Lantern & Ledger is an independent guide to big-city Canadian hotels with an on-site casino. Here is exactly how we choose the hotels and score them.
Every hotel in this guide has a real, licensed casino on the property — that is the entry ticket. From there, we stay where we can, walk every gaming floor, eat in the restaurants and judge each hotel against the same four measures, so the scores mean the same thing across the region.
Our ratings are an editorial opinion, not an average of user reviews, and we take no payment for a place in the ranking or a higher score. Room counts, casino sizes and other figures are approximate and change often — always confirm the current details with the hotel before you travel.
How big and how good the gaming is — the table games, the poker room, the slots and the high-limit rooms — and how it feels to play in the heart of a city.
The quality, comfort and value of the on-site hotel — or, where the floor has none, how good the nearby options are and how close they sit.
The restaurants, bars, shows and the city itself — the reasons to make a night of it beyond the tables.
How central it is, how easy it is to reach by transit, what surrounds it, and whether the package is worth the money.
Scores are out of ten, to one decimal. A hotel scoring above nine is, in our view, a genuine destination worth planning a trip around; the low eights are still strong stays where the casino is one good reason among several. We re-score as hotels renovate, expand or change hands.