11 Easy Ways to Save Money at Dave and Buster’s (2021 Guide)

I thoroughly enjoy taking family or friends to the arcade for a day of fun. Playing ticket redemption games is something I do a lot of to try and win the big ticket prizes. But Dave and Buster’s prices can leave you with a hole in your wallet if you don’t take advantage of the right coupons and promotions.

I went from spending $20 for 100 chips to only $9 for 100 chips. These arcade hacks helped me cut my costs per chip by more than half! This allowed me win more tickets at Dave and Buster’s for the least amount of money.    

I wanted to share my comprehensive guide to buying Dave and Buster’s chips so that you know the cheapest ways to purchase chips. The process involves Dave and Buster’s coupons, deals, and discounts, along with stacking the most cashback as possible.

A lot of the information I learned to start was from the Dave and Buster’s subreddit on how to use Dave and Buster’s coupons and buy chips in the sidebar. My complete guide adds what I learned through my experiences. It is a long read but a lot of the details in each step will help save even more money.

Step by Step Guide on How to Save Money on Chips at Dave and Buster’s

1. Printable $20 for $20 or $10 for $10 Coupons Online

Just as the coupons say you can buy $20 worth of game chips and get another $20 for free. So it is essentially a buy some get some free for game chips.

The 20 for 20 or 10 for 10 coupons are one of the highest saving methods on this list. Because of this it is important to find and save as many as you can so that you have an endless supply to continually use to buy game chips.

The $20 chip bundle at Dave and Buster’s gives you 100 chips. The dollar per chip ratio for that is $0.20 per chip. The coupons cut this in half and you will be getting $0.10 per chip which is the ratio you should be aiming for every time you go into Dave and Buster’s and purchase game chips.

Dave and Buster’s Emails

Dave and Buster’s promotional emails will be one of the best ways to accumulate these coupons. To receive the emails you have to sign up for the reward program.

Make sure to check the box to allow Dave and Buster’s to send you promotional emails. Also check your spam folder or move all emails from Dave and Buster’s into your main inbox.

You will receive a 10 for 10 printable coupon for just signing up.

More coupons will come with time. It used to be that every time that you would spend money on food or game chips and had it connected to your rewards account that the next day they would send you another 10 for 10 coupon. I have found that they do not send a coupon every time but they are more likely to send you a coupon if you do purchase something at Dave and Buster’s.

Receipt Surveys for Coupons

Another great way to get Dave and Buster’s 10 for 10 coupons is to complete surveys. When you purchase any amount of chips you will receive a receipt that allows you to complete a survey online to get a 10 for 10 coupon or a free appetizer with purchase coupon.

This coupon will expire in a month and you can only complete the survey once a month.

Dave and Buster’s New App

In addition to the emails and surveys, you can also receive the 20 for 20 or 10 for 10 coupons in the new Dave and Buster’s app. Just check the app under the tab called “Offers”.

Most locations will not let you use more than one coupon per day per power card.

The strategy for the coupons are to go in-store to Dave and Buster’s a few times a week to use one 20 for 20 or 10 for 10 coupon. Have the purchase connected to your rewards account by telling the employee to add the points to your rewards account.

This will make it more likely for Dave and Buster’s to send another coupon the very next day. If it worked 100% of the time you could get an endless supply of coupons if you went in everyday just to use a coupon and purchase more game chips.

2. More Dave and Buster’s Printed Coupons  

In addition to the Dave and Buster’s promotions received via email and the new app, there are also coupons you can find in advertisements and brochures.

Find Coupons in Advertisements

In the past year I have seen 20 for 20 coupons printed in the local newspaper advertisements or promotional materials that come in the mail. They will show up a few times a year but there is usually 2 coupons each time they do show up.

When you know what date the coupons come in (usually around holidays) then ask family and friends to grab extra copies for you.

Dave and Buster’s Brochures

Other places to find printed Dave and Buster’s coupons are at airports or tourist centers where they have brochures for lots of different businesses in the area. The coupon in these will be the 10 for 10 deal.

They are more likely found in these places if there is a Dave and Buster’s location nearby. I have found the coupons at an airport kiosk and took a few brochures at a time (you could be greedy and take a bunch if you find them but I would not recommend it).

With the printable Dave and Buster’s app and email coupons, along with these at the airport, you should have a good supply to use every time you want to buy chips.

3. Half-off Games at Dave and Buster’s on Wednesdays

All the games are half price on Wednesday at Dave and Buster’s.

Most people already know this tip as Wednesdays at Dave and Buster’s are always pretty busy.

This method will save you the most money per arcade game played. It is one of the best tips on the list (along with the 20 for 20 and 10 for 10 coupons) so take advantage of it.  

If you can, spend most of your time playing games on these half-off Wednesdays. It is Dave and Buster’s cheapest day and best value for you for chips per game played.

Most of the games are 6.8 chips but on Wednesday they will only be 3.4 chips to play. You can play twice as many games on this special day.

The one problem is that you can’t use any coupons or other promotions on Half-off Wednesday.

My strategy because of this is to go in on a few days during the week that are not on Wednesday (so usually Tuesday to get free plays) and Friday for me but you can choose any other days).

On these non-Wednesdays I will use the 10 for 10 or 20 for 20 coupons to accumulate chips. I will only stay for a little bit to play a few games but I will not use a lot of chips on these days. I want to save most of my chips for Wednesday.

Then I will spend the majority of my time at Dave and Buster’s on Wednesday to get the most value out of my chips.

4. Cheaper Dave and Buster’s Chips in Bulk

I used to buy the $20 amount of game chips. This is $20 for 100 chips. The dollar per chip ratio for that is $0.20 per chip. This is fine if you want to play casually and not spend a lot of money but don’t buy this chip bundle if you want to optimize the money you save at Dave and Buster’s.

Learn from my mistake. If you don’t have any of the 10 for 10 or 20 for 20 coupons then buying chips in bulk will be the best way to save money.

The highest chip bundle is $100 for 750 chips. This is a dollar per chip ratio of $0.133 per chip compared with $0.20 per chip from the smaller chip bundle. A way larger savings than buying only $20 worth of chips.

If you go with friends or family to Dave and Buster’s it will be worth it to buy the 4 player pack of $50 per card with 375 chips each. This gives the same $0.133 per chip ratio to 4 cards so everyone can get the most bang for their buck.

5. Dave and Buster’s Groupon for Unlimited Free Game play

Quite often there is a Dave and Buster’s deal posted on Groupon that allows you to buy a discounted power card that allows free game play all day long.

It costs $25 for 2 people to play games for the entire day.

The restrictions are that you can only play the blue swipe games, which are the games that do not award tickets.

This is one of the best deals if you are just into playing games for fun and not for tickets.  

Groupon also has cashback if you purchase through Mr.Rebates.com (look later at the cashback tip).

Here is a list of some of the top blue swipe games to play at Dave and Buster’s so you get an idea of what you can play when you purchase this deal from Groupon:

• Tomb Raider Arcade

• Halo: Fireteam Raven

• The Walking Dead Arcade

• World’s Largest Pac-Man

• Mario Kart Arcade GP DX

• Dance Dance Revolution

• Quad Air Hockey Table
  
  
  

6. Dave and Buster’s Military and First Responders Discount

You can show your military or first responders ID to get 20% off of food and game chips. This special does not work on Wednesdays and cannot be combined with another promotion.

If you are not in the military or a first responder you could find a friend or family member who is because they are allowed to share this deal with up to 4 other people in their party.

7. Dave and Buster’s Tuesday Specials and Deals

Update: As of April 2020 Dave and Buster’s has discontinued the deal on free chips listed below. I will be leaving the information in the guide as they may bring back the special offer after the current pandemic.

Tuesday at Dave and Buster’s is a deal day where if you spend $10 or more on chips you will get 2 free game plays on any game. These free game plays include ticket redemption games.

Tuesday is the best day to go in to use your 10 for 10 coupons.

Go in to your local Dave and Buster’s on Tuesday and use the 10 for 10 coupon. This will give you 2 free game plays.

I will then use the 2 free game plays on the highest cost games. You want to get the most out of your free plays so play a game that costs 9.9 chips.

The Kung Fu Panda Dojo Mojo arcade game at my local Dave and Buster’s costs 9.9 so I use my free plays there to try and win the jackpot or the Despicable Me Jelly Lab coin pusher if there is a rare card ready to go.

You can play any game you want with your free plays, so have fun.

From spending money on Tuesday there is a chance that another 10 for 10 coupon will be sent to your email the next day. Rinse and repeat every week or as often as you want to receive more Dave and Buster’s coupons.

Bonus: Tuesday is also Taco Tuesday at Dave and Buster’s. The special is tacos and Coronas for only $2. This is another great way to save money if you want food but it is not the best if you want to optimize the amount of tickets you can get for the cost.

8. Dave and Buster’s Rewards Program

This step is as easy as signing up on the official Dave and Buster’s website or in-store to be in their rewards program. Just give them your name and email and you are all set to start earning Dave and Buster’s reward points.

You will need to connect a Dave and Buster’s power card to your rewards account to start earning free game play.

The rewards program has many benefits. Probably the best benefit is that for every $100 you spend you get $10 in free game play.

Check that your power card is registered as your rewards card online or on the Dave and Buster’s app. If it is you can start earning towards $10 free game play. You can track your reward balance on the app or online to see how close you are.

It is important if you buy game chips at the front desk you will have to ask the employee to add the reward points to your card. You do not get the points automatically on purchase. The kiosk in-store should add the reward points automatically, though.  

Another great benefit of the rewards program is that you’ll receive both emails and offers inside the Dave and Buster’s app that will contain 10 for 10 coupons or 20 for 20 coupons. As I have stated before, these coupons will be the way you will save the most on chips so accumulate as much coupons in your email as possible.

Some bonus benefits of the Dave and Buster’s reward program is protection from lost or stolen power cards and the ability to check your power card balance, chip count, and reward points online or in the app.   

9. Dave and Buster’s Gift Cards for a Discount

You are allowed to use Dave and Buster’s gift cards while also using the coupons or other promotions. So take advantage of buying gift cards at a discount.

Where to find Dave and Buster’s gift cards for cheap?

Disclaimer: These next few sections I will provide affiliate links that support me and the work of this website. Most links also benefit you with signup bonuses.

GiftCardGranny.com is one well-known website that sells gift cards for cheaper. They tend to have discounts of around 5% on Dave and Buster’s gift cards.

I do not use them because they do not have a large selection of Dave and Buster’s cards and most that they do have are physical only so you will need to wait as the gift card is sent in the mail.

The website I use to purchase gift cards is Raise.com. There are a few reasons why I exclusively use this website:

• Raise almost always has a good stock of Dave and Buster’s gift cards with a variety of balance amounts ($25 and $50).

• Most of the gift cards are digital so I can use it within minutes of purchasing.

• They have a 4-6% discount on the Dave and Buster’s gift cards.

• Raise has a 1-year money back guarantee. Although I have read reviews that it is hard to dispute with customer service if you run into a problem. I have not had any issues so far.

• You get $5 for free with signing up through the Raise.com referral program (I used a friend’s link which is how I got started using Raise and got free money).

• The biggest reason I use Raise is because I can get the most cashback through Mr.Rebates.com. Which leads us into the next tip…

10. Stack Cashback from Buying Dave and Buster’s Chips

The first way to utilize cashback is through Mr.Rebates.com.

This tip is especially useful if you buy Dave and Buster’s chips or food often. You can even stack cashback for other things you buy online to help maximize how much money you will receive.

I have done the research for you about which cashback website gives the most for Dave and Buster’s gift cards. Keep in mind that the percentage cashback changes regularly so the numbers may be different by the time you are reading this.

Rakuten (formerly Ebates) is an option for cashback but currently only gives 1% cashback at Raise.com for gift card purchases.

TopCashBack.com only gives 2% cashback on Raise gift cards.

The best cashback company for gift card purchases is Mr. Rebates.

Mr. Rebates gives 5% cashback at Raise. Just a couple months ago it was 6%.

I use Raise to purchase discount Dave and Buster’s gift cards and also get 5% cashback by shopping through Mr. Rebates. The total cashback/discount is 10% off of Dave and Buster’s gift cards.

Mr. Rebates is also easy to use for other purchases you make at participating stores online. They have a chrome extension that you can install to show a popup whenever you are shopping at a store that has cashback through Mr. Rebates. I can just do my normal shopping online and click one button to get this cashback.

Use this Mr. Rebates referral link to get another free $5.

Another part of this tip is to use any credit card to stack even more cashback with these Dave and Buster’s gift card purchases. It is preferable to get a credit card with a good reward system or higher percentage cashback.

The credit card I use is the Discover It Cashback credit card. This card has 1% cashback but has rotating categories of 5% cashback.

The part I like about the Discover It card is that they will match your cashback for the first year of purchases. So it is almost like 2% cashback for the first year, which is one of the highest cashback percentages for all purchases.

A benefit of the rewards for Discover is that you can redeem your cashback to buy $50 Dave and Buster’s gift cards for $45. Giving you just another way of saving to get 10% off for gift cards.

I have also received $50 for free with signing up for the Discover It credit card through a friend’s referral link.

11. Take Advantage of Signup Bonuses

The last tip. This is how I got into going to the arcade regularly as I would get “free money” from signing up for different things. It felt like I could use this expendable money for more fun activities.

The first signup bonus is for signing up for rewards at Dave and Buster’s. As stated previously there are many benefits to this rewards program, but one thing you get for signing up is your very first 10 for 10 coupon sent to you via email.

There used to be another “signup” promotion if you bought game chips through the newly released Dave and Buster’s app. You got 50% off game chip bundles so I used this to get $100 worth of chips for only $50. This offer is no longer available but Dave and Buster’s does similar promotions throughout the year.

Many credits cards have bonuses for signing up. Just sign up and make a few purchases. Remember to pay off the credit card each month to not accumulate interest and it will cost you nothing to get the signup bonus.

• Get $5 for free through signing up with Raise.com.

• Get $5 with Mr.Rebates.com.

• Use the link to get $50 by signing up for a Discover It credit card. This link only works for 10 referrals per year so I encourage you to post your own Discover referral link in the comments.

Just these 3 signups give you $60 to spend at Dave and Busters. They also include benefits to maximize savings and cashback. It is a win/win and can give you “free cash” to start testing out your luck at the arcade.

Have fun at the arcade and I hope these tips will help you get the most bang for your buck at Dave and Buster’s. Subscribe to the email list down below the comments to get more tips and tricks for the arcade.

If you want to learn more about the best strategies to win tickets then read the SpongeBob coin pusher tips and tricks guide.