Slot machines fall into two categories, Straight slot machine. - Slot machines that have set jackpot payouts according to the machines' payout schedule. For example. If you are playing a straight quarter slot machine depending on it's payout schedule, winning a jackpot by betting one quarter would give you 200 coins, a two quarter bet wins 600 coins and the max bet would win you a jackpot of 2000 coins.   Progressive slot machine. - These slot machines have jackpots which are tied into a bank of machines (more than one machine on a row), a carousel of machines (group of machines on a round platform) or even tied into other machines at different casinos. Progressive slot machines will have an electronic board attached to the top of the machine that displays the progressive jackpot. Each of the slot machines in the progressive group, when played, increases the progressive jackpot. For example, Say you walk into a casino and see a bank of "Wheel of Fortune" progressive slot machines. You can see they are progressive by noticing the payout schedule has progressive listed as the top jackpot. Each time someone plays any machine on this progressive bank, the electronic board displaying the jackpot increases. When a player hits the progressive jackpot, they win whatever dollar amount is listed on the electronic board. Things to remember about progressive slots. -The odds of winning are usually about 2% more. This really does not matter since winning is a matter of luck anyway. -Most importantly, in order to win the progressive jackpot you must bet the maximum bet. If you don't feel comfortable betting the maximum, I would chose a straight slot rather than playing a progressive slot machine. Even though the odds of winning on a progressive slot may only be a tad bit more, there would be nothing worse then to be betting one coin and hit the progressive jackpot, only to win a few hundred instead of the thousands of dollars the max bet might return.