Coin Tosses Are Not 50/50: Scientists Toss 350,757 Coins And Prove Old
Theory

Look closely at the starting position if you want to win.

In sports, coin tosses are often used to decide who goes first, or
pick who goes to bat for the first part of the game.

It seems fair. You'd assume that as coins have two sides and you
introduce a random element (flipping the coin and catching it), the
odds of it coming up with your pick is 50/50 (or one in two). But
researchers have crunched the numbers, looking at an impressive
350,757 coin tosses, and found that coin tosses are not 50/50 after
all. You can tip the odds ever so slightly in your favor.

According to one team led by American mathematician Persi Diaconis,
when you toss a coin you introduce a tiny amount of wobble to it.

"According to the Diaconis model, precession causes the coin to spend
more time in the air with the initial side facing up," a new team
writes in a pre-print paper that has not yet been peer-reviewed.
"Consequently, the coin has a higher chance of landing on the same
side as it started (i.e., 'same-side bias')."

https://www.iflscience.com/coin-tosses-are-not-5050-scientists-toss-350757-coins-and-prove-old-theory-71047

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