A 5x rollover on a $20 deposit doesn't mean you need to wager $100 before cashing out — it means you need to wager $100 before any of it becomes withdrawable, and the difference between those two readings is where most weekend bankrolls quietly die. If you're playing a 96.2% RTP slot, that $100 of required action carries an expected cost of about $3.80, or roughly 19% of the money you started with. The bonus isn't free; it's a $20 loan with a $3.80-or-so service charge, and the house collects whether or not you clear it.
The math, line by line
Take the standard version: $20 deposit, 5x rollover, slot weighting at 100%. You need $100 in total bets. At 96.2% RTP, every $100 wagered returns $96.20 on average, so the expected loss on the playthrough alone is $3.80.
Now the part people skip. You can't wager $100 without surviving the swings it takes to get there. On a high-variance slot, a $20 bankroll betting $0.50 a spin gives you 40 spins — and 40 spins at that RTP has a meaningful chance of hitting zero before you've cleared even half the requirement. On a low-variance game at $0.20 a spin, you get 100 spins, the ride is smoother, but the expected loss is identical. Variance changes whether you finish. It doesn't change what the house takes if you do.
Where the weighting bites
Check the terms before you pick a game. Many US-facing casinos weight slots at 100%, table games at 10% or less, and live dealer at 0%. If blackjack is weighted at 10%, your $100 requirement becomes $1,000 of blackjack action. At a 0.5% house edge that's an expected $5 loss — worse than the slot route, and with far more hands to grind through. The headline number is 5x. The real number depends entirely on which game the fine print lets you play.
What $20 actually buys
Run the weekend realistically. Friday night you deposit $20, claim the 5x, and play slots at $0.40 a spin. Fifty spins gets you $20 of the $100 requirement. Saturday you're down to $11 and still owe $80 in wagering. This is the trap: the bonus keeps you playing past the point where a casual player would have walked, because quitting feels like leaving money on the table. It isn't. The remaining requirement is a liability, not an asset.
A rough rule of thumb: if your expected loss on the playthrough exceeds about 5% of your deposit, the bonus is closer to a marketing hook than a value add. At 5x and 96.2% RTP, you're at 19%.
The comparison that matters
A no-bonus $20 deposit is worth exactly $20, withdrawable the moment you want it. The 5x version is worth $20 minus the expected playthrough cost, minus the variance risk, minus the hours you'll spend clearing it. For a $20 bankroll, the no-bonus route usually wins — not because bonuses are rigged, but because the fixed cost is large relative to the stake.
Which raises the question worth asking before your next deposit: at what bankroll size does a 5x rollover stop being a tax and start being a perk? Run the same 19% expected-cost figure against a $200 deposit and the bonus looks different — but so does your exposure when the variance turns.