This app saved me $120 in Las Vegas — and can save you even more

Las Vegas Casino Gambling
Flickr / Thomas Hawk

Earlier this week, my girlfriend and I took a trip to Las Vegas.

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In an effort to make every dime count, we downloaded an app called MyVegas.

MyVegas is a pair of apps for Facebook, iPhone, and Android where you play blackjack or the slot machines with virtual cash – and earn real rewards, like meals and show tickets, at some of Las Vegas' biggest hotels and resorts. 

With less than a month of playing MyVegas, and some smart strategizing, we earned enough of the game's "loyalty points" to save around $120 on our Vegas vacation. If you're forewarned, you can save even more. 

Here's how it works.

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There are two different MyVegas games for you to choose from. MyVegas slots, pictured here, gives you a choice of slot machines to choose from. Most of them are themed around real-world Vegas casinos, like New York New York. Others are digital versions of real slot machines, like China Mystery. There's even one called "Caddyshaq" that's themed around Shaquille O'Neal playing golf.

myvegas slots
Matt Weinberger

And then there's MyVegas Blackjack. And if you ever run out, you use real money to buy more. A better option is to go to the MyVegas Facebook page, which gives out codes for 5,000 chips every day.

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Matt Weinberger
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The more you play, and the bigger you bet, the more "loyalty points" you earn. You get bonuses on the virtual chips and loyalty for every consecutive day that you play.

myvegas wheel
Matt Weinberger

The easiest way to earn loyalty points is to complete the game's missions, which you get from a Candy Crush Saga-style game board. They tend to be along the lines of, "find forty-five dolphin icons on the Mirage slot machine."

myvegas goals
Matt Weinberger
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Here's another tip: You earn the most loyalty if you play it on Facebook, and the least if you play it on Android. According to the MyVegas FAQ, it has to do with rules on each App Store for how they handle giveaways. Just make sure you avoid any of the "Share" buttons on the Facebook versions if you don't want to spam your friends.

myvegas facebook
Matt Weinberger

A good hack for Android users is that you get all the loyalty points you deserve if you download MyVegas from the Amazon Appstore, instead of the official Google Play market.

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Amazon
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Most of the MyVegas rewards are for MGM Resorts casinos, which include the MGM Grand, New York New York, and Excalibur, where we stayed.

MyVegas resorts
Matt Weinberger

This means you can't redeem your MyVegas points at the other mega-casinos, including Bally's, or the Trump properties. Sorry, Donald.

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Republican 2016 U.S. presidential candidate and businessman Donald Trump reacts near the end of the debate after realizing that a slew of criticisms spoken by fellow candidate and former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee (not pictured) were not aimed at him but at Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, at the first official Republican presidential candidates debate of the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign in Cleveland, Ohio, August 6, 2015. REUTERS/Brian Snyder
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You can swap your loyalty points for real-life rewards straight from the store. The rewards themselves are pretty great, including free appetizers, free show tickets, and discounts on hotel fares.

myvegas rewards
Matt Weinberger

Just read each reward's fine print and be careful of "gotchas." A lot of the best rewards only allow you to use three in a 60-day period. We decided that the two-for-one buffets were the best value, considering our limited time to play and the fact that we could only use three rewards each. My girlfriend even made a spreadsheet to track it.

buffet spreadsheet
We actually ended up skipping one of these buffets. We had Shake Shack instead. Matt Weinberger
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Once you get to Las Vegas, you need to go to an MGM casino (not that hard) and find the "Mlife Player's Club" to sign up for the real-life Mlife loyalty program. Give them the emailed confirmation.

myvegas mlife players club
Matt Weinberger

The Mlife card is actually super handy, and lets you earn all kinds of goodies like free slot credit the more you spend at the casino. My morning Starbucks, as overpriced as it was in a Vegas hotel, put more points on my account.

myvegas mlife card
My girlfriend earned more points than I did. Matt Weinberger
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A big caveat here is that you need to go to each casino's Mlife desk to active the appropriate reward. You have to go to the Bellagio Mlife Player's Club to activate a coupon for the Bellagio buffet, and so on. It's annoying, but not a dealbreaker given the savings.

myvegas bellagio buffet
Matt Weinberger

Still, it was a delicious way to save cash. Next time, with a little more forewarning, we might play for longer and try to earn higher-tier rewards, like free hotel stays or dinner and a show packages. Either way, saving $100 with a smartphone game ain't too shabby!

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Matt Weinberger
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