Every casino bonus comes with a catch, and it's almost always expressed as a multiple: 20x, 35x, 40x. That number is the wagering requirement, also called playthrough or rollover, and it's the actual price tag on a bonus that looks free at first glance.
What the multiple actually means
A wagering requirement is how many times you need to bet a given amount before the associated bonus funds become eligible for withdrawal. Take a concrete example: a 100% bonus on a $100 deposit, with a 35x wagering requirement applied to the bonus amount. That's a $100 bonus, multiplied by 35, which comes out to $3,500 in total bets required before that bonus money can be cashed out.
Notice what didn't change in that example: the size of the bonus itself. A $100 bonus feels the same size whether it's attached to 10x or 50x wagering, but the amount of betting volume standing between you and actually withdrawing it is five times larger in the second case. The multiple, not the headline bonus percentage, is usually the number that determines whether an offer is worth chasing.
Why this number gets buried
Marketing naturally leads with the bonus size, "100% match," "$50 free", because it's the appealing part. The wagering requirement sits in the terms and conditions, in smaller text, precisely because it's the part that determines how realistic it is to ever actually clear the bonus. A bonus with a low multiple and a modest size can be worth far more, in practice, than a larger bonus buried under a steep requirement.
Turning it into a real decision
The useful question isn't "how big is the bonus", it's "how much am I actually going to have to bet, and is that a volume I'd be comfortable wagering anyway." If the answer is that you'd need to bet several times your normal session size just to unlock a bonus you might not even care about, the offer's real value is lower than its headline number suggests.
This is exactly the calculation Edge Wagering automates: enter the deposit, the bonus percentage, and the wagering multiple, and it converts the fine print into the actual dollar volume you'd need to wager, the number that determines whether an offer is realistic for how you actually play.