Deciding on the best bookmakers and sports betting sites in the UK is not an easy task. It’s difficult for punters as there are so many variables to take into account.
The usability of a website or app, the value of bonuses and promotions, the security involved and the customer service level are all important factors.
We’ve done most of that work for you. Here, we’ll go through the best bookmakers on the market, how we review them and what sports you can bet on while also answering your top questions about the best sports betting sites in the UK right now.
The best online bookmakers need to have various things to make them not only enjoyable, but safe. The best sports betting sites in the UK are safe, secure, have excellent features, offer a wide range of good value betting odds, offer promotions and a good range of banking options.
The best bookmakers also need to have great mobile betting and excellent customer service, with all of these things being important to us in order to recommend a bookmaker, especially new sports betting sites.
Here are some of the top brands on the market right now:
Big range of banking methods Excellent customer service New customers & 18+ only. Min. deposit of £/€10. Qualifying real money bet of £/€10. Min odds greater than or equal to 1.5 required. E/W bets excluded. Offer credited within 48 hours. Additional T&Cs apply. Please gamble responsibly
Slot Boss is a casino that caters for players based in the United Kingdom. Formally part of the IPS group, Slot Boss, along with other IPS casinos such as Pink Casino and Bet UK, was purchased by the LeoVegas group in 2018 in a deal worth £65million.
Plenty of ongoing promotions offered Huge choice of odds markets on numerous sports New customers & 18+ only. Min deposit £10. A qualifying bet is a ‘real money’ stake of at least £10. Min odds 1/2 (1.50). Free Bets are credited upon qualifying bet settlement and expire after 7 days. Free Bet stakes are not included in returns. Additional T&Cs apply. Please gamble responsibly
888sport offers a comprehensive list of betting markets and promotions on a daily basis. Comfortably sitting within most people’s lists of the best betting sites on the market, this brand is one of the more popular firms around, and in our 888sport review, we’ve delved a little bit deeper into exactly what they offer.
Excellent Live casino software Fward-winning casino site New customers & 18+ only. Min. deposit of £/€10. Qualifying real money bet of £/€10. Min odds greater than or equal to 1.5 required. E/W bets excluded. Offer credited within 48 hours. Additional T&Cs apply. Please gamble responsibly
Unlike many other bookmakers and online casinos, the word ‘customer’ genuinely comes up plenty with BoyleSports in terms of their positive features, which we, of course, love.
Brilliant customer service, available 24/7 Good ongoing promotions and bonus New customers & 18+ only. Min. deposit of £/€5. Qualifying real money bet of £/€10. Min odds greater than or equal to 1.5 required. E/W bets excluded. Offer credited within 48 hours. Additional T&Cs apply. Please gamble responsibly
Given that it hasn't stood still and carry most of the features we’d expect, Betfred is very much within the best betting sites in the game and now we’ve taken an in-depth look at everything they have to offer online.
Excellent Live casino software Fward-winning casino site New customers & 18+ only. Min. deposit of £/€10. Qualifying real money bet of £/€10. Min odds greater than or equal to 1.5 required. E/W bets excluded. Offer credited within 48 hours. Additional T&Cs apply. Please gamble responsibly
BetVictor is one of the biggest independent bookmakers around. Started by William Chandler and formerly owned by the charismatic Victor Chandler, it is now owned by top horse racing owner-breeder Michael Tabor.
Excellent Live casino software Fward-winning casino site New customers & 18+ only. Min. deposit of £/€10. Qualifying real money bet of £/€10. Min odds greater than or equal to 1.5 required. E/W bets excluded. Offer credited within 48 hours. Additional T&Cs apply. Please gamble responsibly
Our heavily researched, in-depth review of Coral will tell you everything you need to know about one of the top bookmakers in the business.
Good range of betting markets Good mobile betting experience, including dedicated app New customers & 18+ only. Min. deposit of £/€5. Qualifying real money bet of £/€10. Min odds greater than or equal to 1.5 required. E/W bets excluded. Offer credited within 48 hours. Additional T&Cs apply. Please gamble responsibly
We’ve taken a thorough look at everything Sky Bet has to offer. From bonuses to key features, mobile betting to banking + their overall rating.
Very good app and mobile site Good range of markets New customers & 18+ only. Min. deposit of £/€10. Qualifying real money bet of £/€10. Min odds greater than or equal to 1.5 required. E/W bets excluded. Offer credited within 48 hours. Additional T&Cs apply. Please gamble responsibly
LiveScore as a brand will be well known by sports fans around the world already. The LiveScore Bet platform however is very new to the market. We take a look at LiveScore Bet’s markets, bonuses, features, security, banking and much more.
When we review any online sports betting sites, including traditional bookmakers, we have to take a number of things into consideration.
This review process must be vigorous in order to determine that bookmakers, especially new sports betting sites in the UK, are not only trustworthy and legal but also that they offer a wide range of features and services to make sure you are getting good value for money.
Here are some of the factors we consider and make allowances for when deciding on what are the best sports betting sites:
This is based on public user reviews along with our own experiences of having used a specific online betting platform.
We check carefully the level of service offered, whether it is 24/7 and how players can get in touch, i.e., via live chat, email, phone or social media.
We always ensure that any bookmaker or online casino is fully licenced by the Gambling Commission to operate in the UK.
Deposit and withdrawal options are crucial, so we check on how many options a bookmaker has, their fees, timings and bet limits.
The best online bookies offer not only a wide range of sports for customers to bet on, but also whether they are available live, in-play..
Not all bookmakers offer the same odds so you always need to ensure that you get the best possible value for money. Football betting prices may be strong with one site, though their horse racing odds may be weak so we check that out.
While casino bonus offers are usually generous, good sports betting promos are trickier to come by. We check the standard and regularity of betting offers with the best online sports betting sites.
We check on how good the mobile websites and/or apps are. The majority of racing and football bets, as well tennis betting, golf betting and many more wagers are now done via mobile devices so we check which bookmakers have the best apps and mobile sites.
Live betting is crucial, now more and more punters want to watch and bet in the same place. We check on which bookmakers offer live streaming, which sports they show and whether any charges are incurred for watching.
We are always on the lookout for the best new player bonuses, ongoing promotions and free bets. We like to show our members how to lock in a profit from any free bets and other promos.
With that in mind, we consider ourselves to be knowledgeable on free bets and welcome offers. In all of our bookmaker reviews, you will find details of all welcome deals and promotions for existing customers along with advice on how to get the best out of them.
The most popular sport in the world is now the most bet on sport too. Football now provides the widest range of different betting markets for customers, whether betting on one game at a time or backing numerous teams to win in an accumulator:
also stylised as WDW (win-draw-win) and HDA (home-draw-away), this represents the most basic bet. Online bookies will price up a game with the odds for the home team to win, the away team to win and the draw. As there are only three possibilities, odds tend to be restrictive which is why punters tend to place numerous teams into win accumulators, betting on several teams to win to up the odds.
more enticing is the odds on specific players to score. Punters can bet on a nominated player to score first, last or at any time during 90 minutes with odds varying accordingly.
one of the most popular coupon bets now in existence. Instead of betting on teams to win, backers now place bets on BTTS – both teams to score. By effectively placing an accumulator featuring games with both teams to score, players can get big payouts as long as both teams in the nominated games do indeed score at least once, making the winner of the game irrelevant.
markets exist on the number of cards, corners, free-kicks and goals, along with the half-time score, double chance (win or draw) and half-time/full-time which means betting on a team to be leading at the interval as well as at the end. Many other markets may exist, depending on your bookmaker and the popularity of the match in question.
Traditionally horse racing was the bread and butter of the bookmaking industry. To this day in the UK horse racing is still the second most watched and bet on sport in the country.
The Grand National is the single biggest betting event of any type in Britain, while major meetings such as the Cheltenham Festival and Royal Ascot bring in hundreds of millions of pounds in betting revenue.
Horse racing is an everyday sport too, meaning dozens of markets are given every day of the week on domestic races as well as many more around the world. Here’s what you can bet on:
odds are displayed for every horse in a race to win. If you think a 4/1 shot has just as good a chance as a 2/1 favourite, then you can consider yourself to have found a good value bet.
very popular in horse racing is each-way betting. Betting on a horse not only to win, but also to finish in the first 2, 3 or 4 adds some insurance in case not all goes to plan.
punters can not only bet in win or each-way accumulators, but also compile full cover bets such as Luck 15’s. These bets involve the punter picking numerous horses, with bets multiplied to cover doubles, trebles, 4-folds etc. This way, not every horse in the bet has to win for the punter to get a pay-out.
For many years the darling of the everyday betting shop punter, greyhound racing remains very popular in the online era too. A greyhound bet will basically mirror what is available in horse racing, though here things like forecasts and tricasts (picking the first 2 or 3 in order) or more popular given that win odds are more restrictive in 6-runner races.
While not traditionally popular in the UK, the NFL and of course the Super Bowl have become major betting events on these shores. Many markets are available to bet on, with handicaps most popular meaning it’s about the number of points scored and margin of victory, rather than who will actually win.
Some sports maintain their popularity all year, while some are seasonal and cyclical.
has a strong following which is boosted massively when the Ashes is on or a World Cup is in play, with markets including ‘top batsman’ or ‘margin of victory’. Cricket betting is growing in popularity all the time.
betting is naturally stagnant until an event is live when it explodes, while golf betting really surrounds the majors such as The Open.
retains a huge following, including within the sports betting world and in fact along with football is the most streamed sport on sports betting platforms. Once again, it reaches a peak when Wimbledon is on, along with the other three Grand Slam tournaments. Backing a specific score, i.e, 3-1 to Murray, is usually the way punters go.
betting is also relatively quiet until the weekend, and peaks during the World Cup and of course each year when the Six Nations is played. Here, unlike in football, betting surrounds the handicap with the perceived stronger team given a points disadvantage in the betting.
So often the most crucial thing about betting is lost among all the fancy adverts, bonuses and promotions; the odds.
When compiling odds, bookmakers take many things into consideration. From comparing other bookmakers’ odds to previous form and results, player injuries, weather and other factors.
The odds set are then a supposed representation of the chances a specific outcome has of coming true and it’s up to us and you to determine whether or not they are accurate. If you think a horse should be 2/1 favourite and it is priced up at 3/1 for example, that would definitely be a good value bet.
While fractional odds are by far and away the most popular in the UK, betting on American sports will lead to a different layout and betting on horse racing in France or Australia for example may require decimal odds. Here are the three main types to get used to:
for example 7/2. Divide the first number by the second to get your price, in this case 3.5 to 1. This means a £10 bet at these odds would return £35, plus the £10 stake.
the same odds as above in a decimal format would read 4.50, as this takes the basic stake into account. A 10/1 shot would therefore be displayed as 11.00.
known as ‘Moneyline Odds’, they work differently for favourites and underdogs. For the former, the prices work by showing the amount you would need to bet to win £100, while for the latter, the positive number shows the potential win for risking £100.
In-play betting is ever increasing in popularity. In-play, or in the case of horse racing ‘in-running’ betting, is helping those who don’t have a huge amount of knowledge of a particular sport to make more accurate choices. It also helps people to simply enjoy their live sport viewing even more by placing a small bet.
Bettors can now worry less about doing their research on teams, players and horses and can bet without in-depth knowledge of form or history.
Instead, it is possible to wait until an event gets underway, see the pattern of it and decide which way it appears the event is going, i.e., when a football team makes a great start and is playing up to the atmosphere in the stadium. At that point, the customer can place a live, in-play bet at whatever odds are shown at the time.
For our part we check on the choice of in-play bets a bookmaker offers, what sports they offer them on, their timing and accuracy, whether those odds are truly up to the second, whether they are good value compared to other live odds offered elsewhere and also their volatility.
Some bookmakers are a little quick on the trigger, suspending all betting when a football team so much as reaches the penalty box which is frustrating for live backers, while others offer an excellent live betting platform that enhances the enjoyment of a game.
Live streaming is becoming one of the most important factors customers look at when deciding on whether or not to join a bookmaker.
Streaming is usually offered these days in high quality with commentary. The best bookmakers in the business all offer streaming on a number of sports, most notably horse racing, football and tennis, with the service available in the same quality via their apps and mobile sites which we love.
Some bookmakers offer a bigger live streaming library than others, and it’s always important to note that some come with charges. Those charges can take different forms, from requiring the watcher to place a £1 bet on a horse race in order to watch it, to simply having a funded account with a positive real-money balance.
Among others, these are the major bookmaking brands offering some of the best live streaming in the industry:
one of the best all-round bookmakers in the business also has arguably the best live streaming offering. bet365 streams more than 200,000 live events every year including FA Cup football games, all major tennis tournaments and every single British and Irish horse race every day.
one of the oldest bookies around has a strong, modern online platform. That includes a good streaming service with more than 60,000 events shown. While the overall number is lower than bet365, it does cover a very wide range of sports meaning there is something for everyone.
no matter which of the two sister brands you choose, you’ll get a similar streaming experience. As traditional bookies their focus is on horse racing and football so in that regard, you’ll find a similar expanse of events to bet365, while in total they each stream around 100,000 sporting events per year live with full betting markets available on all of them.
as part of their overall revolution of betting, Betfair offers a good live streaming platform with thousands of events available to bet on as you watch live.
It’s well known that online casino games are actually provided to casino brands by a bunch of specialist games developers. The likes of NetEnt, Evolution and
Yggdrasil are known and appreciated by players of slots and virtual table games for example.
What many don’t know is that a lot of sports betting software is also provided to bookmakers by similar development firms.
Gambling software providers are responsible for providing flexible, modular sportsbook solutions to horse racing betting sites, online bookmakers and the like. These companies develop systems that can be tailored to the brand in question, offering odds compiling, event selection, risk management and cash out features etc.
Some of the better-known sports betting software providers are:
As well as providing technology for betting terminals within land-based bookmaking establishments, NSoft also develops pre-match and in-play betting software with a wide range of betting options for online bookmakers.
Their sportsbook services are developed to meet an ever-increasing standard within the online sports betting niche. Using stats and data from partner Betradar, NSoft brings together cutting-edge technology to offer a betting platform that allows a bookmaking brand to offer a great all-round service to their customers with odds compiling an option should the firm in question not always wish to use traders.
GammaStack labels itself as a one-stop solution. They have a team of professionals on hand to develop sports betting platforms that come with various features, ready for an online sports betting brand to use.
Sports betting clients are empowered by GammaStack to offer a quick, easy to use betting platform with a friendly interface. GammaStack’s sports betting solutions are built to be used by experienced gamblers and newbies alike, so can be integrated to the major bookmaking platforms which try to cater for all.
Well-known developer SoftGamings offers online bookmakers three ways to integrate their sportsbook solutions, all of which run in the background with the punter simply seeing the bookmaker’s logo and odds.
Bookies choose from White Label, Turnkey and Self-Service options but to the punter, all we see is the fact that many sports, odds and in-play options are listed with a betslip integrated for us to be able to place our wagers.
Just like in a betting shop or casino. The bettor and the betting site agree on a bet. The bettor bets on whether something will or won’t happen in a sporting event, such as a football team winning. Odds are the perceived chances of the bet winning; if the bet is successful, the bettor is paid out accordingly.
This depends on your bet type and what odds are offered at the time. Some sites offer great bonuses, others don’t. Major firms such as bet365, Ladbrokes, Paddy Power and Betfair have great features but it is always best to shop around according to your own needs.
Events differ, so always shop around. On average, BetVictor, bet365, Betfair, Paddy Power, Ladbrokes, William Hill, Betway and Marathonbet are proven to have the highest odds on average.
Odds compilers and traders assess each event and come up with odds accordingly. Sports betting sites can also use software developers to make systems that calculate online sports betting odds automatically.
There is no set formula, but always do your homework on the teams involved and make sure you get good value as betting on football favourites doesn’t always mean you will win.
All major online bookmakers have horse racing markets. Head to the horse racing section, take a look at each race and click on the odds offered to place your bet (horse) into the betslip.
The best offers are those that aren’t expensive. Sometimes £20 in free bets may be offered, but you may have to wager many times that to receive the bonus. The best offers are 100% matched bonuses, so a £50 deposit would mean a £50 bonus too.
We review bookmakers based on reputation, their support, security, banking options, betting markets/odds, their mobile offering and their extra features.
All major online bookmakers accept major debit cards, while many also accept eWallets such as Paypal, Neteller and Skrill. Apple Pay and Google Pay are also increasingly popular.
Each individual bet has to have value, but horse racing offers the biggest realistic betting odds. If you know how to read the form, winners at 10/1, 20/1 etc are realistic to come by which you generally can’t get if you bet on football games, tennis or rugby for example.
If they are licenced by the Gambling Commission, yes. But our reviews help you to understand which individual brands are the safest to bet with.
The first thing is to contact the bookmaker’s complaints or customer service department. If a disagreement remains ongoing you can contact IBAS, the Independent Betting Adjudication Service with whom you can raise a dispute.
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