[Editor's Note: This answer is provided by Andrew Uyal, casino pit supervisor, ex-advantage player, and author of our book The Blackjack Insiders.]
I've worked for only a handful of casinos in southern Nevada. But I've played in a lot of different casinos all over the country. So I can say that the colors and denominations of the chips are something of an industry standard. Still, some casinos places fancy themselves unique and try to change up a color or two.
For instance, where I started dealing, our $1 chips were blue. I've also seen brown singles (The Orleans, I believe), and of course, the old silver "slugs" as the insiders refer to them. I don't recall ever seeing $5, $25, or $100 chips in anything but their standard red, green, and black, respectively. However, Hard Rock in Vegas used to have $25 chips that had an odd amount of purple on them also, making them almost look like $500s.
In the higher denominations, $500s are typically purple, but I saw them come in orange in Tunica, if I remember correctly. $1,000s are typically yellow, affectionately known among high rollers as "bananas." But I've seen $1,000s in orange, blue, and even rainbow colored. $5,000s are normally brown, "chocolate" if you're in the business. They've been known to come in orange as well. Insiders usually call those "pumpkins." Most $5,000 chips are also larger in diameter than the other denominations. This size is sometimes used on $1,000s, or even $500s, or sometimes on all the chips in the baccarat room.
Orange seems to be the most versatile color, used on several different denominations.
My advice: Don't take anything for granted. Be careful to familiarize yourself with the color of chips at casinos you haven't been to before. You don't want to end up betting the wrong amount. I've never done it, but I've certainly come close on numerous occasions.
