Baccarat Slang: What Macau and French Players Say at the Table

Stand beside a Midi or VIP baccarat pit in Macau, Las Vegas, or Singapore and you will hear two distinct eras of casino history spoken in the same minute: Macau Cantonese calls shouted during the card squeeze—like Chui! (吹), Mou Bin (無邊), Dai Ngaan Boy (大眼仔), and Cheung Lung (長龍)—alongside 19th-century French salon words like sabot, coup, banco suivi, and la grande.

This guide decodes the spoken baccarat slang and table calls you hear around the felt, with Traditional Chinese characters, exact Cantonese Jyutping romanization, and French origins. If you are looking for our complete A-to-Z reference of every scoreboard rule, side bet, and mathematical definition, browse our full baccarat glossary.

1. Macau Cantonese Calls for the Sides & the Five Roads

Modern six-row electronic scoreboards originated in Macau casinos between the 1960s and 1980s. Even in English-speaking pits, seasoned players and dealers frequently call out the three outcomes and the five baccarat roads by their Cantonese names:

Remember the golden rule when players talk about Dai Ngaan Boy, Siu Lou, and Gaat Zaat Lou: on all three derived roads, red never means Banker and blue never means Player. As we cover in Red vs Blue on Derived Roads, red means the Big Road is repeating its column shape, and blue means the pattern broke.

2. What Players Shout During the Card Squeeze (Mi Paai / 咪牌)

At Midi-Baccarat and VIP tables, single-use paper cards are dealt face down so the player with the largest wager on Player (閒) and Banker (莊) can slowly peel back the edges in a Squeeze—a ritual called Zai Paai (擠牌, zai1 paai2, “squeezing the card”) or Mai Paai (咪牌, mai1 paai2, “peeking at the card”).

When a player places both thumbs over the corner numbers and bends up the long edge of a face-down card, the pip columns along that border reveal which group of ranks the card belongs to:

• Mou Bin (無邊, mou4 bin1 — “No Side / Blank Edge”): Seeing zero pips along the long border means all pips run down the center column, so the card can only be an Ace, 2, or 3.
• Loeng Bin (兩邊, loeng5 bin1 — “Two-Side”): Seeing two pips along each long border narrows the card to a 4 or 5.
• Saam Bin (三邊, saam1 bin1 — “Three-Side”): Seeing three pips along each long border narrows the card to a 6, 7, or 8 (the most dramatic peel when paired with a zero-value picture card!).
• Sei Bin (四邊, sei3 bin1 — “Four-Side”): Seeing four pips along each long border narrows the card to a 9 or 10.
• Monkey (公仔牌, gung1 zai2 paai2 — “Picture Card”): Universal table slang for any zero-value 10, Jack, Queen, or King. If a player already holds a 9 or 8 on the first card—or needs a third card that adds zero—the table will call out “Monkey!”
• Chui! (吹, ceoi1 — “Blow!”): Shouted playfully during a squeeze when a player wants to “blow away” an extra center pip—for example, when holding a 10 and peeling a Four-Side card (which is either a 9 or a 10), hoping to “blow off” the 10th pip so the card lands on a Natural 9. Of course, the card's rank was fixed inside the shoe long before anyone touched it—the call is pure social theater.

3. Cantonese Scoreboard Pattern Calls

When players scan the electronic display between hands, four Cantonese phrases describe the column shapes on the Big Road:

• Cheung Lung (長龍, coeng4 lung4 — “Long Dragon”): A streak of 7 or more consecutive wins by Banker or Player. Because a standard Big Road column has 6 rows, the first 6 beads fill the column top to bottom and the 7th bead turns 90 degrees to the right along Row 6 into a Dragon Tail (龍尾, lung4 mei5).
• Daan Tiou (單跳, daan1 tiu3 — “Single Jump / Ping-Pong”): Strict single-win alternation between Banker and Player (B-P-B-P-B-P), where every Big Road column stops at depth 1. Because every finished column has the exact same depth of 1, Rule 1 marks solid red across all three derived roads.
• Seung Tiou (雙跳, soeng1 tiu3 — “Double Jump / Double Streak”): Alternating pairs of wins (BB-PP-BB-PP), where every Big Road column finishes at depth 2.
• Man Lou (問路, man6 lou6 — “Ask-Road / Next-Hand Inquiry”): The two-row preview box labeled B ? and P ? on the scoreboard showing which red or blue ring, dot, and slash the three derived roads will record on the next hand if Banker wins versus if Player wins.

4. French Chemin de Fer Words That Survive on Modern Tables

Before Punto Banco (“Player–Banker”) standardized house-banked baccarat in Havana and Las Vegas in the 1950s, European casinos played Chemin de Fer and Baccarat Banque. Eight French terms from those tables are still used in rulebooks and high-limit salons today:

• Baccara: The French and Italian word for zero, referring to the zero point value of 10s, Jacks, Queens, and Kings, and a hand total of zero.
• Chemin de Fer (“Chemmy”): Literally “iron road” (railroad), named because the heavy card shoe slides around the oval table from one player-banker to the next like a train on tracks whenever the Banker hand loses a round.
• Sabot: French for “wooden clog,” the traditional name for the multi-deck dealing shoe.
• Coup: A single complete round of baccarat resulting in a Banker win, a Player win, or a Tie.
• Banco & Banco Suivi: In Chemin de Fer, calling “Banco!” means one player challenges the entire current bank stake alone. If that player loses, calling “Banco suivi” (“following bank”) exercises their priority right to match the full bank again on the immediate next coup.
• Carte & Non: Spoken in Chemin de Fer when the active player requests a third card (“Carte!”) or stands (“Non”) on a total of 5. At modern Punto Banco tables, all draws follow the automatic Third-Card Rule tableau.
• La Grande & La Petite: Classic French names for a two-card Natural 9 (La Grande, “the big one”) and a two-card Natural 8 (La Petite, “the little one”).
• Palette & Ponte: The palette is the long flat wooden paddle the central caller uses at a 14-seat Big Baccarat table to slide cards and chips across the layout; ponte (adapted into English as punter) is a player wagering against the bank.

5. Seeing These Table Calls on One 18-Hand Reference Shoe

Look at this 18-hand reference shoe (BPBBPPBBBPBPPBBPTB—10 Banker wins, 7 Player wins, and 1 Tie on Hand 17), which you can inspect hand by hand in our free Baccarat Calculator & Road Decoder:

BPBBPPBBBPBPPBBPTB

• Hands 1–3 (B, P, B) — Daan Tiou Opens Dai Ngaan Boy: Columns 1 and 2 each finish with 1 bead (a Single Jump). When Hand 3 starts Column 3 at Row 1, Rule 1 compares Column 2 (depth 1) with Column 1 (depth 1): they match, so Dai Ngaan Boy (Big Eye Boy) records its first mark as a Red ring.
• Hands 4–6 (B, P, P) — Seung Tiou Opens Siu Lou and Gaat Zaat Lou: Columns 3 and 4 each finish with 2 beads (a Double Jump). Hand 4 (Column 3 Row 2) opens Siu Lou (Small Road), and Hand 6 (Column 4 Row 2) opens Gaat Zaat Lou (Cockroach Pig).
• Hands 6–18 on Siu Lou — Derived-Road Dragon Tail: Starting on Small Road Bead 6, nine consecutive Blue dots drop 6 beads down Column 3 to Row 6 and turn 90 degrees right to place 3 beads along the bottom row.
• Hand 17 (T) — Woh (Tie Slash): Hand 17 is a Tie, adding a green slash across Column 10 Row 1 on the Big Road without adding a new Big Road bead or any derived-road mark.

Practice Scoreboard Literacy Step by Step

Knowing what Dai Ngaan Boy, Siu Lou, Gaat Zaat Lou, and Man Lou mean at the table is step one; being able to verify every red and blue mark yourself is what makes the scoreboard clear at a glance. Browse our complete A-to-Z Baccarat Glossary & Dictionary, test any shoe inside our free Road Decoder calculator, or start Module 1 of the Baccarat Smart course for free.