The largest casino in the world is now open.
The Venetian Macao, a $2.4 billion development completed by the Las Vegas Sands Corporation, is twice the size of its sister property on the Las Vegas Strip. The casino floor is the largest in the world at 550,000 square feet, which is large enough to hold 870 table games and more than 3,400 slot machines. The hotel has 3,000 all-suite rooms and 1 million square feet of retail space. A 15,000-seat arena is included in the property and exhibition NBA games will be played there in October.
It's not only the largest casino in the world, but the complex is so huge that it is now the second-largest building in the world. A Boeing passenger jet factory in Washington State is the largest.
This week also marked the initial opening of Las Vegas Sands' Cotai Strip. The Cotai Strip, which is anchored by the Venetian Macao, will be a collection of hotel properties owned and operated by the Las Vegas Sands Corporation. The brands include Four Seasons, Sheraton, St. Regis, Shangri-La, Traders, Hilton, Conrad, Fairmont, and Raffles.
When this Strip is completed, it will contain 20,000 guest rooms, more than 3 million square feet of retail space and nearly 30,000 seats of live entertainment offerings.
Macao is considered a special administration region of China. Gambling has been regulated and licensed in Macao since 1850, and the casinos operated under a monopoly starting in the early 1960s. The monopoly was ended in 2002, and the casino builders soon followed. The Sands opened its first casino there in 2004. Wynn followed two years later, and many more are on their way.
These casinos are some of the largest in the world and last year, they pulled more money from gamblers than the ones in Las Vegas.
