Best Betting Sites in the UK: Updated for November 2024 |
Placing your wagers at the best betting sites in the UK is crucial to your long-term success. If you use poor sites, you might as well just throw your money away. But you can avoid that risk by visiting sites that have been tried and tested. Here, we discuss how to identify betting sites that are safe, secure, and fully featured, as well as how to get the most from them.
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Choosing from the dozens of UK sports betting sites that are available may seem like a tough ask. Even boiling it down to the top 20 betting sites in the UK can seem daunting! Fortunately, the task can be made easier when you know what you should be looking for when choosing the best UK betting sites. Here are the main areas that you should take into account when taking your pick from any list of the leading UK bookmakers.
It’s important that any betting websites in the UK that you use have a recognised gambling licence. You will find details of recognised gambling licensing authorities further along in this article. We do not recommend that you deposit money at UK bookmakers that do not possess a licence, or claim that they are ‘self-regulated’.
Football is the most popular sport in the UK for betting, with 70% of active bettors betting on the sport at least once per year. Other popular sports for betting in the UK include horse racing, greyhounds, boxing, tennis, and golf, but the best online betting sites in the UK have coverage of sports far beyond the most popular. It may also be worth looking out for American Sports, motorsports and eSports too.
Experienced sports betting enthusiasts know that betting goes far beyond the task of picking winners. Any measurable metric of a sports contest can be made available for betting, from whether a specific player will be booked during a football match to a golfer scoring three birdies or more during their latest competitive round. In short, in sports, if you can measure it, you should be able to bet on it, and we champion gambling sites in the UK that allow you to place bets on as much as possible.
It’s also good to look at the competitiveness of the odds of any betting site in the UK. The better value you can get in the way of odds, the more chance you have of showing a profit over the long term. For that reason, the best sites will be those that consistently give you a fair price when you make your wagers.
Decent bonuses and promotions at UK betting sites are always worth looking out for, although care needs to be taken. Many online sports betting sites render their bonuses and promotions worthless by smothering them in unfriendly terms and conditions. We have enough experience to distinguish the bad bonuses from the good ones, and we don’t recommend online bookies that constantly offer bonuses with unfair terms and conditions.
A decent range of fast withdrawal payment methods is crucial to all decent online betting sites in the UK. Most UK punters will prefer to use their Visa or MasterCard debit cards, but sports betting sites should offer plenty of effective alternatives. These should include eWallet such as PayPal, Skrill, Neteller, MuchBetter, Payz and AstroPlay, and payment systems associated with phones like ApplePay and Google Pay. The provision of payments using leading cryptocurrencies (Bitcoin, Tether, Ethereum, Dogecoin, Litecoin) is an added bonus.
There are two ways UK bookmakers online ensure mobile compatibility. One is by making dedicated phone apps for their sites available for download at the Apple App Store and Google Play. The other is by ensuring their site is optimised for the diminutive screens of smartphoness and tablets. We prefer mobile apps, but we don’t downvote sites that don’t provide them. We do, however, look down on sites that feel mobile compatibility is not worth considering.
All the top betting sites in the UK must – by that very designation – offer acceptable levels of customer support. By acceptable, we mean live chat support at a minimum, hopefully available 24/7. You should always test out such support functions to see how long you have to wait for a response and how effective the replies to your queries are. Sending an email to the site’s support email address is also a good way of seeing if you get an effective response.
Although few sites offer it these days, telephone support is still considered by many to be the most effective method of support available at online betting sites.
It always pays to be vigilant when using the internet, as hackers are always keen to access our sensitive data and financial accounts. That’s why you need to look at the safety precautions taken by both old and new UK bookmakers online to prevent the data you send to them from falling into the wrong hands. All sites should make sure all information passed to them is highly encrypted. The site should also have an unblemished track record when it comes to cyber-attacks and data leaks.
What do other bettors have to say about the betting site in the UK you’re looking at? You can answer this question by looking at user reviews. This is the internet, of course, so it might be sensible to discard the very best and very worst reviews just in case they have been paid for (good) or penned by a site’s rivals (bad). The middle ground is where you’ll tend to find the truth when it comes to independent user reviews.
British people love their sports, and a good percentage of Brits love sports betting, too. But which sports can you bet on in the UK? The easy answer to this question is ‘all of them’, but in this section, we are going to drill down and take a deeper look at the competitions, tournaments and contenders in all of the UK’s most popular sporting pastimes.
Football is king in the UK. It’s easily the most popular sport and the most popular sport to bet on, too. League football is where it all starts at online betting sites in the UK, with the English Premier League the top dog, followed by the Championship and Leagues One and Two. The UEFA Champions League and Europa League are both popular among bettors as well, plus the top European leagues such as La Liga, Serie A, the Bundesliga and Ligue One. Nearly all of the best betting sites in the UK, though, provide access to every football match going, from top leagues in Afghanistan to U19s matches in Zimbabwe.
For decades in the UK, horse racing was synonymous with betting and real-world UK bookmakers. Since the advent of online betting websites, though, horse racing has had to pay second fiddle to football, but horse racing betting in the UK still ranks number two. Punters can enjoy their annual flutter on the Grand National or Epsom Derby, or they can peruse the daily UK racecard to pick their favourite mounts. One bonus of online betting sites in the UK is that punters now have access to global racecards in the US, Australia, South Africa, Japan and others!
Even though the Djokovic/Federer/Nadal/Murray era of tennis is over, tennis remains an immensely popular sport for punters in the UK. In England, the tennis calendar is completely dominated by the two weeks of Wimbledon, but coverage at the top betting sites extends far beyond that, including the three other majors (Australian, French, US) and the ATP, WTA and Challenger tours for the world’s premier players.
There are two codes of rugby played in the UK – Rugby League and Rugby Union. The top UK betting sites naturally cover both codes, both nationally and internationally. With Rugby Union it’s international football that tends to be the most popular, encompassing the annual Six Nations Championship and World Cup. With Rugby League, the focus tends to be more on domestic matches in the Betfred Super League and Challenge Cup. Both codes are truly international, though, and UK online betting sites will offer betting opportunities in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and other countries where the oval ball is tossed around.
When football fades from the sporting calendar during the summer, cricket tends to take over. While interest in the domestic game (the County Championship and The Hundred) is not what it once was, the UK sporting public remains thrilled by international cricket and The Ashes in particular. Cricket is a global, all-year-round sport, so online betting sites in the UK will offer coverage in all cricket-playing nations such as Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, Pakistan and the countries within the West Indies.
In the UK, golf ranks second only to football in terms of participation in competitive sports. This helps keep the interest up in professional golf, which peaks in the UK each year during the annual Open Championship. The Open is one of golf’s four majors, and UK online betting sites will give the Open and the other three majors (US Open, US Masters and US PGA Championship) full coverage, as well as leading players tours such as the PGA, the DP World Tour and LPGA.
Who doesn’t love a good punch-up? Pugulism has come a long way since its bare-knuckle days, with the world’s top fighters earning millions of dollars per bout. There are now four pro boxing boards – the WBA, the WBC, the IBF and the WBO with bet sites offering odds on every bout all boards organise. Both men’s and women’s boxing takes place over a large number of weights, so boxing betting fans are never short of fights to put their money on!
Pub sports are big in Britain, and darts is the biggest pub sport of them all. Nearly every person in the UK will have stepped up to the oche at least once in their lives, and both watching and betting on darts in the UK remains big. Darts is currently enjoying a renaissance in the UK, mainly thanks to the record-breaking exploits of teen prodigy Luke Littler. The UK darts calendar is choked with events, so people who enjoy betting on darts at both established and new sports betting sites will always have something to bet on.
In the UK, snooker had its heyday in the 1980s thanks to star players such as Steve Davis, Jimmy White and Alex ‘Hurricane’ Higgins. The exploits of Ronnie O’Sullivan help keep the sport alive, and viewing figures of the annual World Championships still come close to 6 million. Snooker is yet another sport with an event-filled global calendar, so finding something to bet on, snooker-wise, at online betting sites in the UK is never a chore.
For people in the UK, betting on basketball at online bookies means betting on the NBA. The globe’s top basketball league entices players and bettors from all over the world. Celtics, Lakers and Knicks fans can easily bet during the NBA season, with the best UK betting sites offering full coverage of the NBA, plus other competitions such as the EuroLeague and EuroCup, and leagues in other basketball-playing nations in Europe, Asia and South America.
We’ve covered the different sporting markets available to sports bettors in the UK, but what outcomes can you actually bet on at the best betting sites? Well, hold your horses – or your balls – as we’re about to open your eyes!
Most sports in the UK have season-long competitions, such as EPL in football or the Super League in Rugby League. Others have long-term annual tournaments like snooker’s World Championships or Wimbledon in tennis. To bet on an outright is simply to bet on the eventual winner of any of these competitions.
The key component of any sporting contest available for betting on in the UK is every individual match, be it football, cricket, tennis, or baseball. The easiest bet at UK sports betting sites is picking the winner of any individual match or if there is going to be a tie, if ties are possible.
In terms of multi-competitor sports such as horse racing, greyhounds, motor racing and golf, a winning bet is one on the competitor who is first past the post or who records the best overall score at the end of the competition.
In any sport with a final scoreline, most top betting sites will allow you to bet on the number of goals or points scored during a game. This will usually be offered on an over/under basis. For example, in football, ‘over/under 2.5 goals’ is a popular bet. You’d put your money on the game containing 0, 1 or 2 goals (under) or 3 goals or more (over). Other sports will have different over/under targets for you to judge, and at the best sites, you can decide upon your own over/under totals.
The correct score wager is the easiest bet to understand – you choose an event and place a wager on the score at the end of the contest. In football, this could be Liverpool 2 Everton 0, for example. Or, in the NFL Chiefs 32 Steelers 9, or in snooker Kyren Wilson 9 John Higgins 3. As this is a bet that is difficult to get right, you can expect high odds to be given for prospective wagers.
The double result bet is a wager that’s available at UK betting sites, usually for team games in which the playing period is split into two halves (the halves may be split into quarters too). Each half is treated as a separate contest, so it’s up to you to correctly select which competitor will be leading at half-time and which competitor will be leading at full-time. You can also, of course, bet on ties in sports where ties are a possibility.
This is another bet at online betting sites in the UK on team games and football in particular. ‘BTTS’ stands for ‘both teams to score’, and you bet on a yes/no basis. If you bet ‘no’ and either or both sides keep a clean sheet, then your bet wins. If you bet ‘yes’ and neither side keeps a clean sheet, then your bet wins. This bet is most common with football, as it’s the sport with the most clean sheets.
If you know your sports, then handicap bets are for you. People in the US will be familiar with handicap bets or ‘betting on the spread’ as it is known as it’s one of the most common forms of betting. With handicap bets at UK betting sites, one side (the underdog) is given an artificial boost or one side (the favourite) is given an artificial reduction in their final score. The task of the handicap bettor is to bet on the correct winning team once the handicap has been applied to the final score.
An accumulator bet or ‘acca’ is a series of single bets that are strung together to form a chain. If Bet A in the chain is a winner, then the winnings become the stake for Bet B, and so on until the final bet. Any number of bets can be placed in an acca, and of course, the more bets, the higher the overall odds. It does not matter the order in which bets are calculated, as the overall returns will be the same no matter the order.
Of course, if one or more legs of an acca fail, then the acca loses. Many of the best UK betting sites will offer you ‘acca insurance’ in which your accumulator stake is returned to you, usually as a free bet, if your acca fails by one selection.
Bet builders are like accas, except that all legs of your acca must be on the same sporting contest. Most UK bookmakers only offer bet builders on football, but a few allow bet builders on other sports, usually team sports.
An example of a Bet Builder could be an International match, for example, England v Germany. A three-leg bet builder could be Harry Kane to score any time, Germany to be leading at half time and Declan Rice to receive a yellow card. Like an acca, all parts of your bet builder must be successful for your overall bet builder to generate a return.
In-play or live betting has only been possible since the creation of new betting sites that operate on the internet. In-play betting allows you to place bets on certain markets once an event has started. Live betting is typically available on ‘best score wins’ sports (i.e. football, tennis, US sports) but not on ‘first past the post’ sports (i.e. horse racing, greyhounds).
You can bet on most aspects of a contest in play, and also on specific markets designed for in-play betting. Example markets include the next scorer of a goal in football, the winner of the next set in tennis, or the next player to achieve a 100+ finish in a game of darts.
For most of us, a visit to the bookies means getting our coats on and walking (or catching a bus) to our nearest high street bookmakers. Why bet with an online betting site instead? Here, we take a look at a few reasons why leaving your coat on its coat hook might just be the better bet.
Want to place a bet? Then go to your PC, flip open your laptop, or pull your phone out of your pocket. All three options are a lot quicker than walking or bussing to your nearest high-street bookies. There is no queueing at the paying-in counter online, either!
High-street bookies tend to focus on the three most popular UK bookmakers markets – horse racing, greyhounds and football. If your betting interests lie beyond those sports, then getting a bet on at a bookie can become a chore. Why not do it online when it only takes a few stabs of a finger or clicks of a mouse?
With high-street bookies, you are pretty restricted when it comes to options. Your choice may boil down to just three – William Hill, Ladbrokes or Betfred. While there is nothing wrong with these sites, when you move online, the betting world is your gambling oyster! There are many dozens of UK gambling sites online, so you have a much better selection to choose from.
Betting shops only really take bets on events and with terms that they understand. Online betting sites can offer gambling odds specialists. That means if you have a non-vanilla bet you want to place, you are more likely to have it accepted online than by the counter clerk at the bookies. Online bookies in the UK tend to have more features, too, such as bet builders, acca boosts and insurance, free-to-play games and much more.
As part of licensing conditions, online bookies in the UK are required to monitor online accounts for signs of irresponsible gambling, such as continual large deposits, large bets at outlandish odds (a sign of chasing losses) and substantial losses. Such accounts may then be restricted and gambling help offered. If you are paying cash over the counter at real-world bookies, then your ‘account’ will not be monitored. It is safer to use online bookies, especially if you have had issues with your gambling in the past.
Nearly all gambling sites in the UK offer bonuses and promotions, and that includes betting sites where you can bet on sports. We’re now going to take a look at the most common bonuses that are offered by bet sites in the UK.
A welcome bonus typically matches the value of your first deposit at a site with the same amount of bonus cash. Sometimes, the value of your deposit is doubled and even tripled. Bonus cash is money you can only use to place bets, and you cannot cash it out, although you are free to cash out any winnings you make from bets placed using it. Sometimes, you may have to meet playthrough or wagering requirements before you can withdraw your winnings.
The ‘Bet X Get Y’ promotion is probably the most common betting offer found at online betting sites in the UK. As an example, you might be required to make a £10 deposit and then place a £10 bet using your own money at the site. Once that bet has settled, you will receive the same amount or double or even triple the amount of your stake. Such offers usually do not come with wagering requirements, but they do come with other terms and conditions, such as minimum odds, expiry dates and restricted markets.
A risk-free bet almost works in exactly the same way as ‘Bet X Get Y’ offers at the best betting sites in the UK. The only difference is that you only get the ‘Y’ amount (which, in this case, is usually the same as your qualifying bet stake) if your qualifying bet is a losing one. This offer will also come with other terms and conditions, so make sure you always check them out.
Sadly, for most of us, losing money at UK betting websites is as common as winning money. You can temper the ache of losing money with cashback deals. Such deals will pay back a percentage of your weekly losses for any week that you end up in the red. Most such offers will pay your cashback as bonus money, but some will give you cashback as money you can withdraw if you choose to.
You always receive the best returns if you seek out the best odds. UK bookmakers with ‘best odds guaranteed’ will help you achieve that. This usually applies to horse racing but sometimes greyhounds and other sports. When you bet on an event, there are two prices – the price at which you placed your bet and the starting price. The top betting sites in the UK with ‘best odds guaranteed’ will always pay you out at the more beneficial price.
This bonus is an incentive to bet on specific events. Say Liverpool are playing Real Madrid in the UCL and are priced at 5/2. With an enhanced odds deal, you may be offered better odds of 9/2 if you accept and place a bet of the specific minimum value. The caveat is that what you win in excess of the normal odds is paid out as bonus cash and not cash you can immediately withdraw.
The best betting sites in the UK love punters who place accas, as accas are difficult to win with, but when/if they do win, they pay out big time. As an encouragement to get punters to place an acca, many sites will offer acca boosts on winnings. This could be a 5% boost on a four-fold acca, right up to a 100% boost on a 15-fold acca. Acca boosts are usually paid as normal cash, but some sites may pay them as bonus cash, so as always make sure you check the T&Cs.
This deal is also in line with accumulators/accas and is offered by many top UK betting sites. The deal is simple to understand – if you place an acca with a specified minimum number of legs (and sometimes minimum value and odds) and that acca fails by one leg, you will have your stake returned, usually as a free bet or bonus money.
Getting money into and out of your account at sports betting sites in the UK is crucial to the betting experience. While betting should always be done purely for enjoyment’s sake, the chance of winning money adds that extra layer of excitement. What, though, are the best ways of getting money into (and, crucially, out of) your sports betting account? Allow us to examine this question …
| Comparison of Popular Online Bookie Payment Methods | ||||
| Method | Deposit Times | Withdrawal Times | ||
| Minimum | Maximum | Minimum | Maximum | |
| Debit cards | Instant | 24 hours | Instant | 5 days |
| eWallets | Instant | 24 hours | Instant | 3 days |
| PaysafeCard | Instant | 24 hours | Unavailable | Unavailable |
| ApplePay/Google Pay | Instant | 1 hour | Unavailable | Unavailable |
| Bank transfer | 1 day | 3 days | 3 days | 7 days |
| Cryptocurrencies | Instant | 1 hour | Instant | 1 day |
Note: These deposit and withdrawal times are taken as averages. Some UK betting sites may take longer to honour a withdrawal than the ‘maximum’ indicated. Fees are not usually charged for deposits, but some sites may charge for withdrawals – check a site’s T&Cs for information about any fees that may be charged.
The availability of online betting sites in the UK has made in-play or live betting and live streaming possible. Here, we examine both of these important aspects of UK online betting.
In-play betting or live betting online gives punters the unique opportunity to place bets on events that are already underway. You can place any bet on an event that has begun, and you might get better odds than at the start of the event. For example, say you are considering betting on Tottenham to beat West Ham in the EPL but decide to wait until after kick-off. After ten minutes, West Ham score, but you still think Tottenham will win, so you back them. As Tottenham are 1-0 down, you will get better odds on a Spurs win now compared to the pre-match odds.
With in-play betting, you can also bet on aspects of a contest that are not available before the start of a contest. In football, it could be the next side to have a player booked. In cricket, the method of dismissal for the next wicket. If you find the idea of live betting interesting, then look carefully at all live betting markets that are available at the best UK betting sites.
Live streaming goes hand-in-hand with live or in-play betting at many sports betting sites in the UK, although it pays perhaps to lower your expectations! You will not be able to stream top sporting action such as EPL or UCL football matches, tennis and golf majors or top-class rugby union, rugby league or cricket matches. This is because all such events are tied into media deals with broadcasting companies.
You will be able to live stream plenty of sporting action at UK betting sites though – NBA basketball games, MLB baseball games, ATP and WTA tour tennis matches and football action from top European leagues such as the Bundesliga and Eredivisie. There is also a lot of streaming of sports that are not usually televised in the UK, such as volleyball, handball, badminton and water polo.
Cash-out is a facility offered by online UK bookmakers with live or in-play betting. This facility allows you to cash out a bet after you have placed it. You can cash out a bet at any time up until the event you have placed on has concluded.
Let’s look at two scenarios in which you may wish to cash out:
So, cashing out will allow you to lock in profits from winning bets, or minimise losses on losing ones. Cashing out though comes with the caveat that returns are not as profitable as with winning bets that are not cashed out, but are will losing bets that are cashed out.
It’s easy to get started with an account at a UK betting site. The process is slightly different at different UK bookmakers, but you can take the steps below as an accurate guide:
Licensing is important when it comes to betting sites online in the UK. In short, if a betting site does not have a licence or claims that it is ‘self-regulated’, then it will be much better to find a site with a recognised licence from a respected licensing authority. Below we look at the leading licensing authorities used by online betting sites.
Most of the biggest and most well-known betting sites in the UK will have a licence that’s issued by the United Kingdom Gambling Commission, or the UKGC for short. The UKGC was set up in 2005 due to the rise in online gambling sites. It is a government body responsible for overseeing all forms of gambling in the UK, including betting, slots, lotteries, bingo, casinos and arcades.
The Malta Gaming Authority, or MGA, is a respected licensing authority established in Ricasoli, Malta. It was created in 2001 to allow gambling companies to offer reassurance to their players that their services are legitimate through the purchase of an MGA gambling licence. Companies do not need to be based in Malta to be regulated by the Malta Gaming Authority.
Alderney is a tiny island in the English Channel. The Alderney Gambling Control Authority has been around since 2000 and considers itself to be at the forefront of global eGaming regulation. The AGCA has an excellent reputation, so any site with an Alderney licence can be judged as trustworthy.
Like Alderney, Gibraltar is a very small territory (population around 32,000), this time situated at the tip of the Iberian Peninsula bordering Spain, although Gibraltar is owned by the UK. The Gibraltar Regulatory Authority was set up in 2000 in response to the rise of online gambling and the need for regulatory bodies. Like the AGCA, the GRA has a fine reputation.
Kahnawake is a tiny territory in Canada, owned by the Mohawk tribe. As Kahnawake is largely free from Canadian jurisdiction, it is free to offer and operate both land-based and online gambling licences, which is precisely what it does. The KGC has been in operation since 1996 and has a glowing reputation.
Curaçao is a very small territory consisting of two main islands off the north coast of Venezuela and is considered part of the Netherlands. The Curaçao eGaming authority specialises in providing offshore gambling licences. While licences issued by Curaçao eGaming are absolutely fine, some companies will buy collective licences and lease them to eGaming sites. Gambling sites with such leased licences should be avoided if at all possible.
Did you know that most betting sites operate outside of the UK even though they may be familiar UK names? They do this to avoid excessive taxation, although they mainly operate under UKGC licences. Players may wish to use the top betting sites that operate outside of the UK, including sites regulated by authorities that are not the UKGC. We look at some reasons why punters may wish to do this.
Fees for non-UKGC licences (both application and annual) are generally less expensive than fees for a UKGC licence. Some betting sites may choose to pass this cost-benefit onto their customers by offering more beneficial odds than they may have otherwise been able to do.
In order to avoid falling foul of the UKGC’s strict rules about money laundering and responsible gambling provisions, UKGC-licensed sites set low bet limits. If you are a high roller, you might find these limits too restrictive. By choosing sites licensed by alternative gambling authorities, you may be able to find less restrictive limits.
The UKGC is very restrictive about payment options, persuading their licensed gambling sites to only offer debit cards and eWallets. In order to protect yourself, you may wish to keep your everyday financial account details away from the internet, choosing a payment method such as cryptocurrency. Betting sites based outside of the UK are more likely to allow cryptocurrency payments than UKGC-licensed ones.
Again, UKGC-licensed casinos are under severe obligation to positively identify every person who uses their sports betting software. You may not want to give over all your personal details as that runs the risk of identity theft due to data breaches. Non-UK sites will likely allow you to open an account without revealing identifying information about yourself, such as your home address and your phone number.
Even using UKGC-licensed betting websites carries a small element of risk as you will be divulging your personal information in order to open an account. Some non-UK bookies do have a bad reputation, especially when it comes to paying out winnings. In order to prevent this from happening to you, we recommend that you use UK betting sites that are based outside of the UK with high-tier licences, particularly those issued by the UKGC, and the gambling authorities of Malta, Gibraltar and Alderney.
In the UK, new betting sites are being launched all the time. This leads to the question – should you use new betting sites in the UK? Our answer to that question is that as long as a new betting site you found seems safe, there’s no harm in signing up for a new account, even if you don’t intend to use the site long-term.
New sports betting sites in the UK will almost definitely have a sports betting bonus you can take advantage of. They may also offer benefits such as better odds, interesting markets, and a unique user experience. We always check out the new betting sites that we find, and we suggest that you do, too.
After reading all of the above, you should now have a much better understanding of the best online betting sites in the UK. We’ve explained to you how to get the most from bet site bonuses, what payment methods you should use, how to keep your personal information safe and much more. Remember, no matter where you bet, how you bet and what you bet on, always make sure you bet responsibly.
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