the offer expires half-cleared and the bonus balance is forfeited. There is more on this in the online slots guide.

The structured approach is to size the deposit to the turnover you can realistically complete inside the window. If you play three evenings a week and stake £10 a spin, you generate roughly £900 of turnover per evening at an brisk pace; over 14 days that supports a bonus of around £350 at 35x — more than most caps anyway. If you play one evening a fortnight, a full match at any multiple above 25x is a poor fit regardless of how attractive the headline looks. Sizing the deposit to your habits, rather than to the cap, is the single most effective way to lower the true cost of these offers. Response times and escalation routes are measured in our customer service rundown.

Pick by priority

Different priorities point at different sites — the top of a table is not automatically the right pick.

  • You will play the bonus through

    Longest window to clear it: 21 days at Spinpin.

  • You want the lightest requirement

    Lowest wagering on the table: No wagering at Bet365.

  • You play higher stakes

    Highest max bet while a bonus is active: £10 at Spinpin.

When Declining the Offer Is the Better Play

Not every account should carry an active promotion. Accepting one locks your play into eligible games, capped stakes and a deadline, and for certain styles of play the restrictions cost more than the bonus funds return. This section sets out the situations where the box marked "no thanks" is the correct answer, and it is more common than most comparison sites admit. What is actually in these lobbies is broken down in online slots UK.

Five situations where skipping wins

You play table games.
At 10% weighting, blackjack and roulette players face ten times the stated turnover. Unless the operator weights your game at 100%, decline.
You want to withdraw early.
Many operators void the bonus balance and its winnings if you request a cash withdrawal before wagering completes. If flexibility matters, an uncluttered cash balance is worth more than locked funds.
The window does not fit your calendar.
A 10-day window against a fortnight without time to play guarantees forfeiture. No offer is worth accepting on terms you already know you cannot meet.
Your stake habits exceed the cap.
If you normally stake £10 a spin, a £2 cap while wagering changes your game entirely, and variance-hungry players lose their preferred profile.
You are chasing a specific high-RTP title.
If that title is excluded during wagering, the offer forces you onto worse-returning games. The mathematics rarely favour the swap.

The middle path: partial offers and opt-in timing

Several operators on this page allow you to defer or decline the promotion at deposit and still receive loyalty benefits afterwards. Fortunica's lighter structure is a case in point: with a 25x multiple, a £5 stake ceiling and a 30-day window, accepting costs relatively little flexibility. The same player at CrownJewels — 40x, £2 cap, 10 days — may be better off declining and playing their own money. The rule of thumb: accept when the multiple is at or below 35x, your main games are weighted at 100%, and the window comfortably exceeds the time you need. Decline when any two of those three fail. Whether a newer operator is worth the risk is covered in the new UK casinos page.

There is also a pure-cash argument. Wagering requirements exist to keep you playing; the expected cost of clearing a 35x offer on 96%-RTP slots is roughly 40% of the bonus amount in losses. A £100 match therefore delivers about £60 of expected value while removing a fortnight of game choice. Whether that trade suits you depends on whether you would have played those games anyway — a point worth honest reflection before you claim anything on impulse.

What to verify first

  • Confirm the numbers in the cashier

    Everything on this page is a comparison estimate; the cashier is the authority. Start with the minimum (£50) and the fee (1%).

  • Complete verification early

    Documents clear in about 4 hours. Doing it before the first withdrawal removes the single most common delay.

  • Set deposit and session limits first

    Tools available: reality check, cool-off, self-exclusion, wager limits. They are easier to set before a session than during one.

  • Match the account names

    The bank account name and the casino profile name must be identical or transfers reverse.

  • Keep the payment route consistent

    Depositing with one method and withdrawing to another triggers a manual review at most operators.

Terms That Break an Otherwise Good Offer

Below the multiples and windows sits a second tier of clauses that individually look minor and collectively decide whether a package is fair. These are the deal-breakers: the withdrawal lock, the max-conversion cap, payment-method exclusions and stake-by-stake restrictions. Each is explained here with the standard ranges so you can spot them quickly in any terms document. Everything here applies on a phone too, with the differences set out in our mobile casino comparison.

Withdrawal locks and voided winnings

The harshest common clause voids the bonus balance — and any winnings generated with it — if you withdraw cash before wagering completes. Its milder cousin merely cancels the remaining bonus and lets you keep winnings from cash stakes. The difference can be hundreds of pounds. Before accepting any offer, locate the sentence describing what happens to winnings if you cash out early; if it is absent or ambiguous, ask support in writing and keep the reply. Operators that answer clearly tend to apply their terms predictably. The same operators are compared on payout speed in the fast withdrawal casino guide.

Max conversion caps

A conversion cap limits how much of the bonus-derived balance can become cash, commonly between £100 and £500, or a multiple of the bonus amount. Caps matter most on packages with spins, because spins winnings are welcome bonus funds until wagering completes — a 200-spin package at 10p a spin with a £100 conversion ceiling has a hard upper bound regardless of how well your session goes. Uncapped conversions are rare and genuinely valuable when found; when a cap exists, treat it as the offer's true maximum and ignore the headline figure above it. Deposit limits decide what the withdrawal minimums mean in practice: our payment methods rundown.

Payment-method and stake-pattern exclusions

Two exclusions catch players regularly. First, some operators exclude certain e-wallets or prepaid methods from triggering the first-deposit offer; the deposit works, but the promotion never activates, and the terms usually state this in a single line near the payment section. Second, terms commonly prohibit "irregular play" — alternating high and low stakes, covering most of a roulette wheel, or hedging across two games — as grounds to confiscate welcome bonus-derived winnings. These clauses target genuine abuse, but they are drafted broadly, and honest players have had winnings withheld under them. Play your normal game at your normal stakes with an active offer and the risk stays theoretical; change your pattern to chase the requirement and it does not. Profiles of the operators themselves are collected in our gambling sites UK comparison.

Spins-specific small print

Per-spin value
typically 10p, occasionally up to £1; 200 spins at 10p is £20 of play, not £200.
Spin expiry
usually 7 to 14 days from credit, separate from the match window.
Named game only
most spin packages are tied to one title, and the tie does not transfer if the game is removed from the lobby.
Wagering on winnings
spin winnings usually carry the same multiple as the match; genuinely wager-free spin deals exist and are flagged as such on the pages above.

Operator-by-Operator Notes

Operator-by-Operator Notes: welcome bonus guide for players in the UK

The ten operators divide into two groups: six newer brands competing on structure, and four established names whose terms are stable but rarely the most generous. The notes below group them accordingly and highlight, for each, the single detail most likely to affect your decision. Exact live figures sit in the tables above; what follows is the structural read.

The newer brands: Spinpin, Winplace, CrownJewels

Spinpin runs a conventional structure — match plus spins at 35x, £2 stake cap, 14 days — and is best suited to players who will clear the requirement steadily over two weeks. Winplace splits its offer across two deposits at a friendlier 30x, which halves the single-window pressure but requires a second funded transaction to reach the full value; if you will not make a second deposit, you take only half the package. CrownJewels offers the highest cap on this page but pairs it with the least forgiving terms: 40x wagering inside a 10-day window at £2 a spin. That combination is only sensible for players who know they will put in the hours, and honest comparison says most should take a smaller match there rather than the maximum.

The newer brands: Bravoplay, Fortunica, Betninja

Bravoplay and Betninja both attach their spins to a featured slot, which concentrates the spins value for fans of that game and reduces it to near zero for everyone else. Their match terms mirror Spinpin's at 35x and 14 days. Fortunica is the structural outlier and, for most readers, the easiest offer on this page to complete: 25x wagering, a £5 stake ceiling while active, and a 30-day window. The trade-off is a lower cap — the full match is reached at a £50 deposit — so heavy players will find its ceiling limiting even as casual players find it the most achievable package of the six.

The established names: Bet365, William Hill

Bet365 and William Hill publish their promotional terms directly and update them frequently, so this page deliberately defers to their own figures rather than restating them. Structurally, both behave like the mid-pack of the newer brands: multiple in the low-to-mid thirties, standard weighting tables, and the significant advantage that their cashier and verification processes are mature. For players who value predictable administration over maximum headline value, either is a reasonable place to run a first offer. Check their current terms page before depositing, because the numbers there govern, not any comparison table anywhere else.

The established names: Ladbrokes, Coral

Ladbrokes and Coral sit in the same stable of considerations: long-standing terms frameworks, frequent cross-sport and casino promotions, and first-deposit offers that tend to be moderate in size with mid-range multiples. Their weightings and early-withdrawal rules follow the industry patterns described above, so the arithmetic in the turnover section applies to them unchanged. The main difference is practical rather than numerical — both run overlapping promotions across products, and it is worth confirming that taking the casino offer does not exclude you from any sports promotion you would rather have, since the first welcome bonus accepted usually takes precedence.

Questions with numbers attached

What does it cost to start?

£50 at Bet365, with None in operator fees. Withdrawals return 10–100 min once approved.

What are the limits?

£2,500 a day and £30,000 a month here, with a £10 minimum on the way out.

Is verification required?

Yes, once — usually triggered around £1,000 in cumulative withdrawals. It takes about 4 hours.

What is in the game library?

3800 titles at Bet365, including 2400 pokies and 75 live tables, from 88 studios.

How responsive is support?

08:00–00:00, first reply around 22 min, via phone, telegram.

Values shown are indicative and compiled for comparison — treat them as a starting point and verify the current terms with the operator. 18+.

How New Operators Differ From Established Names

Competition for new accounts is sharpest among recently launched brands, and that competition shows up in the shape of their packages rather than only in their size. Newer operators stretch on multiples, windows and stake ceilings because they need completions and reviews; established names hold firmer terms because their acquisition funnel does not depend on a single promotion. Understanding that dynamic tells you where to look for value in any given month.

Anyone comparing new online casinos UK against the long-standing brands will notice the pattern quickly: the newcomers offer lighter multiples and longer windows, the incumbents offer stability and smoother verification. Neither is universally better. A reader weighing up new online casinos with no deposit welcome bonuses UK will also find that wager-free deals are rare at any operator and tend to be small when they appear — the cost of the requirement is simply moved into a lower headline amount instead.

Where the value actually sits

Value concentrates in three features, in this order: the wagering multiple, the weighting table, and the window. Everything else is presentation. A spins package at 10p a spin looks larger than a £20 match but is usually worth less; a 100% match at 40x looks larger than a 50% match at 25x and is usually worth more effort for less expected return. When you next read an online casino welcome bonus page, run the turnover division first and let the numbers rank the offers before the marketing does.

Putting the Numbers Together

The method on this page reduces to four steps. Take the headline amount and divide by the multiple to get turnover. Multiply turnover by the expected house margin on your usual games to estimate cost. Confirm that your games are weighted at 100% and that the window fits your calendar. Then decide whether the adjusted value justifies the flexibility you are giving up. Applied consistently, those steps will rank any set of casino offers correctly, regardless of how they are advertised.

Step 1 — Turnover
welcome bonus amount × multiple. £100 at 35x is £3,500 of stakes before withdrawal.
Step 2 — Expected cost
turnover × (1 − RTP). At 96% RTP, clearing £3,500 costs about £140 in expectation.
Step 3 — Feasibility
confirm weighting for your games and a window with at least 30% slack.
Step 4 — Decision
accept if adjusted value beats playing with cash alone; otherwise decline without hesitation.

Two closing points. First, the free spins element of any package should be valued at its per-spin amount multiplied by the count, then discounted for the wagering attached to its winnings — a realistic figure, not the advertised one. Second, if the pages above list a free spins no wagering deal alongside these matched offers, weigh it seriously even when it looks small; without a requirement to clear, every pound of its winnings is a pound of cash, and few matched packages beat it on expected value per pound deposited.

Finally, keep perspective. These promotions are entertainment subsidies, not income strategies, and the operators price them accordingly. Read the terms once properly rather than four times hastily, size your deposit to the turnover you can genuinely complete, and treat any offer whose conditions you would not accept in writing as one to skip. The best online casino UK players can choose is, more often than not, the one whose terms they have actually read — and that habit costs nothing at all.